What Does Great Internal Communication Really Look Like?

Internal communication is often talked about as a cornerstone of success. Yet many contact centres struggle to define what “great” really means, leading to mixed messages, inconsistent experiences, and teams that feel disconnected from the bigger picture.

That’s why we asked our consultants panel – featuring Jim Rembach, Jeremy Watkin, Danny Wareham, Nick Drake-Knight, Dave Salisbury, and Alex McConville – how you can move from simply sharing information to creating meaningful connection with your agents.

Planning for Clarity From the Very Start!

Jim Rembach, President of Call Centre Coach, and author of The FONE Report: Why Supervisor Drift Happens – And How to Stop It — Jim Rembach

The first lesson I have to re-learn every day is this: I do not get to call myself a good communicator; the recipient does.

With that mindset, I plan for clarity from the start. Without it, ten chat threads chase the same issue, inboxes overflow, people stop reading, and inconsistency, rework, and morale suffer. Customers feel it.

If I do not start with me, Supervisor Drift, Execution Drift, and Cross-Team Drift become the norm. After all, drift is when expectation and action are not aligned – and I am accountable for preventing it!

Contributed by: Jim Rembach, President of Call Centre Coach

Communicating Essential Information in More Than One Way

Jeremy Watkin, Director of Customer Experience and Support at NumberBarn — Jeremy Watkin

I can’t stress enough the importance of communicating essential information in more than one way.

I’ve certainly been guilty of communicating an update to my team over Slack or through email and then found myself dumbfounded when I realized that multiple people didn’t see the update.

This is why it’s essential to communicate information multiple times in multiple different ways.

For any important update we might send out an email or post to Slack and include a short Loom video showing the update. We would then follow it up with a meeting where it is discussed and demonstrated again.

In a perfect world, we would also test their knowledge with a short follow-up quiz or by reviewing customer interactions where they had to use that information.

Contributed by: Jeremy Watkin, Director of Customer Experience and Support at NumberBarn

Ditching the “Carpet-Bomb” Approach

Danny Wareham, Certified Business Psychologist and coach — Danny Wareham

An often-overlooked aspect of poor communication is over-communication. We are frequently told that there’s no such thing as too much communication,^[1] and even Harvard’s Professor John Kotter suggests leaders should increase their communication tenfold^.[2]

Yet this is often misinterpreted as a simple volume game: broadcasting every message to every audience, all the time. This “carpet-bomb” approach – email blasts, Yammer posts, and endless updates – can actually create distance, not connection.

Responsibility shifts subtly from sender to receiver: “The email went to everyone; if they didn’t read it, what else can we do?”

The real power of communication lies in focus, and so effective communicators apply the three I’s:

Identification – Who the audience is
Intent – What they need to do differently
Impact – How success will be measured

For example, when a major telecommunications firm prepared to migrate all its systems to the cloud – a £10-million efficiency initiative – the project team initially planned a mass email to all frontline advisors.

Applying the three I’s revealed that these advisors would experience no functional change: same systems, same logins, same workflow. There was no action for them to take, so no message was required.

By adopting this discipline, the organization reduced internal communication volume by almost 90%, freeing time and attention for the 10% of messages that truly required action.

The communications team could then track behavioural outcomes and continuously refine their approach, driving both efficiency and engagement.^[3]

References

^[1] Fisher, M. (2018, December 13). There is No Such Thing as Over Communication. Medium.

^[2] Kotter, J. (2012, February 10.). Think You’re Communicating Enough? Think Again. Forbes.

^[3] IoIC. (2025). The role of internal communication. Ioic.org.uk.

Contributed by: Danny Wareham, Founder & Director of Firgun

Applying the Delete-Distort-Generalize Framework

How we convey meaning, and how we test the meaning of others, helps or hinders understanding. That’s why a useful reference for contact centre professionals is the Delete-Distort-Generalize framework:

Delete

We miss out pieces of information. Content is omitted in messages in the hope receivers will ‘get’ the idea we are describing.

A common feature of deletion is the surface structure of utterances spoken by agents and colleagues during conversation, and the dangers which lurk beneath.

“The new processes are not going well.”
“We can do better than that.”
“We’ll get that sorted as soon as we can.”

Sound familiar? Try these questions to test and challenge this:

“Ok, shall we look at it together?”
“Which part of wrap-up do you mean?”

Distort

Our tendency to select our interpretations, to make assumptions, attempt mind-reading, jump to conclusions, and see-hear-feel things that may not exist.

“She didn’t get the report in on time, she doesn’t care.”
“The new software will mean job losses.”
“The customer didn’t ask about a service plan. It’s not important to him.”

Sound familiar? Try these questions to test and challenge this:

“How does that mean he doesn’t care?”
“What are the reasons the report was submitted late?”

Generalize

A function of frustration, sweeping comments, non-specific. We use ‘universal quantifiers’ such as… Always, every time, never, everyone, no one, all, none, those types, that sort.

“They’re older customers. They probably don’t understand the website.”
“None of us want to do that.”
“All customers feel the same way.”

Of course, we may know generalization from home too, “You never empty the dishwasher!”

Sound familiar? Try these questions to test and challenge this:

“Which people don’t listen to your ideas?”
“Which ideas specifically?”

Contributed by: Nick Drake-Knight, Director, Continue & Begin Ltd (NDK Group), whose books provide insights into Delete-Distort-Generalize and other communications techniques

Measuring Success Against “The Three Rs”

Poor internal communication doesn’t announce itself – it hides between systems, people, and assumptions. One of the clearest examples? The AI chatbot.

Sam Altman put it best: “AI will amplify human abilities, not replace them.” When a chatbot gives wrong answers, most leaders blame the bot. In reality, poor internal communication – unclear guidance, incomplete data, or outdated process documents – is usually to blame.

It also surfaces in Process Capability Analysis (Z-Scores). When Z-Scores drift outside control limits, it’s often because processes aren’t aligned or understood consistently across teams. That’s a communication problem, not a competence issue.

The same holds true for the Three Rs of Quality Work – Reproducibility, Replicability, and Repeatability. If results can’t be reproduced or repeated, communication has failed long before measurement did.

A client once told me, “We pride ourselves on internal communication.” Yet their metrics were consistently outside tolerance. Their surveys said “excellent,” but their data said otherwise.

Internal communication is a hidden variable influencing everything – from AI performance to human-led training. If you’re not measuring it, you’re not managing it.

Contributed by: Dr M. Dave Salisbury, COO at D&C Consulting LLC

Closing the Loop to Make Sure Your Messages Are Actually Landing

Alex McConville, author of ‘Diary of a Call Centre Manager’ — Alex McConville

In my experience, communication needs to be clear and consistent:

Daily team briefings delivered verbally
Followed by the brief document on email
And all underpinned by a well-maintained knowledge base

This is the best way to cover your bases and make sure everyone stays informed.

You also need a feedback loop to ensure that this is being delivered correctly to customers. This can be through traditional QA monitoring then agent feedback and/or speech analytics that’s plugged into your knowledge base which flags any information given that doesn’t align.

Contributed by: Alex McConville, Contact Centre Consultant and author of ‘Diary of a Call Centre Manager’

★★★★★