Communication

As producers, effective and clear communication is the master key to success. Miscommunication can be incredibly expensive and toxic, particularly when we're on a tight schedule coordinating large teams towards uncertain outcomes.

The larger the project, the more significant the negative ripple effects.

There's a simple rule here, clients should always have visibility on:

Make sure this information is always readily accessible to them, ideally via a permanent link rather than emails which will be lost in the noise.

Transparency

Keep the client informed, offering regular updates, and don’t shy away from sharing challenges as well as successes. Being open about the challenges you're facing fosters an open dialogue, it invites them to be a part of the team and to understand why you are facing delays, it builds rapport that can help you in the long-term.

Listening

Genuinely understanding what a client wants requires active listening. Respond thoughtfully to their needs, demonstrating that they're more than just another account.

Clearly Defined Roles and Responsibilities

Make sure that every team member knows their role to avoid confusion and promote smooth workflow.

Open Channels for Feedback

Facilitate an environment where everyone feels free to express thoughts, fostering a cohesive and innovative dynamic.

Regular Meetings and Updates

Touch base regularly to align everyone and tackle potential issues before they escalate.

Group channels, not DMs

Every message sent via DM is information lost in a silo that the rest of the remote team will not have access to, it creates potential for misalignment and error.

It's time to embrace working remotely, not just locally apart. Instead of replicating in-person meetings on Zoom, let's lean into asynchronous communication to make everyone's lives easier. This section is heavily inspired by Basecamp's book Rework, which I recommend reading.

A few reasons to find ways to increase asynchronous communication in your productions:

1. Increased focus and reduced distractions

Asynchronous communication allows teams to control when they receive and respond to messages or feedback. This leads to increased focus and less distractions, which means more quality work.

2. Reflective and thoughtful responses

Spontaneous thoughts in rushed circumstances might not always be worth sharing. When we give our thoughts time the truly valuable insights start to emerge. Async creates opportunity for insightful exchange, which leads to better decision-making.

3. Documentation and progress monitoring

Asynchronous communication requires documentation, making it simpler to track progress and reference past conversations. This proves more valuable on larger projects when we might have many different specialists coming at different phases.

4. Greater adaptability and anxiety mitigation

Embracing asynchronous communication provides flexibility, the team can communicate at the hours where they've allotted time for it. This alleviates stress and anxiety, creating a healthier work atmosphere with more positive work.

5. Reducing miscommunication

Communication can be easily distorted, particularly in verbal exchanges. Each additional relay of information adds noise and reduces fidelity to the original intent. Written communication is permanent and transparent, it reaches the intended recipients directly.

Team calendars shouldn't dictate our communications. Tools like Loom have made async simpler than ever. Whether for internal collaboration or client communication, async levels the playing field, helping everyone work smarter, not harder.

Try using Loom to brief your teams or give feedback, encourage the use of asynchronous comms to reduce the number meetings clogging your team's calendar. Set your focus hours and change the default meeting size for internal meetups to 15 minutes instead of 30.