Advice

Why Your Company's Communication Strategy is Confusing: And How to Fix It Without Hiring Another Consultant

Three weeks ago, I walked into a boardroom in Sydney where the CEO was explaining their "revolutionary new communication framework" using seventeen different acronyms in the first five minutes. I counted. When I asked what "SMILE methodology integrated with our B2C touchpoint optimisation via omnichannel synergies" actually meant in plain English, the silence was deafening.

That's when it hit me: we've created a monster.

After fifteen years consulting for everyone from mining companies in Perth to tech startups in Melbourne, I can tell you with absolute certainty that 73% of corporate communication strategies are solving problems that don't exist whilst completely ignoring the ones that do. And before you ask, yes, I made up that statistic. But it feels right, doesn't it?

The Real Problem Isn't What You Think

Most executives believe their communication issues stem from "lack of clarity in messaging" or "insufficient stakeholder alignment." Bollocks. The real problem is that everyone's trying to sound smarter than they actually are.

I remember working with a freight company in Brisbane where the operations manager sent emails like this: "Per our previous correspondence regarding the optimisation of logistical workflows, please be advised that we are implementing a paradigm shift in our delivery methodologies."

Translation: "We're changing truck routes."

But here's the thing that'll get me in trouble with my fellow consultants – sometimes simple is brilliant. Not everything needs a framework, a methodology, or a bloody acronym. Sometimes you just need to tell people what's happening, when it's happening, and what they need to do about it.

The best communication training programs I've seen focus on this exact principle: clarity over cleverness.

Why Australian Businesses Get This Wrong

We've got this weird cultural thing happening. In the pub, we're direct as anything. "How's work?" "Shit, but the pay's good." Done. But put us in an office, and suddenly we're "leveraging synergistic opportunities to optimise human capital engagement."

It's like we think professionalism means using five words where one would do.

I blame American business culture. No offence to our friends across the Pacific, but they've convinced us that everything needs to be "strategic" and "innovative" and "disruptive." Sometimes a meeting is just a meeting. Sometimes feedback is just feedback.

The companies that get this right? They're the ones making money while their competitors are still debating whether to call their customers "clients," "stakeholders," or "engagement partners."

The Three Things Actually Killing Your Communication

First: Death by Documentation

I worked with a manufacturing firm last year where they had a 47-page communication policy. Forty-seven pages! To tell people how to talk to each other. The irony was lost on them when I pointed out that their 47-page document about clear communication was itself unclear.

You know what works? Three simple rules:

Say what you mean
Mean what you say
Don't say it if it doesn't matter

Everything else is just noise.

Second: Meeting Multiplication Syndrome

This deserves its own rant, but I'll keep it brief since we're supposed to be talking about communication, not my personal vendetta against unnecessary meetings.

Here's the thing though – bad meetings are a communication problem. When you call a meeting without a clear purpose, you're communicating that everyone's time is worthless. When you let one person dominate the conversation, you're communicating that hierarchy matters more than ideas.

I've seen effective communication training transform entire organisations simply by teaching people how to run meetings that don't make everyone want to update their LinkedIn profiles.

Third: The Feedback Vacuum

And this is where most companies completely lose the plot. They spend thousands on communication consultants and software platforms, but they never actually ask their people what's working and what isn't.

I was at a mining company in Western Australia – won't name names, but they're big – where management was convinced their weekly newsletter was fantastic because open rates were high. Turns out people were opening it because there was a rumour that reading it was somehow tracked and would affect performance reviews. Nobody was actually reading it.

The solution wasn't better newsletter content. It was admitting the newsletter was pointless and finding better ways to share information.

What Actually Works (From Someone Who's Seen It All)

Look, I'm not going to pretend I've never gotten this wrong. Five years ago, I convinced a client to implement a "360-degree feedback ecosystem" that was so complicated it required training sessions to understand the training sessions. We scrapped it after three months and went back to managers having actual conversations with their teams.

Sometimes the old ways are old because they're good, not because they're outdated.

The Two-Minute Rule

If you can't explain your communication strategy in two minutes, it's too complicated. I don't care if you're running a multinational corporation or a corner shop. Communication should be simple enough that the newest team member understands it without needing a bloody handbook.

The Friday Test

Every Friday, ask three random employees to explain what the company's priorities are this month. If you get three different answers, your communication strategy isn't strategic – it's broken.

The Grandmother Principle

If your grandmother couldn't understand your latest company update, it's not clear enough. And before you tell me your grandmother wasn't in business, mine ran a successful catering company for thirty years using nothing but a telephone and a notebook. She knew more about customer communication than most MBAs.

The Australian Advantage

Here's what I genuinely believe: Australian businesses have a natural advantage in authentic communication. We don't do corporate speak naturally. We're suspicious of it. When someone starts talking about "paradigm shifts," our bullshit detectors go off immediately.

The problem is we've let international business culture convince us that professional means complicated. It doesn't. Professional means effective.

Some of the best business communicators I know are tradies. They tell you exactly what's wrong, how long it'll take to fix, and what it'll cost. No jargon, no fancy frameworks, just clear information delivered with authority.

That's what your communication strategy should aim for. Not the complexity of a management consultancy proposal, but the clarity of a good electrician explaining why your power's out.

The Uncomfortable Truth About Communication Training

Most of it is rubbish. There, I said it.

Companies spend millions on communication workshops that teach people to use more words, not fewer. They focus on presentation skills instead of listening skills. They teach frameworks instead of common sense.

The best communication training I've ever delivered was four hours long and had exactly three slides. We spent most of the time actually practising conversations, not talking about how to have conversations.

But here's the thing that keeps me up at night: we've created an entire industry around making simple things complicated. Communication consultants (myself included) have a vested interest in making you believe this is harder than it is.

It's not rocket science. It's harder than rocket science because at least rockets follow physics. People are complicated, emotional, and often completely irrational.

What to Do on Monday Morning

Stop reading articles about communication strategy and start doing something about yours.

Pick one communication problem in your organisation. Just one. Maybe it's emails that nobody reads, or meetings that accomplish nothing, or feedback that never gets acted upon.

Fix that one thing using the simplest solution possible. Don't form a committee, don't hire a consultant (sorry), don't implement a system. Just fix it.

Then pick another one.

You'll be amazed how much you can improve without a single acronym or framework. Sometimes the best communication strategy is just deciding to communicate better.

And if that's too simple for your taste, you can always hire someone to complicate it for you later.

Want more straight-talking business advice? Check out our other articles on workplace training, professional development, and the fine art of getting things done without overthinking them.