Change Communications

The seven “C”s to communication credibility!

• correct (get it right – grammar, spelling)
• consistent (follow a stylebook)
• clear (use simple words, short sentences, short paragraphs)
• concise (save people time)
• coherent (think structure, organization)
• complete (answer the questions)
• creative (be interesting, don’t bore)

Source: Communitelligence Teleseminar

Tips on making the connection

Intranet owners and developers don’t necessarily need to immerse themselves in the field of human-computer interaction (HCI). There are many basic design principles that any intranet developer can apply to make technology more human-friendly. Being conscious of fundamental human behaviors and their users’ specific needs will go a long way towards promoting positive user experience:

• The human mind works linearly, so organize content structures by context. Don’t spread related information all over the screen, bury it under multiple levels, or interrupt it with other, less relevant content. This causes users to break their train of thought.
• Arrange content to promote at-a-glance absorption. Layout should be arranged so that users can understand the context of the page with only a cursory glance.
• Don’t clutter up screen real estate. Humans aren’t good at absorbing large amounts of information at one time, so keep screens clean.
• Navigational systems must be self-explanatory even for casual users. If instructions are required to show users how to navigate an intranet, it’s too complicated. These types of complex interfaces are often found in purely Flash-based sites where design takes precedence over functionality.
• Never use technical jargon or obscure acronyms unless the primary audience is also in a related technology-based discipline.
• Don’t forget to edit content that originates from within the organization. Poorly written content will affect the comprehensibility of the message and/or topic.
• Blogs, podcasts, and discussion groups can be used to give an intranet a more human voice
• A virtual assistant (also referred to as a “chatterbot”) can be used to interact with users and to answer the most commonly asked questions. The Web site for home furnishing giant, IKEA, for example, offers “Ask Anna.” Anna serves as an interactive FAQ, capable of answering common customer questions. Anna even has enough artificial intelligence to respond to questions such as “How are you?” Even though Anna isn’t a live person, it provides a comfort level to those users who aren’t as technically inclined. This helps tone down technical interaction and bolsters more natural, conversational interaction.
• Flashy gimmicks will adversely affect users’ interaction with an intranet so keep it simple. Don’t include non-spec features, or features that don’t contribute to positive user experience. These can unnecessarily complicate the system and be intimidating for some users.
• If contact information is provided on an intranet, always respond to it so that users know there’s actually a person behind the system. Users will feel further disconnect if they take the time to write an e-mail only to be ignored.

Did you know that 60 percent of workers who are kept in the dark by their bosses plan to leave within the next two years?

Communications consultancy CHA, which carried out over 1,000 interviews with UK workers, found that 60 percent of workers who are kept in the dark by their bosses plan to leave in the next two years.

That figure drops to just 23 percent among those who don’t feel they’re kept in the dark. But when workers receive clear communication, their motivation increases dramatically with 80 percent motivated to add value, dropping to less than 36 percent in organizations where the communication is confusing.

Workers who know what the company plan is are five times more likely to be motivated, while 65 percent say too much of the information they receive isn’t relevant to their job and 39 percent say they are told too late about major changes in their place of work.

Source: CHA PR report, A little more conversation. For more information visit: www.chapr.co.uk

Stakeholders will need different levels of communication and they will need it at different times. They will need information about the change which directly affects them, but they may also need to establish a sense of relationship to the project if their involvement is key.

Communication planning should therefore include elements of both information and relationship building, and there is a role for the whole project team in fulfilling the full spectrum of stakeholder needs. This is indicated in the communications escalator illustrated below:

• Awareness - achieved through the transmitting of information about the project through newsletters, e-mail and other communications channels.
• Understanding – the transmitting of information in a more intimate and focused way, for example, road shows, video conferencing and presentations.
• Support – the level of communications where employees seek clarification and the project team provide help or support. Two-way focused communication is integral to the support approach, including Seminars and training courses.
• Involvement – the level of communication where employees are actively involved in the development of the project, which can be achieved through team meetings, workshops and feedback forums.
• Commitment - the highest level of the communications escalator and is achieved through the building and development of quality relationships, joint problem solving sessions etc.

Replies to a debate posted to Melcrum’s CommsNetwork:
What is the role of strategy in internal communication? Should we leave strategy to the business managers and concentrate on doing what we know how to do, the craft of communicating, well?

