Internal communication tone of voice — find out yours with this game

Companies are aware of how important it is to use the right tone when communicating with customers. But they tend to forget that the internal communication tone of voice is at least as important. It matters a great deal what tone you use when talking with employees.

What is internal communication tone of voice?

Internal communication tone of voice is 

• the way you talk to colleagues,
• the way you word your message,
• the style, the personality and the attitude that your words radiate,
• the company values that you represent

"People will not always remember what you said or what you did, but they will remember how you made them feel."

Maya Angelou

So if you communicate in the right tone, it has a motivating effect on colleagues and shapes the employer brand favourably too.

Why it matters for internal communication

There are several reasons why it's so important to find the company's own internal communication tone of voice and use it consistently.

1. It builds trust

A consistent internal communication tone of voice lends personality to company communication, so employees feel as if they were talking to a real person. A constant tone also conveys stability and helps forge a bond between employer and employees, which contributes to building trust as well.

2. It defines company culture

Just as the way a person talks to others reveals a lot about them, the internal communication tone of voice also gives away a lot about company culture. From it you can tell how friendly the atmosphere prevailing at the company is. How open is management to employees' opinions? What values has the company committed to? And so on.

All this supports employees integrating more quickly within the company. And if they can't identify with the company's values, that becomes clear in moments.

3. It aids message delivery and motivates

It matters a great deal whether colleagues merely hear/see the company message, or actually understand what it says and can identify with it. What's more, it can be so motivating for them that they're even willing to put extra energy into their work of their own accord.

The internal communication tone of voice can motivate colleagues, but it can also demotivate them. A motivated employee strives to perform better, while a disengaged employee only does the necessary minimum. It's quite obvious which of the two employees management prefers. But creating a motivated employee is impossible without using the right tone.

How to develop it

Below I present a few tips on developing your  internal communication tone of voice.

1. Define your company values

You can define your company values by involving a smaller group of leaders, but through the CHEQ communication channel you can involve every employee in the process. You can ask everyone what they think the company's core values are. 

By defining the company values together, you can develop an internal communication tone of voice that reflects employees' personality and value system. As a result, they'll be far more open to taking in company messages, and they'll behave according to the defined company values both during and after working hours.

2. Talk with colleagues, not just to them

Plenty of companies make the mistake of not talking with colleagues, but only to them. This mostly happens at companies that practise one-way communication. Where they communicate with employees on the principle of two-way information flow, this problem rarely arises.

The CHEQ tool supports genuine dialogue between company leaders and employees. You can — and indeed should — ask colleagues for feedback. This feedback can relate to developing or refining the internal communication tone of voice, both directly and indirectly. For example, you can specifically ask whether employees would like to communicate in a friendlier or a more serious tone. You can also gauge how sincere and empathetic they find the company communication tone of voice, or whether they consider it cold and bossy instead. Based on the feedback, it may be worth adjusting the tone, and even examining what positive effects it had — e.g. performance rose, more colleagues got involved in the life of the company, turnover fell, and so on.

3. Don't use jargon

One hallmark of a perfect internal communication tone of voice is that it doesn't use jargon. Technical or other specialist terms lead to cliques forming. Only the members of a given group understand the discourse; those outside the group don't. If you use words in your communication that not everyone knows, you exclude some of your employees. Just think about it: within a large company there are many kinds of roles. Colleagues working in sales and those working on the production line may use different jargon. Not to mention that a new employee has no idea at all about the specialist terms and abbreviations used within the company.

So when developing your internal communication tone of voice, you also have to make sure that every employee feels addressed. And that's possible if you use everyday, simple expressions that everyone understands.

4. Be consistent

When developing your internal communication tone of voice, make sure your speaking style is the same across every channel. So if, for example, you motivate colleagues enthusiastically and in a friendly way through CHEQ, then don't be a cold, scolding, fault-finding leader figure in your email newsletter communication either. That confuses employees. They can't decide what the prevailing company culture is, how sincerely opinions and suggestions can really be shared. How should they communicate so that colleagues cooperate with them? What values does the company represent?

To maintain a consistent internal communication tone of voice, it's worth putting together a tone-of-voice guide that sets out how to communicate. It's good if this guide covers the expressions and slogans that can be used and the vocabulary accepted under the company culture. The guide should also cover the visual appearance, since we often communicate without words (colours, shapes, charts, GIFs, emojis, etc.).

5. Visual appearance matters

As I mentioned earlier, the internal communication tone of voice reflects the company's personality, and just as a person's personality is complemented by their appearance, the same is true of internal company communication. Imagine how grotesque it would be to communicate in a serious, stern tone in a baby-pink setting overflowing with cutesy touches. No one would take either the message or its sender, the management, seriously. The same is true if you share news in a jokey tone in some very serious setting. Employees become confused, because they can't decide whether the message is really a joke or not.

It's no accident that the tone-of-voice guide mentioned in the previous point also includes visual elements. Visual appearance is, after all, the visible clothing of the internal communication tone of voice. The two have to be in harmony with each other.

Find out what your tone of voice is

Join us on "The Communication Odyssey" journey, where you can find out in a playful way what internal communication tone of voice you use when talking with colleagues. The game takes just 1–2 minutes, but in return you can find out which communication hero you are and what benefits and dangers your speaking style brings. The game is FREE, but you need to let us know if you'd like to try it. Please click here if you're interested in our internal communication tone-of-voice game.