A simple solution to fix workplace miscommunication | Melissa M. Mikus

0:00With no fees or minimums on checking accounts, it's no wonder the Capital One bank guy is so passionate about banking with Capital One. If he were here, he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums. He'd also talk about how most Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends, it's pretty much all he talks about. In a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See CapitalOne.com slash bank. Capital One N.A. Member FDIC. This Monday.com ad was created by a team of people and AI agents. Reese, our content agent, wrote the copy based on our best practices, like mentioning Monday.com three times.

0:40That was the second. Johnny, our coordination agent, built the timeline and kept everyone aligned. Olivia, our human creative director, stayed in the loop because agents are great, but they don't always know when a joke lands. She had one note. Tell listeners it only takes minutes to build an agent. So, minutes. Create your own AI agent today on Monday.com.

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1:46In fact, according to LinkedIn, those hiring with LinkedIn are 24 % less likely to need to reopen a role within 12 months compared to the leading competitor. Join the 2.7 million small businesses using LinkedIn to hire. Get started by posting your job for free at linkedin.com slash tedbiz, spelled B-I-Z. Terms and conditions apply. If you call my cell phone and I don't pick up, you're guaranteed to get my voicemail greeting. It says, if you're trying to leave me a message, I won't listen to it. I don't check this inbox. You can text me. You can email me. You can send me a note via carrier pigeon, but you can't reach me here.

2:30This has been the case for a while now. I was spending a lot of time fielding calls, being spammed, listening to voicemails, and talking on the phone. And I realized that wasn't where I did my best or most direct communicating. And more than that, it was cutting into time I wanted to use for contemplating. That quiet, uninterrupted zone where your mind can really chew on some difficult ideas. I decided that if people didn't know the best way to communicate with me, I should just tell them. I'm Madhupa Akinola. This is TED Business, a podcast from TED. Our speaker today is leadership expert Melissa M.

3:15Mikas. And she's here to say that miscommunication and misunderstanding in the workplace isn't just a nuisance. It's often expensive. But luckily, she has a simple, effective solution to clearing up the chaos. A communication-style tag. Then after the talk, I'll ask you how you like to best communicate. But first, a quick break. This episode is brought to you by PACA. I'm always on the hunt for those staple pieces I can easily pack and know I'll be comfortable no matter what I'm doing. At this point, I don't travel anywhere without my Paka hoodie and original cruise sweater. They're both made with the same care and unmistakable softness.

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5:27And now Melissa M. Mikas takes the TED stage. So I'm sure everyone here has been on the giving or receiving end of a workplace communication failure. Is that fair? Well, I want to share a time when I sent a message to my team that created countless hours of wasted effort, a few sleepless nights, and maybe even some tears. That message was, sure. Yep, that's it. One word, four letters, no punctuation, no emojis. Just sure. I bet you were expecting something a little bit more controversial or spicy. So here's what happened. My team was working on an important presentation for an upcoming board meeting.

6:12And right on deadline, the project manager, Charlie, sent me an email with a presentation and said, are we okay to send this to the board chair for feedback? I reviewed the presentation that evening while simultaneously making dinner, but I was delighted. It was spot on, key messages, graphics, so much so that I didn't even have any feedback. But as water's boiling over on the stove and my dog's trying to sell chicken off the counter, I just forgot to respond to the email. The next day, Charlie sends me a quick slack. Are we okay to proceed? I was on another call, but I didn't want to delay my response further, so I just said sure.

6:47Well, the next morning, I checked my inbox, and I have this detailed email from Charlie with a whole new presentation attached, and I was confused. I called him up on the phone and I said, hey, Charlie, what's going on? Defeated, he admitted that he interpreted my sure to mean, meh, this is okay, I guess. That simple sure spun out my entire team. And that's just one small example of miscommunication, but think about the bigger ones. How many times have you or your team gone down the wrong path on a project, or felt frustrated by lack of progress, or maybe even spent hours or days in a disagreement that wasn't even a disagreement in the first place.

7:32So you're not alone because employees and executives, 86 % of them, blame workplace failure on ineffective communication. And U.S. businesses alone lose$1.2 trillion, trillion dollars a year as a result of miscommunication. So this isn't just about being nice and diplomatic. Miscommunication is expensive. It hurts employee morale, it stalls progress, and it increases turnover. So I want to provide a simple solution to address this. It's minimal effort. We all like that. You can do it today. And it's low cost, maybe even free. Are you ready? the best way to enhance communication effectiveness is to tell people how you best communicate and how best to communicate with you.