Chris Smithers Internal Communications BT Global Services

———————————————————————

Chris,

I think there’s a balance. Don’t expect to contribute to thestrategy if you can’t do the day job, and you can mess up communication pretty thoroughly if you can’t write or speak

• People’s expectations of involvement at work are rising
• ‘Knowledge workers’ need to understand much more, take more decisions themselves (so ’strategy’ is the purpose and direction, not the detailed plans)
• There’s a need to bring larger, more disparate organisations together
• We need to react more quickly to changes
• Businesses are cutting costs by devolving more and more activities to managers
• One of the key drivers of this is the growing importance of service within the mix of what companies deliver, as well as globalisation, consolidation and other trends.

All this makes communication, particularly two-way communication, key.

Keith Hardie
Head of Communication, Premier Travel Inn

———————————————————————

Chris and brethren,

Fair enough. I’ll bite. Ask yourself a couple of basic questions:
What is the purpose of all thoseinternal newsletters and web sites? Why do companies devote scarce resourcesto them?It is not to make people feel good. It is not to win Quill awards. It is notto keep “communicators” employed. None of that is fundamentally important.

Rather, it is to enable the company to succeed in ways it has never succeeded before. Just as you do not buy gasoline for the sake of owning it, but rather because it can take you places, so a company doesn’t publishvnewsletters for the sake of having them, but rather because they can takevthe company places it wants to go.

But the newsletters and web sites are irrelevant by themselves because theydo not operate in a vacuum. They cannot enable the company to succeed unlesstheir messages are consistent with other messages, far more powerful, beingsent by leadership behaviors, programs, policies, day-to-day decisions, anineffable passion for the enterprise, and so much more. That’s the stuffthat employees pay attention to.If we don’t speak up about inconsistent messages, no one will. Theinformation and messages in our publications and web sites must absolutelybe consistent with the reality experienced by employees. If it isn’t, the company cannot change and it cannot succeed.

Thomas J. LeeFounder and CEO, Arceil Leadership Ltd.
Extraordinary Tools for Extraordinary Leaders

Statistics taken from Melcrum research on Senior Leadership Communication:

• 57% of survey respondents do not think that their leaders’ verbal communication skills are good, and 17% say they have an autocratic CEO
• 39% of executive team senior leaders don’t agree that their involvement in communication is important to business performance
• 64% of companies don’t measure senior leaders’ communication performance at all
• 45% of communicators think that convincing their senior leaders to even make the time to communicate is a top challenge

Source http://www.melcrum.com/

What is the right way to communicate with employees during unpredictable times? We can all be subject to disruption ranging from terrorist attacks to natural disasters and organizational change, so it pays to know how best to act during difficult times.
by Al Siebert, director, The Resiliency Center

When facilitating meetings at times when people have heightened emotions, always remember to:

1. Deal with your own feelings first
To facilitate well, you must first deal with your own feelings. Remember not to impose them or your values on others.

2. Conduct a group “check in”
If people are feeling emotional about organizational or world events, focus on their feelings first before trying to cover agenda items. Ask each person to comment on how they feel about the events, express any concerns they have and comment on how they feel about being at the meeting. Look at each person closely while they are speaking to judge for yourself how “present” or emotionally distracted they are.

If people are feeling emotional about organizational or world events, focus on their feelings first before trying to cover agenda items.

3. Discuss the agenda
Ask each person to say if they feel they can be involved in discussions about the agenda items. Make it safe for them to say no if they can’t. Acknowledge their feelings, don’t suppress them, then focus the group on the things that must get done.

4. Reschedule some items on the agenda if necessary
If the majority of the group says they don’t feel that they can focus on the meeting, then save all agenda items that require open discussion until a later date. Limit the meeting to essential information items that are very time relevant.
Limit the meeting to essential information items that are very time relevant.

5. Be prepared to postpone to a later date
Meetings usually require a relaxed atmosphere conducive to open discussion — this may be difficult in times of stress. Resiliency research shows that feelings of distress, anguish, anger and anxiety will constrict and narrow cognitive processes. Postponing a meeting is a rational course of action when involved group discussion, analysis, problem-solving and goal-setting is required.

