The Conversation We Should've Had Sooner

Anonymous employee surveys are funny. You ask for honest feedback...

...and then you have to be ready to read it.

We recently wrapped one up at Array, and one theme kept showing up: transparency.

Specifically, people wanted more communication around changes, decisions, and the "why" behind them.

I'll be honest, I didn't expect that - because from my seat, we talk about this stuff all the time. But just not with everyone at once.

Leadership might spend two or three weeks talking through a new process, a role change, or a decision we're trying to make. We ask questions, debate different approaches, change our minds a few times, and eventually land on a direction.

Then we announce its rollout to the rest of the company.

To us, it feels like we've been talking about it forever.
To everyone else, it feels like it happened overnight.

That disconnect was on us.

And I see it happen in business all the time.

Teams spend weeks discussing staffing, compensation, technology, marketing, office policies... whatever it is. Those conversations have to happen.

But once a decision is made, it's easy to move on without bringing everyone else along.

If people don't know why something happened, they'll usually come up with their own answer.

Sometimes they're close. Most of the time... not so much.

As I was thinking about all of this, I kept coming back to a conversation I had with Jon David Huffman.

Jon David is the managing partner of Poole Huffman, a 40-person litigation firm, and one thing about the way he leads is that he doesn't treat communication as a one-time event. His team is constantly reinforcing the same values through leadership training, book clubs, weekly emails, and regular conversations.

Not because people aren't paying attention, but because that's how trust gets built over time.

And that’s not just true inside your business.

Transparency applies to your partners.
Your clients.
Your vendors.

Really, anyone who's trusting you to do what you say you're going to do.

If you watch the video, you'll hear me share a story about a client's website going down for about an hour at 4 AM on a Sunday. Realistically, they probably never would've known - we likely would’ve fixed it and moved on.

But the Array today? We tell the client anyway.

Not because they asked.
Not because they caught it.

Because trust is built in conversations like that.

If any of this hit home with you, I'd love to hear your thoughts. Send me a message at [email protected]. I read every reply.

Until next week,
Kevin

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