There are so many reasons why employee communication needs to change to be more convenient and useful.

Here’s another: Working parents are so stressed that they can’t deal with complicated communication.

For example, here’s Pew Research Center research that won’t come as a surprise to any parent trying to juggle a sick child and a deadline:

• In 1965, fathers’ time was heavily concentrated in paid work, while mothers spent more of their time on housework or childcare. Over the years, fathers have taken on more housework and child care duties – they’ve more than doubled time spent doing household chores and nearly tripled time spent with children since 1965. Meanwhile, women have increased their time spent doing paid work. Significant gaps remain, but there is clearly a more equal distribution of labor between mothers and fathers these days.
• Many of today’s fathers find it challenging to balance work and family life. Fully 52% of working dads say it is very or somehwat difficult to do so – a share slightly lower than the 60% of working mothers who say the same. And about three-in-ten working dads (29%) say they “always feel rushed,” as do 37% of working mothers.

Obviously, good communication won’t solve these problems; there are some very significant societal and workplace issues at work here.

But here’s something to consider: Every time you communicate in a way that’s dense and difficult, you’re adding to employees’ stress instead of reducing it.

What should you do differently? Here are just three ideas to consider:

• Respect employees’ time.
• Don’t inundate people with data, but do give advice.
• Provide labels and definitions, so employees don’t have to struggle to remember what things are called and how they work.