What skills do leaders need to use during change? Find out how to create meaning, focus and direction by helping employees move past the psychological stages of shock, delusion, anger and depression to the stages where they let go of their old ties and explore the possibilities of the new situation. by Marie Mosely, business psychologist

1. Use storytelling to create links
Stories help to create meaning in a chaotic world. People need some sense of predictability and stability, particularly when they’re going through restructures and transitions. Stories help staff to understand links between the past, present and future. They are universal and understood in all languages and by all cultures. They engage people and, if told well, create a positive anticipation for the future.

2. Build scenarios for the future
Get people thinking about how they would like the story to end. Scenario building helps people to understand the challenges ahead. It creates relevance and meaning and links the past with the possible futures. It cuts through the day-to-day beliefs and assumptions that can blinker an organization and its people, and it creates a positive self-belief that, whatever happens, they can cope. It also helps people focus on how they might best use their time, effort, talents and skills.
Scenario building helps people to understand the challenges ahead.

3. Use internal communication effectively
Make sure that internal communication systems are as effective as they can be. Spending a lot of time and money on external communications is a waste if employees are demotivated and don’t know what’s happening or where the organization is going. They will either clam up or communicate in rumors.

4. Create discomfort
In order to move from our current state, we need to create discomfort. Comfort creates acceptance and inaction. People change the way they are doing things for two reasons: inspiration or desperation. Leaders need to encourage staff to be motivated by both.
People change the way they are doing things for two reasons: inspiration or desperation.

5. Challenge successful models
Successful models are hard to challenge but people often maintain the status quo with processes and procedures that work now, when they should be thinking about what’s on the horizon and how it will affect the business in the future.

To speed up a major change in your company, think about how your intranet, paper and face-to-face communication contribute to the process.

In an in-depth report on managing major change called “Communicating Big Change Using Small Communication,” authors Dr TJ Larkin and Sandar Larkin explore the idea of using “thousands of small face-to-face conversations between managers and employees” to bring about big change in large companies. Drawing on various research findings, the report outlines the effectiveness of each of the main communication channels and when and how they should be used in a major change campaign. This can briefly be summarized as follows:

1. Intranet: best for short, quick information retrieval Internet is the best channel for searching and retrieving factual information. This implies that the company intranet is most useful during the implementation phase when employees need to quickly find small pieces of information located within large data sets. It’s wrong, however, to rely on the intranet as your major communication channel during the planning phase of the change. Using intranet instead of face to face is a mistake. Intranet is not employees’ preferred choice and does not change behavior. It’s also a poor choice for sensitive information.

Don’t rely on the intranet as your major communication channel during the planning phase of the change.

2. Paper: best for learning complicated informationWhen ideas on a computer screen become complicated — employees hit “print.” Research shows that employees prefer paper as soon as new material becomes difficult to understand. Although less certain than employees’ preference (i.e., face-to-face communication), many studies also show improved comprehension. With difficult topics, employees often learn more when reading from paper than from a web page. This means paper plays an especially important role during implementation when there may be many new and complicated ideas to communicate. Paper also plays an important supporting role in face-to-face communication. It’s wrong, however, to rely on paper as your primary communication channel during the planning phase of a big change.

With difficult topics, employees often learn more when reading from paper than from a web page.

3. Face to face: changes behavior If your change means employees must change the way they behave, then face to face is the best channel for communicating the message. “Diffusion of innovation” is the study of how groups adopt new behaviors. The leading expert of this approach is Professor Everett Rogers. Surveying 50 years of research and 4,000 studies, Rogers concludes that mediated information (print and electronic) creates awareness of new ideas but rarely adoption. On the other hand, face-to-face communication with a respected member of your own group (opinion leader) delivers the most new behavior.

A study by the Hay Group, Key Driver Analysis, also examined different ways to communicate and the associated amount of employee support forthe change. The correlations discovered by the Hay Group show most support when employees learn about the change from their own managers.

Experience from a major IT project in the telecommunications sector:

- Consultation of acteurs sociaux obligatory for programme management (respect of legal framework)
- Dedicated communication plan
- IRP communicate with staff
- Need to inform management in parralel or they feel excluded
- CCE for a company, CE for a location, CHSCT health, quality and safety
- Scope for communicating out of project, limited strictly to what was presented to IRPs
- Careful with associating employees to deployment. Not appreciated by IRP who see the effort as a CHCT bis.

CE = Comité d’entreprise
IRP = Instance de Representation du Personnel
CHSCT = health, quality and safety board