Transparency in communication is a fundamental aspect of effective leadership, and it plays a crucial
role in building a positive and productive work environment. When leaders are transparent and share
information about their activities and decision-making, even when employees may not be directly
affected, it can benefit the organization and its employees. First and foremost, transparency fosters
trust. Trust is the foundation of any successful relationship, including the relationship between leaders
and employees. When leaders are transparent in their communication, employees perceive them as
honest, credible, and reliable. They feel that their leaders are being open and upfront with them, which
builds trust and strengthens the bond between leaders and employees. Trust is essential in the
workplace as it promotes psychological safety, encourages open communication, and enhances
collaboration and teamwork. Employee involvement ensures that, through a collaborative decision-
making process, the employees and the leadership team are responsible for the organization’s overall
success (Fontein, 2022).
Transparency also creates a culture of inclusivity. When leaders share information about their
activities and decision-making, even when employees may not be directly affected, it promotes a sense
of belonging among employees. It makes them feel that they are valued members of the organization
and that their input is respected and considered. When you let employees help with decisions, it shows
that you trust them. Even if you only let employees give input to assist you in making the final
decision, you still show that you value their opinions (Kappel, 2018). This inclusivity encourages
employees to participate in discussions, share their ideas and perspectives, and contribute to the
organization's success. Inclusive organizations have higher employee engagement, job satisfaction,
and retention rates.
Moreover, transparency enables employees to understand the goals and direction of the organization.
When leaders share information about their activities and decision-making, employees gain insights
into the organization's strategic objectives, challenges, and opportunities. This understanding helps
employees align their efforts with the overall strategy, improving their productivity and effectiveness.
Employees who are well-informed about the organization's goals and direction are likelier to make
informed decisions, take ownership of their work, and contribute towards achieving the organization's
objectives.
Transparency in communication also promotes adaptability and resilience in the face of changes. In
today's fast-paced business environment, organizations must be agile and responsive to market,
industry, or internal dynamics changes. When leaders are transparent about their activities and
decision-making, employees can anticipate and understand changes better. It enables them to adapt
their work plans, priorities and approaches accordingly. Transparent communication also encourages
open discussions and feedback, which can lead to innovative ideas and solutions to address challenges
and seize opportunities.
Furthermore, transparency helps prevent rumors, speculations, and misunderstandings in the
workplace. When leaders are not transparent, information gaps can arise, leading to assumptions,
misinformation, and employee confusion. This can create a toxic work environment, breed distrust,
and negatively impact employee morale and productivity. However, when leaders are transparent and
share information proactively, it minimizes the likelihood of rumors or speculations. It ensures that
employees have accurate and complete information on to base their decisions and actions. I strongly
support that leaders should practice transparency in their communication by sharing information about
their activities and decision-making, even when employees may not be directly affected. Transparency
fosters trust, promotes inclusivity, enables employees to understand the organization's goals, enhances
adaptability, and prevents misunderstandings. It creates a positive work environment where employees
feel valued, engaged, and empowered, improving job satisfaction, productivity, and overall
organizational success.
transparency is a vital aspect of any department. Transparency in the workplace/department/etc.
cultivates an environment of trust and honesty between the employees and supervisors. The upside for
leaders to openly discuss information regarding certain topics is that it creates an opportunity for other
lower-level employees that maybe only touch a part of the process/decision making model to fully
grasp the situation. Also, it encourages a learning type of environment that will hopefully let
employees in a department grow and advance in their career. From my own experience, asking the
"why" in any given situation in the workplace should not be curbed or frowned upon--leaders being
transparent and sharing information freely allows this sort of "why" interaction which is so important
for a company because the more their employees learn and become more knowledgeable about the
company, the more they will be able to be innovative and improve different aspects of said company.
As you can see, I do support this notion as I have had work experience with different sides of the
spectrum. Better transparency between leadership and lower-level employees does wonders for
productivity and goal achieving motivation. I am originally from Chicago, Illinois and currently live
in Nashville, Tennessee. I am married and we have 3 young adult children. I am an Army veteran and
presently work as a human resource professional with the federal judiciary. Fun Facts: My husband
and I operate a business that provides opportunities for rest and respite to those who work in ministry
and for non-profit organizations by providing vacation accommodations, event tickets, and dining gift
cards. Our love of travel allows us to use our travel agent expertise to encourage others to explore this
big, beautiful world. This is the final course in my MBA-HRM journey. I've learned so much and I’ve
had an incredible experience here at SNHU. Yipee!
Leaders may choose to communicate information to employees that do not have a need to know to
open clear lines of communication, reduce ambiguity, mitigate concern and confusion, and build trust
across the organization. A true or perceived lack of transparency can negatively impact morale and
organizational performance (Reina & Reina, 2015, pp. 45-47).
I support the idea of sharing information with employees in this way because it provides context to the
employees surrounding decision-making, policies, practices and changes within the organization. It
also allows employees to gain a big picture perspective into the organization’s operations, which
builds trust and increases employee buy-in. Open communication can also nurture collaboration and
innovation across teams.
