Technology allows us to connect with colleagues, in real time, cost-free. But, says Melcrum managing online editor James Bennett, are we in danger of losing face-to-face Communication?:

Every morning at 10am without fail, the group heads at Melcrum have a huddle. When better to set the tone for the working day than first thing in the morning, when everyone’s fresh and raring to go?

The first rule of the huddle is to, well, huddle. This entails gathering in a small circle with one member of the team leading the way.

A huddle is not a discussion but a series of statements listened to by the key members of the company. The huddle leader then asks each individual what he or she is working on that day and may ask for a short daily sales report or any outstanding achievements, events, or queries. Finally the leader questions each member on whether they are facing any potential ‘blocks’, or problems that could prevent them from carrying out their daily duties. Anything else is then taken offline and worked on separately.

The explosion of social networking and platforms such as Yammer, however, got me thinking about whether we need huddles anymore? Having access to the internet, 3G mobile phones, endless iPhone applications, email, Twitter, instant messaging, texting, voicemail, video on demand, and even the conference call allows us to communicate whenever we want, from wherever we want and with whoever we want. Not only that, we can use whatever method we choose because the majority of professionals have access to all this technology for virtually no cost whatsoever.

Doing business with someone without ever meeting them during your working career could eventually happen. Just ask yourself how many times someone has said to you, “It’s great to finally meet you after all those emails”, or “I never realised you looked like that in real life”. People have forgotten what it’s like to meet and simply don’t have as much face time as they used to. And, year after year, this trend is increasing.

This can have its advantages. Take Yammer – a closed corporate network that allows you to connect with all your colleagues via a website, pop-up desktop application and/or mobile phone app. It allows you to continually share with your colleagues what work or even social activities you are doing. At Melcrum, we’re using it as an experiment and the amount of knowledge sharing, ideas and information you learn about the business and each other is invaluable. A tool like Yammer allows you to communicate to your colleagues simply, cost-free and with messages targeted specifically to them and their network.

Yammer serves the same purpose as a huddle but is arguably more transparent and not restricted to a small number of senior leaders. However, faceto- face contact and that instant sharing of crucial first-thing-in-the-morning, targeted information is immediately lost. Many communicators face huge budget cuts and are being told that face-to-face communication is the most effective form of comms during a recession, but is it really? Surely in this tech-savvy age, real-time online conversations lead to an increase in information sharing and eventually personal contact? I’d be very keen to see any research on how effective online conversations are compared to face-to-face meetings.

The common answer to a successful internal communications strategy is to use a combination of communication channels. Many companies use a blend of blogs, conference calls, live Q&A video streaming with the executive board as well as face-to-face meetings. But despite this leap forwards one still has to question how effective this all is, where this is all heading and how we will be communicating within our organizations in the future.