I took the time to interview two individuals with leadership experience to address the communication problem I was facing. The first person I spoke to has worked with my company for nine years. I asked him if he would be interviewed through a questionnaire I would send him via email, and he was ready to do that. The second person I interviewed is a leader with years of experience in retail and loss prevention management. He is in a new role with this company, and I wanted to see how he would speak to certain aspects of communication. The second person I interviewed face to face.

The interview questions I sent to the first interviewee were: The answers summarize his responses.

Question 1: Do you feel there is a communication issue at the warehouse?

Answer: Yes, Communication has changed drastically since he started now the twice-a-week a week huddles; provide no information other than receiving numbers

Question 2: Do you believe the restrictions on radios affect efficiency and safety? Yes, it affects the ability to complete tasks efficiently and is a concern for the safety of employees in a potential injury.

Question 3: Why do you think the company no longer holds post-lunch huddles? Does this have an impact on the staff? I believe upper management thinks it's a waste of time to hold a post-lunch because if staff comes back and gets right to work, it saves company costs in the end. By not holding a post-lunch, staff members tend to return from lunch later than expected. This is a trending concern.

Question 4: Do the new twice-a-week pre-shift huddles provide enough communication to the staff? No, the huddles give information on workload, company information, policy updates, or safety alerts are not provided.

Question 5: Do you think the COVID-19 Pandemic affected how the company communicates now? Communication was better pre-COVID; during COVID, huddles were suspended, and have never returned to pre-COVID huddles.

Question 6: Does leadership communicate differently with people? Play favorites, etc. Yes, He believes every lead/manager treats their "favorites" differently, which affects morale.

Question 7: How would you change the methods of communication? Get back to daily huddles and open communication between managers and the general warehouse, how it was when he first started. Every employee is to carry a radio.

Question 8: Does the company provide adequate training for new hires and provide them with points of contact should they have questions? No, the training process is about two to five days. The process should take four weeks to train staff adequately, and a buddy program for new hires should be implemented.

Question 9: Since your role as a point, do you believe communication has gotten worse within the warehouse? Yes, which is terrible because I was told from day one that communication is the key to success.

I was not surprised by most of the answers. He provided thoughtful answers and provided enough detail to understand his reasoning for his answers. For this interview, I wish I would have done it in person. That would have opened a better discussion and delved more into solutions to the issue at hand.

The second person I interviewed is a leader in the warehouse. He was willing to speak to me because of the differences he sees from his previous jobs.

After asking him if he would speak to me, I set up a time to sit down and talk after work. The first question I asked him was:

How do you think the communication in the warehouse is?

His reply took me by surprise. He stated that the overall communication could have been better, but there was an issue with the warehouse manager. In his previous jobs, he would speak to his managers in person and have direct conversations with them. However, most communication between leadership in the warehouse is through email or Microsoft Teams messaging.

He said the first thing he would do to change the communication would be to reduce the amount of electronic communication and have direct conversations with leaders and staff.

He told me that he sees that the leadership team is uncomfortable having crucial conversations with the staff. He also focused on two things that the leadership staff needs to do better and that he's trying to change: 1) Leadership needs to set expectations and develop their staff, and 2) They need to communicate with the team clearly. He mentioned that to fix the communication issue, the leadership team must change behaviors, set routines, set clear expectations, and communicate them to the staff.

The next question I asked him was about the radios being restricted. He stated that he believes it is a safety concern, so they are changing back to having the employees carry radios starting next week. He also said that it affects the team's efficiency and productivity.

We discussed a few other things regarding communication and ways to improve it. He stated that the leadership team needs to develop business relationships with the team better. Building these relationships will enhance communication in the warehouse.

I enjoyed the openness of the interviewee. The one thing I would have changed about this interview would have been to set it up earlier and ask for a more extended amount of time to speak to him.

Overall, trying different styles of interviews was interesting. I wish I had asked the face-to-face interviewee earlier and had more time to speak to him. The email interview was good for the ability to have detailed answers written by the interviewee. Both interviews went well. I wasn't surprised by many of the answers from either interviewee, but I enjoyed how open they were with their answers.

Thanks,

Mark

Question1: Guided Response

Respond to at least two of your classmates. In each response, address the following:

• Compare any feedback discussed, considering especially if the comment seems to ring true for your own experience as well.
• Discuss the growth strategy that your peer identified and how it compares to your own.

Your responses should each be about 100 words. Please read all your classmates' posts, whether you are responding or not. You may respond to more than two classmates in this discussion.