Modern leaders face a communication challenge that didn't exist twenty years ago: managing information overload in their teams.
Your people are drowning in emails, notifications, reports, updates, and requests for input. In this environment, leadership communication isn't just about sharing information clearly – it's about filtering and prioritising information so your team can focus on what actually matters.
The most effective leaders I work with have become expert curators. They don't just communicate everything they know – they communicate what their team needs to know when they need to know it.
This means saying no to information sharing that doesn't serve a clear purpose. It means batching updates rather than sending them as they occur. It means distinguishing between information that requires action, information that's just for awareness, and information that can be ignored entirely.
Some of the best leadership communication I've seen recently has been leaders who explicitly tell their teams what not to pay attention to. "Ignore the industry report that came out yesterday – it's not relevant to our situation." "Don't worry about the competitor announcement – we're staying focused on our roadmap." "The metrics in section three of the monthly report aren't actionable for us."
This kind of communication requires leaders to be genuinely strategic about what matters and what doesn't. But it's becoming essential as the volume of available information continues to increase.
The Succession Planning Communication Gap
Here's something I've noticed that doesn't get discussed much: most leaders are terrible at communicating their decision-making processes to their potential successors.
They'll delegate tasks and even projects, but they don't share the thinking behind their choices. Junior leaders learn what to do but not how to think about complex situations.
This creates succession planning problems that look like communication issues but are actually knowledge transfer failures.
I worked with a family business in regional Queensland where the founder was genuinely trying to prepare his daughter to take over operations. He'd include her in meetings, ask for her input, and give her increasing responsibility. But he never explained his reasoning for strategic decisions.
When she finally took over, she could execute the operational plans but struggled with the judgment calls that weren't covered in the documented processes. Not because she wasn't capable, but because she'd never seen inside the decision-making process.
The most effective succession planning I've seen involves leaders who explicitly narrate their thinking. "I'm choosing option A over option B because our cash flow can't handle the upfront investment, even though option B would be better long-term. I'm not responding to that customer complaint immediately because they're testing our boundaries, and setting precedent matters more than this individual transaction.
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