Whopping

Managers sometimes worry about over-communicating with their employees lest they cause information overload or come across as patronizing or pedantic. However, those fears may be unfounded.

Analyzing 2,717 comments from archived leadership assessments, researchers found that over-communication was cited just 46 times, whereas under-communication got a whopping 421 mentions. Surveying people about their current or most recent boss revealed a similar imbalance.

In a subsequent laboratory experiment, participants reviewed feedback in which a hypothetical leader was variously described as communicating too little, too much, or the right amount before they evaluated the leader’s ability and empathy. The appropriately communicative leader got the highest ratings, and the under-communicating leader scored much lower than the over-communicating one. The under-communicator was also seen as much less empathic than the other two.