{"id":5472,"date":"2020-07-30T10:27:36","date_gmt":"2020-07-30T14:27:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/?p=5472"},"modified":"2020-08-24T15:02:21","modified_gmt":"2020-08-24T19:02:21","slug":"small-bites-methods-of-communication-part-1","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/2020\/07\/30\/small-bites-methods-of-communication-part-1\/","title":{"rendered":"Small Bites – Methods of Communication – Part 1"},"content":{"rendered":"

Authored by Coaches Abby Sadauckas and Polly Shyka<\/em><\/h4>\n

Small Bites are short, informational articles with practical ideas about stress reduction, improved communication, and farmer well-being. They are written by coaches from UMaine Extension\u2019s Farm Coaching<\/a> team. Farm Coaches are available at no cost to work remotely with farmers and farm families.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Methods of Communication <\/strong><\/h3>\n

\"woman<\/strong><\/h3>\n

There are a plethora of ways that you can \u201chear\u201d from family, staff, and customers. Right now is a great time to consider how, when, and through what channels you want to hear from each of your farm\u2019s different constituent groups. Thinking about methods of communication might help you reinforce or clarify some boundaries. During the current conditions, it is a great time to reset boundaries and expectations to both preserve your sanity and retain organization.<\/p>\n

Letting each person or customer group know how and when you receive and reply to messages can provide clarity and ease during the busy season.<\/p>\n

Here are some of the channels that you can choose from:<\/p>\n

Text Messaging<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Pros <\/span>– It\u2019s quick! Texts are real-time responses with a written record of the decisions made.<\/p>\n

Cons<\/span> – It may be easy to overlook communication if your \u201cchannels\u201d of family, staff and customers mingle in your texts. Short snippets of text may not convey your full meaning or may lead to miscommunication.<\/p>\n

Email<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Pros<\/span> – Can be great to document a conversation, particularly with customers. It may be helpful to set-up an \u201cout of office reply\u201d or footer in your email that explains your office hours and \/ or response time. You can also set-up responses to frequently asked questions in your drafts to use and re-use when answering common inquiries.<\/p>\n

Cons<\/span> – It may take more commitment to designate a \u201cblock\u201d of time to read and respond to emails. Some users write emails like text messages. Sentence fragments and other short-hand may lead to a misunderstanding.<\/p>\n

Phone
\n<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Pros<\/span> – Best used for time-sensitive matters that can hold up decision-making. Also important if you need to hear a person\u2019s tone in a sensitive conversation (with a customer regarding pricing or an issue about a returned product, for example.)<\/p>\n

Cons<\/span> –\u00a0 It can be hard to dispense with pleasantries and get down to business. Also, there is no written record, like email and texting, so taking notes is important if important decisions are made.<\/p>\n

Social Media & Direct Messages (DMs)<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Pros<\/span> – These provide additional access for customers to connect and can offer ways for customers to \u201csee\u201d the farm and for you to share day-to-day activities.<\/p>\n

Cons<\/span> –\u00a0 Managing social media communication in each platform can be both cumbersome and time-consuming. Consider using a social media management tool<\/a> to streamline the process or delegating some of the responsibility to others at the farm.<\/p>\n

With information flowing in and out of all of these channels, making sure the right people and records get updated is really where it all comes together. How do you record orders that come in via text or social media? What are the systems that support all of this communication? Capture the information into a good system that is easily accessed by your whole team. Stay tuned for the next Small Bites to read more about systems to support communication.<\/p>\n

Reach out to the coaches<\/a> to make a communications plan that incorporates all of the above!<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Authored by Coaches Abby Sadauckas and Polly Shyka Small Bites are short, informational articles with practical ideas about stress reduction, improved communication, and farmer well-being. They are written by coaches from UMaine Extension\u2019s Farm Coaching team. Farm Coaches are available at no cost to work remotely with farmers and farm families.\u00a0 Methods of Communication There […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":42,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"5","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_kad_blocks_custom_css":"","_kad_blocks_head_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_body_custom_js":"","_kad_blocks_footer_custom_js":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":"","spc_primary_category":0},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"taxonomy_info":{"category":[{"value":5,"label":"News"}]},"featured_image_src_large":false,"author_info":{"display_name":"","author_link":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/author\/"},"comment_info":"","category_info":[{"term_id":5,"name":"News","slug":"news","term_group":0,"term_taxonomy_id":5,"taxonomy":"category","description":"News about AgrAbility","parent":0,"count":258,"filter":"raw","cat_ID":5,"category_count":258,"category_description":"News about AgrAbility","cat_name":"News","category_nicename":"news","category_parent":0}],"tag_info":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5472","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/42"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5472"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5472\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5701,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5472\/revisions\/5701"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5472"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5472"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/extension.umaine.edu\/agrability\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5472"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}