Effective Communication isn't optional - It's the Work
Heard an interesting message today. One of those quietly uncomfortable ones that sticks with you.
It was framed as “sharing the secret” not in a conspiratorial way, but in the sense that real communication isn’t about broadcasting decisions, it’s about explaining consequences.
The example was simple.
Changes were made to an IT system to improve security. On paper, the decision made sense. Security matters. Risk reduction matters. No argument there.
But the effects of those changes weren’t communicated to the wider group.
So when people were later asked to complete what should have been simple tasks things that used to take minutes they suddenly couldn’t. The work still had to get done, but the workaround now took hours. Productivity dropped, frustration rose, and nobody immediately knew why.
The reasoning behind the change, apparently, was:
“We’ll put it in place, and if it affects people, we’ll hear about it.”
That’s an interesting philosophy.
On one hand, it’s reactive. Efficient, maybe, if you believe the cost of disruption is lower than the cost of explanation. On the other hand, it assumes that people should absorb friction silently until it becomes painful enough to complain.
Security over productivity isn’t inherently wrong. Sometimes it’s necessary. But security without communication quietly taxes everyone downstream.
The real issue here isn’t the technical decision it’s the absence of context. When people don’t understand why something changed, they don’t adapt; they resist, workaround, or burn time trying to reverse-engineer the rules.
Good communication doesn’t slow work down. It prevents invisible slowdowns.
So was this good management or bad communication?
I’ll let you be the judge.