My experiences have shown that when gaps in communication exist, employees fill those gaps with
their own ideas and perspectives. These perspectives can spread widely across an organization. When
this information is false, it can be detrimental to the organization and difficult for the leadership to
correct. c
transparency is an important element of effective leadership, which involves decision-making
processes and giving access to all staff to acquire information regarding organizational activities
(Dholakia, 2023). Some leaders may think that transparency or sharing information with employees is
not that necessary for the completion of a specific project or task, but it is a misconception.
Transparency is crucial for fostering a collaborative and open work environment and building trust
among all the team members. Reina and Reina (2009) state that the business ethic of transparency is
essential for the completion of specific tasks or projects (Reina & Reina, 2009). The organizational
leaders may give information about their decision-making processes and activities when staff may not
be directly impacted for different reasons. Here, transparency helps to develop credibility and trust
with all the team members. It has been found that when leaders are honest and open about their
decision-making processes and activities, the team members are more likely to believe them and trust
them. This can help to increase employee commitment and engagement in the organization and reduce
employee turnover. Moreover, transparency also helps to promote a culture of organizational
accountability (Bennis, Goleman, & O'Toole, 2008). If leaders are transparent about their decision-
making processes, then they will be more accountable for their decisions and actions. This can help to
ensure the decisions taken are meeting the interest of stakeholders and the organization and prevent
unethical behavior. Further, transparency can promote innovation and collaboration within the
organization. If all the staffs get access to information about the organizational decision-making
process and other activities, they could better understand the organizational objectives and goals. It
can help to determine some areas where they can develop innovative solutions for organizational
challenges and contribute to the success of the organization.
Here, I would like to support the notion that a leader must share important information about the
decision-making process and their activities. I feel transparency is crucial for developing credibility
and trust with employees, fostering a culture of innovation and collaboration, and promoting
accountability in the organization. However, the leader needs to balance transparency with the
requirement for privacy and confidentiality in certain situations. Thus, it can be said that transparency
is an essential component of effective leadership that can help to achieve organizational goals in a
cooperative way. The leaders can maintain privacy and confidentiality to ensure that the stakeholders
and organization can meet their goals and objectives.
Information on changes rarely trickled down to everyone that needed it. For example, management
wanted to change the reporting and process we used to allocated sales from different regions to their
respective categories at the end of the month. This allocation was done during month end close by
manual journal entry. This change created six extra hours of work during our peak closing period
creating new work papers to prepare the journal entry based on the new report. c Management changed
the reporting two more times over the next few months, again at month end, creating the same re-work
at a critical time. The accounting department was left out of the loop until the changes had been made
and were told to implement them each time. If the accounting department had been given the heads up
on the change, it could have been suggested to evaluate the changes in a test environment during a
slower period during the month and once management was happy with the allocation of sales, moved
to production with a process already in place. Unfortunately, that was not a one-off situation, as
multiple times the accounting department was left scrambling to fix something at the last minute that
was a result of an error or change the department had not been properly informed of or consulted on.
Coming from that type of environment, I believe that transparency and communication are key. c Reina
and Reina, in Chapter Three talk about Trust of Communication and how sharing information leads to
collaboration. c Any changes made by a company can possibly be considered as uncomfortable by the
employees. By giving more than just the “need to know” information, you let people know the
reasoning behind changes made and not just the actions to perform it. Management might not always
think that the “why” isn’t always important enough to disseminate to their employees. However,
providing this information can lead to a better process understanding for the person who actively
performs the specific duties affected by the change. It also allows the processor to give feedback from
a performance perspective on how the changes would increase or decrease production as well as any
issues or kinks that might affect how the changes are implemented since they are the ones with hands
on experience. This sharing of information also can give the employee a feeling of being respected
and of being included in the decision-making process instead of being just a cog in the machine. c It can
also reduce anxiety by knowing why management is making changes and how it will affect the
employee instead of leaving ambiguity by just stating the change. c For example, if a company were to
just state that they were moving from an alternating three-shift pattern to a two-shift pattern without
any further information, the employees working shift could assume that the company was not doing
well and lay-offs were in the future. However, if the company were to explain the reason behind
change in the shifts was because they were increasing the production floor space to be able move all
employees to two permanent shifts because employees were not happy with “swing” shifts, it would
increase morale knowing that the employees’ concerns were heard and alleviate any fears of lay-offs.
References
Cardon, P. (2021). Business Communication: Developing Leaders for a Networked World. New York:
McGraw-Hill.
Reina, D., & Reina, M. (2015). Trust and Betrayal in the Workplace: Building Effective Relationships
in Your Organization. Oakland: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Bennis, W., Goleman, D., & O'Toole, J. (2008). Transparency: How leaders create a culture of candor.
John Wiley & Sons.
Dholakia, U. (2023). Transparent Business Leadership. Transparency in Business: An Integrative
View, 111-134.
Reina, D. S., & Reine, M. L. (2009). Trust and betrayal in the workplace: Building effective
relationships in your organization. ReadHowYouWant. com
Dennis Reina PhD, & Michelle Reina PhD. (2015). Trust and Betrayal in the Workplace: Building
Effective Relationships in Your
Organization: Vol. Third edition, revised and updated. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Fontein, D. (2022, October 18). Accelerate Decision-Making by Involving Employees | Thought
Exchange. ThoughtExchange. https://thoughtexchange.com/blog/employee-involvement-decision-
making/
