Engaging Employees inAchieving Corporate Goals

INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS

THE STRATEGIST/FALL 2004 PAGE 24

Organizations often devote extensive resourcesto developing a vision and strategic goals, thendo little to ensure that employees understandthese objectives. Our research using employee

focus groups and surveys has found that employees are ableto parrot the company vision but frequently don’t know howto apply it. Some tell us confidentially that they doubt the vi-sion is attainable.

In the current climate of acquisition, restructuring andglobalization, companies are increasingly required to commu-nicate with employees from diverse cultures, locations and joblevels. Finding effective ways to connect all employees to thecorporate business strategy is more critical — and challenging— than ever before.

While conducting communications audits and develop-ing strategic internal communications processes for severalFortune 500 organizations, we found three best practices wereinvaluable. These practices can easily be adapted by any orga-nization seeking to increase knowledge and engagementamong employees, whether it is creating or improving its in-ternal communications process.

Define success clearlyA communications audit typically involves qualitative or

quantitative surveys, but the process or results of the auditmay vary considerably, depending on the final goals. The re-turn from a communications audit can be significantly im-proved by clearly determining how the findings will be used.

The ultimate goal is to improve business results (in-creased engagement, better utilization of resources), not justdetermine the effectiveness of communications vehicles.

The audit should lead to actionable information as op-posed to a research report. In fact, with a few organizationsthat we audited, a separate research report would have beencumbersome, so the program moved right from the audit tothe development of a comprehensive communications planthat included excerpts from our findings.

This doesn’t mean scrapping reports entirely. Clients

may want a report that they can share with executive man-agement when gauging progress on an existing communica-tion plan. For a company that wanted to create acommunications function for a regional office, the definition ofsuccess was having the function running by the end of our as-signment. The deliverable included creating a communica-tions plan and job description, interviewing potentialcandidates and hiring a communications manager. You needto ensure your outcome meets your needs, rather than con-forming to a standard approach.

Sample measures of success for an audit and resultingcommunications plan for a new corporate vision include:• Identifying existing business unit resources that can be in-corporated into a corporate communications road map.

• Increasing cooperation and alignment between corporateand business unit communications.

• Developing efficient information dissemination channels be-tween corporate headquarters and company locations.

• Unifying recently acquired business units and regionsthrough one overall corporate culture.

• Engaging employees following a restructuring.• Getting employees worldwide to understand how the orga-nization’s vision, mission and values are associated with theirown roles within the organization.

After agreeing on the measures of success, work back-ward to identify specific audit objectives and methodology.Resulting communications plans must include specific metricsthat enable ongoing measurement of progress.

Identify how to emotionally connect with employees

One organization, which had just completed restructur-ing, used the communications audit to determine how to igniteemployee passion for a new vision.

This company recognized that effective employee com-munication increases employee engagement through develop-ing emotional relationships and loyalty. Loyal employees aremore likely to support the organization’s goals and help the

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BY JENNIFER SCHADE

Best Practices for Communicating aNew Corporate Vision

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company stay competitive. In the end, this relationship canhelp retain or gain market share.

Our research revealed that employees were proud of theunique heritage of their corporate brand. This pride motivat-ed employees, even though the business environment had be-come extremely challenging. This pride was incrediblyvaluable to our client and virtually impossible for competitorsto duplicate. The brand held a prestige that employees associ-ated only with their company, and they wanted to help thebrand regain its stature. Our client decided to appeal to theemployees’ pride in the organization to gain support for thecompany’s new vision.

Another client was technologically ahead of many otherorganizations because of its well-developed corporate in-tranet site. Employees were accustomed to checking the sitefor news and corporate announcements. While the intranetsite and e-mail system were effective for getting news to em-ployees, their ability to obtain employee feedback or conveyexecutive management’s personality and enthusiasm aboutthe company’s new vision was limited.

As a result, employees reported that they were eager toadopt the restructured company’s identity and culture, butthe company’s internal electronic communications felt sterile.

Employees perceived the audit interviews as a step to-ward increased two-way communications and liked the op-portunity to provide input into the development of acommunications process. Audit findings identified the needfor more opportunities for executive management to conveyits viewpoint and more feedback mechanisms for employees.Communications were personalized and changed to engageemployees emotionally, enabling them to feel like contributorsto growth. In addition, the audit clearly indicated that the tim-ing was ideal for the announcement of a corporatewide visionand accompanying strategic goals.

Harness the strength of your existing re-sources

Creating or revising a communications process doesn’tnecessarily mean abandoning existing processes.

All organizations have communications systems, bothformal and informal. Formal protocols include the organiza-tion’s internal media, such as employee newsletters or thecompany intranet. Informal processes involve all employeeswho spread information.

A communications audit is an opportunity to identifythose formal and informal processes in an organization andharness their capabilities in a communications plan.

At one organization, decentralization had made business

units largely responsible for their own communications. Thecompany was now in the process of centralizing communica-tions and creating a communications team at its world head-quarters. Our audit identified communications practices ofindividual business units that the corporation could adopt.

We discovered that most business units used internalconsultants as liaisons with other locations. We interviewedthese professionals, along with other employees, who provid-ed feedback on existing communications and informationneeds. We covered all business units, geographic regions, sitelocations and functional areas. Members of the organization’snewly centralized communications team assisted our consul-tants and utilized the discussions to establish contacts.

Our interviews identified communications tools rangingfrom site meetings to newsletters. These tools have been sup-plemented with others to create an organized information net-work connecting world headquarters to all regional locationsacross the globe. Existing tools have been revised to conveymore leadership messages as well as the vision and strategicgoals of each business unit. The network of internal consul-tants, along with the organization’s local leadership, has be-come part of a worldwide communications infrastructure tohelp disseminate corporate news.

Smart communications generate resultsPowerful internal communications means good business.

The best way to create strong communications is to obtaininput from the people you are trying to reach.

An effective communications audit and research-basedplan reduces your margin of error. Even the highest quality,most professionally produced communications and materialswill fail if their contents don’t reach and aren’t meaningful tothe intended audience. When your communications and ac-tions are based on your employees’ needs and motivations,they will be compelling. Helping employees feel motivated tosupport the organization’s achievement of business goals maybe one of the most important and effective ingredients inbuilding market share. ■

Copyright 2004 JRS Consulting, Inc.

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Jennifer Schade is president of JRS Consulting, Inc.,a firm that helps organizations build leading brandsand attract and motivate employees and customers.Subscribe to the JRS newsletter onwww.jrsconsulting.net.