JAY — Communication and perseverance are key to any successful business, said Wil Wolf from Combined Management at the June 5 Jay, Livermore, Livermore Falls Chamber of Commerce breakfast meeting.

“There’s a lot of factors that go into a successful group,” said Wolf, explaining that communicating well was crucial to good morale amongst team members at any business.

He kept the speech lively and humorous, frequently asking questions of the chamber members. Wolf asked them why communication was so important, and they responded that people need to feel like they’re being heard, it eliminates the unknown, and it helps build trust.

“It also fosters good decision making,” added one member.

Wolf explained that the two general concepts of management differed greatly from one another. In the top-down approach, all decisions come from one person at the head of a firm. In the team concept, as much of the decision making as possible is delegated.

There’s also an importance to determining how your team communicates best, said Wolf. Generally speaking, he noted, employees that are engaged are more likely to keep working with the company and perform their job more effectively. Therefore, communication is critical to both personal and organizational success.

“Sometimes, as business owners, as managers, we forget we’re finite beings,” said Wolf. “We operate with the information at hand. You need a communications strategy to incorporate the most current information. We need to make sure our employees make a decision with real time information.”

Communication must be tailored “for the individual in front of us,” he said. Wolf added that when we’re uncomfortable, we fall back to our default communication mode.

“Ultimately, we want to have as accurate information as possible,” he said. “But when it comes down to it, as owners, as managers, as leaders, we won’t the the ones who experience the circumstances firsthand.” He encouraged business owners to give employees the freedom and authority to adjust to what they saw in real time.

To illustrate the importance of perseverance, Wolf shared a few stories “because stories are more fun.” He told about his two boys contrasting the size of spiders when they were younger. They took a smaller spider and placed it on the web of a larger spider. After a brief scuffle, the smaller spider stood up to the much larger spider and made it retreat.

“Sometimes, the loser doesn’t want to fight as hard,” said Wolf. “When you’re at an organizations, a business, or your department, out there is someone that is competing with you economically. You have complete control over who hard you fight. And you’ve got the tools out there to help you do that.”

He warned against paralysis by analysis.

“We don’t want to take action because we’re afraid of the consequences,” said Wolf. He concluded that “in the end, the people that really matter, we can’t disappoint them in the first place.”

[email protected]