Companies must move away from a communication and collaboration to a conversation and coordination model to succeed, researchers argue.
In a new report called “The Future of Work on Digitally Profcient Teams,” business analyst firm Constellation Research argues that in the current age, “communication” in which information is broadcast or pushed from the top down is no longer efficient.
“In today’s ‘social’ age, people like to respond, provide feedback, ask questions, and share content with a larger audience,” the Silicon Valley-based research firm said in its report. Communication now needs to be multi-directional, enabling people to respond not only to the original author, but extend the information out to different networks of people.”
This could implicate not just the means of communication but also the attitude towards receiving a response.
The evolution of collaboration is a little bit trickier.
The idea of people working together is certainly not going away, but technology has also evolved to improve on efficiency.
Namely, modern employees go through the same steps of brainstorming, knowledge sharing, content creation and decision making, today’s technology increasingly allows for structure and accountability.
According to Constellation, these include task assignment, milestones, deliverables and priorities. Hence, collaboration evolves into coordination.
“These features add a layer of accountability and structure to a project, enabling teams to much more accurately allocate resources, assist areas that need help, and reward successes,” Constellation said. “Organizations and people who are able to modernize their mindset from communication and collaboration to conversation and coordination will beneft from more connected employee and customer communities.”