Stop the Telephone Game: Internal Comms Must-Dos

You remember this game, right? A message starts clear at one end of the line, and by the time it reaches the other end, it’s something entirely different.

It was fun as kids – but not so fun in the workplace … and the stakes are a lot higher.

A garbled message about a reorg, a policy change, or a leadership shift doesn’t just get an uncomfortable laugh. It gets a rumor mill grinding, an anxious team feeling distracted, and a leader wondering why no one seems to trust what they say.

So how do you keep the message from falling apart as it travels? Here’s what I’ve learned after years of helping organizations communicate, whether the waters are choppy or crystal clear:

1. Put it in writing before it goes verbal. The moment a message is only spoken – in a meeting, a hallway conversation, a quick call – it starts to drift. Draft the actual language leadership wants to use and put it in writing before it starts traveling by word of mouth.

2. Equip your managers with the full message, not just the “cliff notes.” Managers are your most trusted messengers, but they’re often working from a vague summary instead of the real thing. Give them talking points, anticipated questions, and permission to say, “I don’t know yet, but I’ll find out.”

3. Create one source of truth. Whether it’s an intranet page, an FAQ, or a recurring email, employees need a single, trustworthy source to check. When people know where to look, they’re less likely to fill the gaps with speculation.

4. Make sure there’s a way for questions to travel back up. Internal communications isn’t a one-way megaphone. Give employees a real channel – a Q&A session, a survey, an open office hour – to ask questions and get clarification. And those questions they ask? That should shape what you communicate next.

None of this eliminates the game of telephone entirely – some drift is inevitable any time a message passes through people. But with the right structure, what reaches the frontline can stay close enough to the truth that trust stays intact.