Effective Communication is the Key to Business Success

Many of us in the business community are guilty of making professional mistakes. Whether we fail to follow-up with a client, send a late payment to a vendor, or completely miss the mark on a deliverable, most of us have made some business blunders. How we handle the outcome of those mistakes, what we learn from them, and how we allow our shortcomings to change the way we conduct ourselves in the business community will lay the foundation for our future success.

Lack of effective communication causes the majority of business mistakes.

How many of your business mishaps could have been avoided had you just made the effort to contact the other party involved? One simple email message to a client letting her know that you need to push back the deadline can be the difference between ending a business relationship or getting repeat business from a happy customer.

Have you ever been on either side of this scenario?

Last night, I was expecting a photographer at my home for professional family photos. He was to arrive at 5:00 so we had plenty of time to get the shots done before my husband needed to leave for an evening engagement. At 5:15,when the photographer hadn’t arrived, I managed to get a hold of him. He was stuck in traffic, didn’t have my contact information with him, and figured that since he wasn’t going to be at my home with enough time to get the job done before my husband needed to leave, he just went home.

He went home.

Success or failure in business is caused more by the mental attitude even than by mental capacities.

I had this blog post in mind when I read the above sentence. It was a Tweet by @tedrubin and really had an impact on me. I can’t speak for the rest of the busy professionals out there in the blogosphere. I don’t know what was going on in my friend’s personal or business life at the moment that caused him to just turn around and go home without contacting me. I do know that his choice was bad for business and ultimately resulted in my reluctance to want to refer him to my own clients.

Effective communication means being honest with yourself and your customers.

Am I perfect? Not anywhere close. Have I  made business mistakes? Absolutely. And I have learned invaluable lessons from each mistake I’ve made. To act as though I am without flaws is ludicrous.

But I do know that the best and most effective way to communicate with people is to be honest about what’s going on and to keep them in the loop when plans aren’t going to go as scheduled.

Now, if you’re habit is to never stay on schedule, well, that’s a completely different topic better saved for another time.