/ Is Your CEO Good at Communication? Employees and C-Suite Disagree

Executives and employees agree on one thing about their CEO: they want to hear from her more often. In CEO.com’s recent “360-degree CEO” survey report, 79% of executives and 74% of general employees said they would like to hear from their CEO at least monthly.

From there, employees and the C-suite have fascinating differences of opinion on how—and how well—the CEO communicates.

When it comes to communication, executives are far more critical than general employees. Executives are twice as likely as general employees to say their CEO “always” focuses on negatives or “never” focuses on positives when communicating with the company. By the same token, employees are twice as likely to say the CEO “always” celebrates company success.

executives are more critical than general employees

Where regular company meetings are concerned, CEOs feel like they talk to the team very frequently. However, employees don’t seem to be getting the message. Where CEOs are concerned, 5% reported communicating daily with their organizations; 19% communicate weekly; and 31% communicate monthly. But employees disagree—0% said they receive daily communication; 11% reported weekly communication; 28% said they hear from their CEO monthly. Down at the bottom of the scale, 7% of CEOs reported that they communicate with the company less than quarterly—compared to the 26% of employees who reported the same frequency.

Nearly half of CEOs report speaking to the company less than monthly

Even if employees don’t hear from the CEO regularly, she’s at least surprisingly available via email: 69% of executives reported receiving email replies from their CEO within the day—and for 15%, they received replies within an hour.

CEOs respond well to email

Get the full survey report, entirely free and quotable, here.

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