Communication is the Problem. Communication is the Solution.
Leaders screw up communication. Constantly. Spectacularly.
I know this because I’ve done it and seen it in my career. But also, over the last few years as an executive coach, I’ve had the privilege of working with amazing clients from startups to Fortune 5 companies, across Research, Design, Product, and Data Science. I’ve worked through some thorny shenanigans with founders and executives of all stripes.
You might think with such a diverse set of folks, the problems would be equally diverse. And it’s true — the context and the flavor is always unique. That’s probably a good chunk of what keeps me employed.
But recently I sat down to think about the cross-cutting lessons of the last few years of coaching. I thought about the areas in which my clients have experienced the most challenge and the most growth. And I realized that some truly giant chunk of it comes down to one key insight:
Communication is the problem. Communication is the solution.
Most leaders, it turns out, need to be better communicators. No one is universally bad, of course, and (mostly) not badly intentioned. But making life harder for themselves and their teams, and underachieving as leaders because they haven’t built some core leadership communication habits.
The realization that so many leadership challenges are actually communication challenges might seem obvious to you. And yet, somehow, we’re all still screwing it up. If that’s true, though, it’s probably because it’s really freaking hard.
What can seem so simple to talk about is actually not at all straightforward in practice. Especially, perhaps, for senior leaders. In my experience, many executives can get to the point where they’re convinced communication is someone else’s job, or they get too comfortable and let their leadership communication skills stagnate.
That’s too bad, because it definitely gets harder the more senior you get. Everything is more fraught, you’re constantly balancing multiple constituencies, and every syllable is under the microscope.
But the silver lining is that, in a world full of things that aren’t in our zone of control, communication surely is. Squarely in the middle, where we as leaders can learn to pay attention to the right things, develop powerful patterns and habits, and take action that makes things better fast.
So much ink has been spilled on the topic of leadership communication. And I’ve suffered through a lot of it! But rather than regurgitating all that stuff into some bland directives, I thought I’d share some real-world scenarios (greatly abstracted, of course), in the hope that some will resonate with you.
I’ve grouped these scenarios into three areas based on their (extremely abstracted) solution. There’s so much more to it, of course. Tailoring these solutions to the issue and the leader and the context, and then building leadership capacity around it is really the essence of the work I do with my clients. But I hope enumerating some of these challenges will help you conquer them.
Say the Thing
For leaders, silence is never golden.
So just say it already. Simply, authentically, proactively. People don’t need you to have all the answers, they just want clarity. So be direct and be kind, but ask the question or say the thing. Now.
- You’re putting off a tough conversation because it’s going to be… tough. You’re hoping a better moment will present itself (spoiler: it never will).
- Your boss has a bad idea, and you have a better one, but you haven’t shared it yet because you’re nervous about pushing back.
- You heard through the grapevine about something another executive did/said. You’re worried about the hearsay, but you haven’t talked to them directly.
- You know full well that people are using the same words to mean different things, that people have different goals or priorities for the same work, but you’re going along with it.
- You’re waiting on an email from HR or your boss to go out, even though the whole team already know and they’re expecting to hear from you.
- Some but not all of your team / colleagues know about a thing. The rumor mill is operating, but you haven’t told everyone yet.
- You have a clear strategy and vision, but you haven’t let people in on it yet, so you’re stuck in reactive mode rather than getting ahead of it.
If any of this sounds familiar, the underlying disease is that you haven’t communicated enough, or with the right people. The cure is taking a deep breath and going for it.
Repeat the Thing
If you didn’t repeat it, did you even say it?
Once is never enough. Ten times. In ten different ways. Messages that matter are worth repeating — in different words and via different channels, so they have the highest possibility of sticking.
- You told them already and they don’t seem to remember. You’re frustrated.
- You thought you were super clear at the last all hands meeting, but your team has a very different interpretation.
- You’ve explained your priorities and your reasoning to your boss already, but apparently it didn’t stick.
- Another exec thinks you’re not on board with their approach, even though you’ve already explained that you totally are.
- You’ve already re-launched the project / re-branded the team / announced the new org chart, but your partners still think it’s the old way.
Wouldn’t it be nice if you could say a thing once and everyone would hear, understand, and remember it just the way you wanted? Gosh, if only humans worked that way. But since we don’t, strategically repeating the messages that people need to hear is pretty much the only way.
Find the Frame
It’s not just what you say, it’s how you say it.
So you say the thing, and you repeat the thing. But what thing? In many ways the hardest part of communication isn’t the saying or the repeating — it’s the framing. If you pick the wrong one, you can repeat it forever and it still won’t land. On the other hand, memorable framing builds trust, creates allies, and puts you in the driver’s seat.
- Somehow your boss doesn’t see you as on their side, even though you’ve presented to them multiple times.
- You’re haven’t noticed the words and phrases your colleagues are using to pitch their ideas, so you don’t know how to frame things in a way that will land.
- You told the team about the changes, and they got all freaked out, reading a bunch of meaning into your email that you didn’t intend.
- You predicted exactly where the strategy would go wrong, but you missed the opportunity to set the framing that’d help everyone deal with it in a forward looking way.
Learning to nail the framing is mostly about listening. Leaders who do this well pick up on the messages their colleagues are giving and giving off (h/t Erving Goffman). They learn to couch their own messages in the framing that surrounds them, and that doing this well is the secret to influence — Cohen & Bradford’s Influence Without Authority all day every day.
Helping leaders recognize signals and craft the frame has been the most rewarding part of coaching. It’s one thing to build habits around saying and repeating, and another to find the framing that works just right for what the situation needs. But when it works, I’ve seen it be the fuel that powers incredible growth and impact.
Never Confused
In late 2024, LinkedIn CPO Tomer Cohen went on Lenny’s Podcast and shared a super memorable mantra that he uses to lead his teams:
We might be wrong, but we’re not confused.
— Tomer Cohen, LinkedIn CPO
This phrase has stuck with me ever since. His meaning is primarily about clarity of plan and execution. But for me, the meaning is entirely about clarity of communication.
Recently I wrote an article for Business Insider about this point — people don’t want certainty from their leaders so much as they want clarity. Especially in chaos and crisis, the best leaders are just super crisp about what’s happening and why. They know what to say, how to frame it, and how to drive it home. They welcome disagreement and debate, but they’re avoiding confusion and ambiguity at all costs.
It’s really a different frame from the typical product dictator BS that so many of our name-brand leaders model these days. Clear and decisive doesn’t mean domineering. It means communicating openly and consistently enough that people know where they stand. Clarity, humility, and decisiveness have a powerful synergy that too few people recognize.
Like most things, knowing that leadership communication is the problem doesn’t mean we know how to solve it. The rest is doing the hard work of finding the authentic, kind, and proactive style that works for you in your context. Communication is the problem, but it’s also the solution.
Update — I just published a follow up that focuses on tips for framing.
Tailoring these solutions to the leader and the moment, building leadership capacity along the way has been the essence of my work as an executive coach. If that resonates and you want to sharpen your own leadership communication, check out juddantin.com and drop me a line.
I write about leadership, product, design, and management. Check out my newsletter One Big Thought. Sign up to get email updates here. And Remember that No One Has Any Idea What They’re Doing.
