Are you part of the two-thirds of organizations that aren’t trusted by their employees? If you find yourself unsure, there could be an issue with transparency in the workplace.
Employees rely on workplace transparency to understand expectations, how their work contributes to team and company goals, and their sense of job security. When there’s a lapse in transparency, it can complicate the work environment.
In the realm of professional services and accounting firms, a deficiency in transparency can lead to mistakes in data entry. These errors, in turn, have the potential to significantly impact your organization’s relationships with clients.
But what exactly does workplace transparency look like, and what are its impacts on your bottom line? Let’s take a deeper dive.
What Is Workplace Transparency?
Workplace transparency is a philosophy that prioritizes clear, open, and honest communication from both ends of the corporate ladder. It promotes a two-way dialogue between team members and their organizations that can lead to better communication, increased efficiency, and higher job satisfaction.
- From a leadership standpoint, workplace transparency means:
- Making sure work-related expectations are clear, understood, and consistent
- Being open and honest about the organization’s level of success
- Considering employee input in major decisions
- Admitting when mistakes have been made
- Offering continuous and individualized feedback to individuals where appropriate
However, transparency doesn’t fall solely on the shoulders of those in leadership roles. Team members must also be committed to being transparent about things like:
- Their workload
- Challenges they are facing in their projects or work environment
- Mistakes they’ve made
- Deadlines that are at risk of not being met
- Expectations that need more clarity
- Ideas for improvement
Why Is Workplace Transparency Important?
Workplace transparency leads to trust, and trust has been linked to more desirable employee behaviors. For example, an Edelman survey of more than 32,000 people found that employees who trust their employers are:
- 39% more likely to demonstrate employer advocacy
- 38% more likely to remain loyal
- 33% more likely to be engaged at work
- 31% more likely to feel committed to their employer
It doesn’t take much to realize that an increase in these behaviors can have a sizable impact on your organization’s reputation, productivity, retention, and, ultimately, profitability.
Transparency is also critical for collaboration, especially in the work-from-anywhere era. It’s easier for team members to feel out of the loop when they’re not reporting to a physical office, leading them to feel disconnected from the organization and its mission. Consistent communication can combat these feelings of isolation and keep team members engaged.
How to Improve Company Culture Through Workplace Transparency
Enhancing your organization’s workplace transparency is achievable through the implementation of simple steps and tools. These measures can significantly improve the clarity and openness of your operations.
Create Clearer Pathways to Success
Nearly half of all U.S. employees say they don’t know what’s expected of them at work, which can lead to copious amounts of wasted time spent hunting for information and making assumptions.
You can use technology such as workforce management software to avoid this issue by giving you project management tools that clearly outline due dates, deliverables, responsibilities, and updates in real time.
Because all tasks and projects are tracked, employees can more easily prioritize their workload and feel confident they’re working on the correct tasks.
Improve Communication
You can have every intention of being transparent from the top down, but if you don’t have effective communication tools, information may be lost or misconstrued.
Workforce management software keeps all of your communication tools in one place instead of across multiple apps, including:
- Individual & group chat
- Shared meeting notes
- Company dashboards
- Employee social networks
- Internal memos
Compiling all of your communication tools in one application means your team members will always know where to find organizational updates.
Encourage Ownership
Reliability in the workplace depends on accountability. One way to encourage team members to take ownership of their work is to implement workforce management software with project management features that:
- Assign individuals to specific tasks
- Track due dates and project milestones
- Show when an assignment is missed or overdue
- Showcase who is responsible for each piece of the project
- Show task progress in real-time
Tracking projects increases workload transparency within teams and for your entire organization, which can also help keep task distribution equitable and offer the opportunity for real-time recognition when goals are met.
Align Remote & Hybrid Teams
In the work-from-anywhere era, workplace transparency also requires a way for team members and managers to track who’s in the office, who’s working elsewhere, and who’s off the clock. Workforce management software offers scheduling tools where all of this information can be found, as well as each individual’s time zone, helping to keep teams connected even when they’re apart.
The First Step to Increase Transparency & Profits
Transparency is crucial for employee trust, retention, and engagement – all of which directly affect performance. coAmplifi’s workforce management software can improve communication, accountability, and project management in an all-in-one solution. Schedule your demo now!