8:29It's pretty simple. But how do we do this in real time and in a way that the information is accessible to those that we engage with? So most of us have an email signature, a social profile, an internal directory profile that typically includes name, title, contact information. What if we normalize adding another highly visible piece of information, a communication style tag that covers two critical pieces of information? One, how we best communicate, email, phone call, text, Slack, and any workplace norms you've set for yourself like working hours or protected focus time. And two, how we show up as our best selves or avoid getting tripped up.

9:19For example, my communication style tag thrives best in morning meetings. Provide detailed context in advance for fastest decision-making. Now, I want to share another story, communication mishap, if you will, that'll show how I brought this into play with my team. A few years ago, I joined a fintech startup, and my first task was to put together a strategic roadmap for the CEO. I didn't know much about the product yet, but lucky for me, brilliant woman named Kate on my team had worked at the company since day one, and I thought I should talk to Kate. Now, I'm an extrovert. I love a brainstorm.

9:55Get in a conference room with a whiteboard, throw ideas against the wall, let's see what sticks. So I throw a meeting on Kate's calendar, Roadmap discussion, very detailed I know, and I wait for the meeting. I show up, I start excitedly spewing ideas left and right, and I am met with total blank stare. I don't know if Kate is disinterested or totally terrified of me, but I awkwardly end this meeting and leave a bit frustrated. But later that day, Kate sends me an email, and that email has five very well thought out, brilliant ideas that she brought to the table. I realized that this spontaneous brainstorm was in my communication comfort zone, not so much for Kate.

10:38This was a turning point for me. To be a leader of highly effective teams, you need to invest in understanding their communication styles and share your own as well. So I got them together at a team meeting and I asked them to create their communication style tags. Now, we can't accommodate everybody's preferences 100 % of the time. But the information is knowledge that gives us power to make better choices and to adapt if possible. Perhaps unsurprisingly, Kate is an introvert. She prefers asynchronous communication so that she can thoughtfully process her ideas. Kate's communication style tag is email for fastest response during the day, prefers written comms to enable thoughtful, clear responses.

11:22Then there's my colleague, Mike. Mike would never respond to the messages I would send him on our internal messaging system. He would just ghost me. He wouldn't respond for days, hours, sometimes just not at all. So I catastrophized the situation and I said, what's wrong with me? Does Mike not like me? Does he think my questions are silly? Like, what is going on here? Turns out, Mike's an extrovert. He has to turn off Messenger during the day. Otherwise, he would just chit-chat with colleagues all day long. It wasn't me. Mike's communication style tag is text for urgent matters, adaptive to communication styles, but prefers a live interaction.

12:04Most extroverts do. So that's just two examples. By now, I hope you're starting to think, what is your communication style tag? Think about the two key ingredients and how they apply to you. How do you best communicate? Is it over email, live phone calls, text, et cetera? Do you do your best thinking in the morning like me, or do you protect Fridays for focus time? How do you show up as your best self? Do you need time for thoughtful written responses like Kate, or do you respond better to visual cues and prefer live interaction or videos? I'll give you a few more rapid-fire examples, see what resonates.

12:43My colleague Kelly, she was ghosting meeting invites until I asked what was going on. She told me that an agenda-less meeting gave her anxiety, so she just didn't show up. Well, we fixed that. Kelly's communication style tag is, checks email twice daily, agendas required. An analyst, Matt, would balk at shorthand messages over Slack or Teams or other shorthand communication tools. He lived in detailed spreadsheets and 1 ,500-word emails. Matt's communication style tag, email Deep Diver, full context only. My friend Liz loves a voice memo. You send her a text message, she is sending you back a voice memo.

13:27Her communication style tag is voice memo enthusiast, send brief messages for quick updates, avoid long texts. And then a project manager I worked with, Louis, he would hold daily stand-ups with his team, but he refused late afternoon meetings. He needed that time to think. His communication style tag is morning meeting maven, books everything before lunch, afternoons are for thinking. So if you're a team leader, a manager, or just somebody tired of workplace friction, go first. Create your communication style tag, normalize it with your teams, and do it in a highly visible way so that people have this information on a day-to-day basis.

