Member Article

Injecting creativity into internal comms

O Communication MD Kari Owers was recently invited to speak to a local group of internal communications professionals, all working within large businesses headquartered in the North East.

The theme of the workshop was “Creativity in Internal PR” where she was able to share some of O’s campaigns and demonstrate how they might help apply a fresh lens to their workforce communications.

With the advent of social media, a company’s staff is now one of its most valuable owned channels for communication to the outside world. Word of mouth at home or down the pub, what they share on social media or how they interact with the customer is reliant on how much they understand and are engaged with the direction the business is moving.

Here are the 5 top tips Kari shared:

1. Lead from the front – the visibility of the CEO to the workforce is of major importance to the success of the company’s internal communications. A chief that walks the floor regularly and makes the effort to talk is one that undoubtedly will have a loyal following. If a business is multi-site or international, one creative way to make the CEO more ‘present’ is the use of video. Snappy bitesized video messages are just as quick to send from a smartphone as sending an email.

2. Physical still matters in an online world – digital communications are great for speed and mass communication, but successful internal conversations are often better done face to face, especially when a tricky subject matter is at hand. I demonstrated how we approached this by using bright red sofas in market towns when trying to encourage people to talk about mental health for Time to Change – its no different in a workplace, why not have a sofa on the shop floor, or a ‘talking table’ in the canteen?

3. Keep it simple – in today’s world we have so much choice, so much noise and very little time. Sometimes internal memos, speeches or even newsletters can get a bit wordy. Remember the call to action often used in external marketing, drill down your internal communications to the one thing you want people to do, think or say differently – and then make it a simple ask.

4. Involve them – if you give your workforce the platform to embrace the company’s aims and be part of it they will volunteer much more willingly to spread the word. Train your ambassadors in best practice on social media, and try to give them a reason to care enough to get involved.

5. And finally if you can ditch the words altogether, just talk in pictures. Video, photography (especially pictures from around the business day to day) and infographics that make the dull or complex more digestible are all creative ways to grab the attention of your people at work.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by O Communications .