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At Bigle Legal, we see communication as a fundamental tool to make this company move forward. It has been more critical than ever in this remote working time. It has been vital to let us all paddle in the same direction.
Every company is divided into departments, no matter how big or small it is. Each department is composed of persons who have their own tasks, goals and problems. The status of every task, the problems being faced and the condition of every employee has to be communicated to someone else. This communication is usually daily, weekly or monthly, depending on the company and its values.
In this article, I will be covering the main reasons why we meet daily and not weekly or monthly. Below are the bullet points that will be treated
- They encourage each member to take control of their tasks
- They help each member to improve their communication skills
- They boost the team's listening skills and empathy
- Gives management a daily status overview
- Reduces long-term anxiety and pressure without losing performance
By the end of this journey, you will be able to understand our meeting system and use it at your convenience. Though we will not be covering every single pro and con, you will be learning the benefits behind our daily short meetings.
They encourage each member to take control of their tasks
One aspect that has to be taken care of in any company is employee growth. It might be hard to see a company grow fast, especially a scaleup like ours if its workers don’t develop skills, increase their knowledge and succeed constantly.
That’s why every Bigler (that is what we call a Bigle Legal employee) must take one hundred per cent responsibility for their tasks. Being pushed to explain how good or bad you have done, encourages you to review your assignments and take them to the next level.
I personally use a simple notebook where I revise my tasks every single morning and write down a to-do list of what I want to achieve that day. When the day is finished, I highlight in orange the tasks that have not been completed. This method helps me track down how fast or slow I am going with every task.
They help each member to improve their communication skills
We should never forget that a team is formed by people. People who can be either more introverted or extroverted, more or less communicative, etc. Same as people not having the same physical condition to hit the gym and get fit as fast as others. it does not come with the same ease to talk in public for each of us.
At our company, we believe that good communication is essential. As Warren Buffet says: "Invest in yourself. One easy way to become worth 50 per cent more than you are now at least is to hone your communication skills. If you can't communicate, it's like winking at a girl in the dark: Nothing happens. You can have all the brainpower in the world, but you've got to be able to transmit it."
So, the more you practice, the better you will become. No matter what is it that you need to explain or how technical the speech is; the small efforts made will be compounded with time.
They boost the team's listening skills and empathy
Listening is just as important as explaining, if not more. One of our core values is to know our product. Keeping up daily on our coworkers’ news not only benefits the rest of the members by letting them know what is going on apart from their developments but to know each other better.
This will, without a doubt, increase your department's trust and respect. After every meeting, if someone is facing a problem, someone else volunteers to help him/her. It doesn't matter who is asking for advice, a second opinion or time to debate. The team goes first and the first step to placing your team before yourself is learning to listen to them.
Gives management a daily status overview
In Bigle Legal, it is a must that we have as much as we can under control. Especially managers. Knowing what new features have not been started, are being developed or are ready to be tested by someone else, makes the difference between great or mediocre progress.
One of the key duties of managers is to reorganize, even more than to organize. Features are often demanded by our own product, by clients or by providers. Bugs are inevitable and will appear sooner or later. So, some of the hours that the team has to invest are non-negotiable hours. But there is something that we can control: who and when will apply these hours.
Then, the more information managers control, the better they can reorganize all the tasks and prioritize them. If we waited at the beginning, or the end, of every week, managers would lose 4 of every 5 days of information, a stunning 80%.
Reduces long-term anxiety and pressure without losing performance
As a developer, you will be facing new problems and challenges almost every day. It is vital that you can handle this, but it is not that simple.
Imagine working as a freelance and having a monthly deadline for new developments. Visualize yourself seeing that you are not going to accomplish that time limit. You will probably develop anxiety and feel the pressure in your neck.
What if you could explain that you are stuck with the code to whomever you have to tell the same day. This will relieve a lot of this pressure. Knowing that you have a team you can trust and you can talk to daily is a huge pain alleviator.
If you feel that your company is lacking trust, communication or respect, maybe meeting more often with a clear goal will improve the relationship between teammates. If you perceive that your department is losing control of the tasks, you have another reason to share your status on a daily basis.