14:10Share it with your clients, your colleagues, your friends. The more people that adopt this change, the more effective it will be. Think about how it could apply to your personal life. My partner Charles turned to me a couple months ago on a Sunday evening and said, I got an email invite for us to go on a whitewater rafting trip. We have to RSVP tonight. Are you in? Well, I had about a million questions. Is this a glamping trip? Are there showers there? Who's actually going on this trip? Now, he should probably know me better by now. That's a whole other TED Talk. But maybe this subtle reminder that I need advanced context to make fast decisions would be better for our relationship too.

14:53And this isn't just a nice idea. This information is data. Data helps you make better informed decisions, which drives better outcomes. And when we tell people how best to work with us, we not only increase communication effectiveness, we build trust, we move faster, we feel less strained, and we build teams that actually work. So what's your communication style tag? Thank you.

15:26with no fees or minimums on checking accounts it's no wonder the capital one bank guy is so passionate about banking with capital one if he were here he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums he'd also talk about how most capital one cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs yep even on weekends it's pretty much all he talks about in a good way what's in your wallet terms apply see CapitalOne.com slash bank CapitalOne N.A. member FDIC this Monday.com ad was created by a team of people and AI agents Reese our content agent wrote the copy based on our best practices like mentioning Monday.com three times that was the second Johnny our coordination agent built the timeline and kept everyone aligned Olivia our human creative director stayed in the loop because agents are great but they don't always know when a joke lands.

16:19She had one note. Tell listeners it only takes minutes to build an agent. So minutes. Create your own AI agent today on Monday.com. There are many podcasts you can turn to for work advice, but on our show, Fixable, we help real people just like you tackle real workplace challenges fast. I'm CEO and bestselling author, Anne Morris. And I'm Harvard Business School professor, Frances Fry. And we are the hosts of the TED podcast, Fixable. Whether you're lacking confidence at your new job, feeling burned out, or struggling to lead your team through a big change, we won't shy away from any problem. We bring our clear thinking, honest opinions, and expertise to solve your toughest workplace issues through practical solutions.

16:58Hear new episodes of Fixable every Monday, wherever you get your podcasts.

17:08That was Melissa M. Mikas at TEDxBCG. Melissa reminds us that sometimes the most simple answers are the most effective. There's so much unnecessary guesswork and social error that goes into trying to backchannel what we actually need and want. What if you just came out and told people plainly what works best for you? And what if you don't quite know the answer to how you like to communicate? Well, taking inspiration from some of Melissa's examples, I want you to ask yourself, what time of day do I like to have uninterrupted thinking time? What time of day do I prefer to have meetings? Do I prefer email or text message or talking over the phone?

17:52Do I like bouncing ideas off of a group in an open-ended setting or having a fixed agenda? These are just some questions to get you started. But pay attention in the coming weeks to the modes of communication you prefer. And don't be shy to share them with your coworkers and your family and your friends. They might really appreciate the heads up and share with you some preferences of their own. That's it for today. TED Business is part of the TED Audio Collective. This episode was produced by Hannah Kingsley-Ma, edited by Alejandra Salazar, and fact-checked by Julia Dickerson. Special thanks to Maria Ladeas, Farah DeGrange, Daniela Balarezo, Tansika Sangmanivang, and Roxanne Heilash.

18:41I'm Madhupa Akinola. Thanks for listening.

18:55is so passionate about banking with Capital One. If he were here, he wouldn't just tell you about no fees or minimums. He'd also talk about how most Capital One cafes are open seven days a week to assist with your banking needs. Yep, even on weekends, it's pretty much all he talks about. In a good way. What's in your wallet? Terms apply. See CapitalOne.com slash bank. Capital One N.A. member FDIC. This Monday.com ad was created by a team of people and AI agents. Reese, our content agent, wrote the copy based on our best practices, like mentioning Monday.com three times. That was the second. Johnny, our coordination agent, built the timeline and kept everyone aligned.

19:36Olivia, our human creative director, stayed in the loop. Because agents are great, but they don't always know when a joke lands. She had one note. Tell listeners it only takes minutes to build an agent. So, minutes. Create your own AI agent today on Monday.com.