17 October 2008
Experts offer words of caution at the SCM Summit
"Social media may be funky, but don't become a maverick."
Melcrum’s CEO, Victoria Mellor (pictured, left), opened the 7th annual Strategic Communication Management conference in London with the sentiment “Engagement and values aren’t luxury items to be struck off the list during tough times.”
This set the tone for a conference that was understandably dominated by discussion around protecting the function during turbulent times.
A high-caliber meet-up
The keynote speakers of both days, Roger D’Aprix and Bill Quirke (the Hub's communication strategy expert), talked about the difficulties faced by the internal communication profession currently and steps that can be taken to protect it for the future.
Engagement and values aren't luxury items to be struck off during tough times.
Around 200 communicators from around the UK, Europe and further afield met at the Millennium Gloucester Hotel in London; as one of the speakers pointed out “no where else in the world right now will you find such a high caliber collection of internal communication practitioners and experts in one room.”
A keynote message from an expert
Roger D'Aprix (pictured below), vice president of ROI Communication kick-started the Summit with a thought-provoking keynote presentation, talking about the evolution of the economy over the last decade from being industrial, to service led, and now to being information led.
Keynote speaker Roger D'Aprix addresses the audience
“The companies we work for are in the throes of chaotic change leading to an over-communicated and under-informed employee population,” D'Aprix said.
He also disagrees with the idea that social media is a necessity for today’s communication strategy, maintaining that new technology can potentially add to the noise that exists in organizations. D'Aprix warns against practitioners turning to social media as a means of solving all communication problems that exist, as this simply adds to the noise.
The companies we work for are in the throes of chaotic change leading to an over-communicated and under-informed employee population.
Simplicity provides the winning strategy at Tesco
Greg Sage, head of internal communication at retail giant Tesco, echoed this sentiment. Sage strongly defended print channels forming part of the company's very simple, but effective, internal comms strategy.
(The need to have a simple comms policy was a theme that cropped up on a regular basis, but don't make it so basic that it gets forgotten about warned Peter Jones from Bupa in his presentation.)
Social media may be funky, but is it appropriate?
Sage is a strong advocate of reaching the company's "non-wired" employees, i.e., those based in stores or depots without access to a computer, through Tesco's tabloid-style internal newspaper The One.
Sage said that although social media is cheaper and makes the function appear "funky", he urged communicators not to become mavericks.
But Sage has found that some new media does work well. For example, on announcing that the company was going to start sending text messages to store managers, within 24 hours, 70% of managers had signed up to receive this service. This clearly demonstrated how isolated a lot of the managers felt and the enthusiasm with which this idea was received.
Delegates met to benchmark, share best practice and hear from industry experts
Social media may be funky, but don't become a maverick.
Aligning internal and external
Mary Lynn Carver, global head of group internal communications at AstraZeneca gave an inspiring presentation about aligning external and internal communication.
Using the interactive workbooks on each table (provided by Live Interactive), delegates discovered that only 39% of those in the room believed these 2 functions are aligned in their own organizations.
This could prove problematic as Carver gave a hard-hitting fact: “There’s only going to be ONE communicator at the executive table, so internal and external need to work together.”
Review and protect your team
Managing director of Synopsis Communication Consulting, Bill Quirke, opened the second day talking about how to recession-proof the internal communication function.
Define, deliver and demonstrate value.
Paraphrasing the singer John Lennon, he said, "Life is what happens when you're busy looking at best practice."
Quirke's advice to communicators was to define, deliver and demonstrate value and to always "look at yourself before anyone else does," to avoid coming under the scrutiny of someone in your organization who doesn't appreciate or understand the value you bring.
Increasing inclusivity at the Foreign Office
In one of the streamed sessions, Nicola Bowles, head of internal communication and PR at the Foreign and Commonwealth office (FCO) talked about global communications. Bowles told us how the Office is leading stakeholders through a major 3-year change program – at the end of which the organization plans to be "More foreign, less office".
The internal communication team at FCO aims to drive engagement by targeting groups of employees better, being more inclusive and encouraging accountability.
Bowles also spoke about how the organization gathers together all the ambassadors from around the world to discuss policies and new initiatives. Last year's gathering included UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown as one of the speakers. More on this can be found in the latest issue of Strategic Communication Management.
Highlight the emotional impact of change
Liz Wiggins drew on her experience as VP internal communication at Unilever to speak in another streamed session about managing change communication. She encouraged practitioners to look carefully at the psychological effects of organizational change and to use it to strengthen their argument when talking to leadership teams about the importance of looking after employees during what can be a very traumatic time.
A 'scrawl wall' is a hugely cathartic experience for employees.
She believes it's important to distinguish between the different types of communication required at different stages of the change curve. For example, when the change news breaks, and when the change news actually sinks in.
For the latter, Wiggins suggests that companies provide venting mechanisms. For example, a "scrawl wall" can be very effective for employees as it's a hugely cathartic experience for them and will help them deal with the change.
Concerns for the future
The final presentation of the summit came from Peter Jones from Bupa. He brought the conversation full circle and echoed D’Aprix’s remarks from the opening presentation by saying that there's already too much noise in the workplace and social media just adds to it.
He also backed up D’Aprix’s and Quirke’s comments that the function needs to look closely at itself and make changes where necessary in order to add the most value to an organization.
Jones feels standards within internal communication are low and more needs to be done to recruit only the most talented of communicators.
Have your say
Were you at any of the Melcrum Summit's so far this year? Which session did you find most valuable? Have you started reviewing your function? Do you agree with Peter Jones that the profession needs more talented communicators?
Recommended resources:
Ask Bill Quirke your question about strategy (members only)
Tesco's employee newspaper competes with the "red tops"
The Melcrum Blog: Live and direct from the Summit part. 3
TOP TIPS: Five ways to match your internal brand with your external voice
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