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Effective business communication is key, no matter what size or life-stage the business is at. If you don't communicate the messages you want people to hear, you are basically letting the rumor mill run free and may unwillingly create a negative atmosphere. So what can you do?

The first thing to decide is who do you need to communicate with, you will find the answers in the following questions.

Who are your stakeholders?
Who do you need to take responsibility for a part of the work?
Who do you need to keep on your side as you develop your business?
What do you want outsiders to think about your company?
The first stakeholders are two of the most obvious namely staff and clients, the next groups would need to include suppliers, investors, banks or grant agencies and a group that is often overlooked, but can help you be successful (or not) is the media and the local community you work in.

With communication it is important to decide the level of involvement and action you want a potential listener to take. When you have an important message to communicate it works to draft up a small table with on the top all the parties that need to be communicated to and then on the left hand side the level of involvement and the level of communication buy-in necessary.
For example, you are launching a new product and at this point you have done the feasibility study and need the funding to start production. Who needs to know about this development: relevant employees, more importantly shareholders, directors, investors and possibly the bank. From an involvement point of view the relevant employees at this point just need to know what is coming, no action is required just yet. However the shareholders, directors, investors and possibly the bank you need them to support your launch and invest the money in order to start production. So the level of involvement needed is buy-in and investment action, which immediately means that you will need a much more elaborate level of communication with them than with your relevant employees. It suffices to keep the employees informed for now, but the investors need to be convinced and shown figures as many times as necessary until they support you.

By thinking your communication efforts through all of the time especially at critical business milestones, you develop a great strategy of keeping all parties affected by your business on your side.
Always ask yourself the following questions:
- who needs to know?
- what do I need them to do?
- what do I need

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