My podcast interview from my recent virtual book tour with Phil Gerbyshak is finally up following some audio glitches.
To my readers – thanks for your patience.
To Phil – thanks for your diligence in fixing and posting the audio file!
Tag: internal communication
In contrast to the clueless company mentioned in my last post, I’m going to again cite Marriott.
Check out what Mike Jannini, Marriott International Executive VP, had to say about his company’s employee-centric approach in a recent address at the Creating Value through Service Symposium.
Companies that are employee-focused are inherently customer-focused. Being customer-focused alone is not enough (and a poor strategy) when employee value is only lip-service.
In his June 24, 2008 article “If the customer comes first, where does that leave employees?”, Steve Crescenzo shares a story about a company whose approach is “Customers First, Employees Last.” [Updated note: access to Steve’s article is for Ragan.com Select Members. Ragan offers both free and select membership options on Ragan.com. It also offers My Ragan, a free social network for corporate communicators.]
This ‘customers first-employees last’ approach may not be what management intended, but it became the reality of the corporate culture as experienced by employees.
What’s especially disturbing is that an internal communications professional within the company tried to bring the situation about employee frustration to management’s attention – specifically in a proposed article entitled “Does ‘Customers First’ Mean Employees Last?” for an online employee publication. But management nixed the idea; they didn’t want to hear it and/or didn’t want to deal with it.
Unfortunately, the company described here isn’t unique. There are too many firms with customer problems – evident through constant complaints and customer churn – where the solution is to come down hard and put pressure on employees without actually engaging them to assist with solutions. (Why bother asking the employees who have daily interaction with the customers? If they were so smart, they’d be in management instead of on the front-lines!)
Hint to managers who think this way: customer dissatisfaction doesn’t occur in a vacuum. Besides worrying about customer retention, take a look at your employee retention.
In Lewis Green’s recent blog post (Leaders Reap the Benefits of the Reality They Create) about why nearly two-thirds of U.S. workers are considering switching employers, he says higher compensation is not the answer. It’s more about creating better organizations for everyone: “We should set our goals to create a great culture, to keep our promises to our customers, and to create a better world …” A key ingredient in improving one’s organization is to listen to both employees and customers and “hear what they’re saying.”
His sage advice is reinforced by John Maver who has found employee frustration with management is based on employees “not understanding or having ownership of the company’s actions” although employees are held accountable for results. In his article, Aligning Employees with the Strategic Plan, Maver advocates talking to employees, training them, and engaging them so they “understand that their work fits into the success of the organization and how it fits in. People [need to] see how [the company’s] strategy is going to make them better off through job security, promotions and pay increases … as well as making the company more successful.” In other words, communicate what’s in it for them and the mutual benefit for the organization.
Want to improve employee ownership of business results? Want better retention? Then listening to and engaging employees is well worth the effort.
Thanks to Toby Bloomberg for introducing me to Lewis Green & John Maver in a recent Diva Marketing post.
A while back I wrote several posts about e-mail’s impact on workplace relationships and the growing body of research on this topic.
As a follow up, here’s a recent article on the subject: “E-Mail is Easy to Write (and to Misread)” by Daniel Goleman. Citing a number of research studies already out there + some not yet published, Goleman offers a fascinating look at how e-mail can easily be misunderstood because our human brains aren’t able to interpret electronic communications as effectively as we can face-to-face communications.
Although there’s no guarantee for perfect communication in face-to-face or verbal situations, studies in the emerging field of social neuroscience confirm a likelihood for miscommunication via e-mail. (Maybe that explains why, despite the medium’s efficiency, it takes me a long time to write some e-mails … another reason I sometimes prefer to pick up the phone instead of sending an e-mail.)
Goleman’s article also includes tips for minimizing miscommunication. So check it out.
Categories
Reducing Information Overload
I addressed the issue of managing information overload in a previous post. For great advice on reducing overload, check out a recent issue of Melcrum’s Source for Communicators.
What resonated most with me is the guiding question for internal communicators: “How do I make this [content] relevant for my audience?” rather than just focusing on message distribution.
The relevancy question is applicable to everyone responsible for communications (internal and external) … and it’s THE question we need to constantly ask ourselves.
When it comes to employee engagement, most of us know the critical role of supervisor-to-employee communications, especially given the proximity of the supervisor and staff working relationship. But a recent study found companies overestimate the importance of this communication.
Watson Wyatt’s Work USA® 2006/2007 research found that “senior leadership and the frequency with which senior managers communicate with employees are far more important drivers of engagement.”
Not to minimize the role of supervisory communications, the study also found “High-engagement employees receive communication from [both] their supervisors and senior management far more frequently than low-engagement employees.”
The bottom line: to engage employees, communication is needed from ALL levels of management.
[2014 update: the following content still resonates, although the original links in this post were removed because they are no longer available.]
Here’s a fascinating concept to add to your internal marketing & communications toolbox: Workplace Journalism — “a conscious effort to make employee communications at least partly about employees and their concerns, not just the business and its issues.”
I learned about this from Barry Nelson, who believes business communicators can have a positive impact by adding more “empathetic, employee-advocacy journalism … into their otherwise business-results focused reportorial mix.”
He recommends that in addition to communicating corporate strategy, goals, progress & results, (which employees need to know), companies should also share stories of how employees cope with on-the-job issues & stresses (which employees want to know). According to Barry, we need to give “at least some prominence to our employees’ human concerns” such as “how and why to get along with the boss, make friends on the job, cope with stress, live the brand, be a good teammate, and other aspects of a satisfactory work life.”
The Pay-Off
This isn’t just ‘feel-good’ communications for the heck of it. Organizations that share these types of stories demonstrate their care and concern for employees, and this contributes to a strong sense of employee commitment and loyalty in turn.
To learn more, check out Barry’s guidance on getting started with Workplace Journalism.
Here’s an interesting situation. An organization put in a suggestion box at the request of its employees. Within a week, there were over 135 suggestions in the box. But the company has only 36 employees!
If you view the contents as half-full, you might think, “Wow, what a great response!” If you tend toward the half-empty perspective, you might think, “Uh oh, there’s a lot of pent-up frustration among the staff.”
Despite my usually optimistic approach, I share the latter thinking in this case. It’s because I heard about this from one of the employees who told me that the suggestion box was one of management’s responses to high turnover and low morale.
Regardless of what one thinks about the suggestion box, I just hope this organization’s management takes it seriously and uses it as just one (but not the only) tool to listen to employees.
Categories
Search Committees Need a Clue
A friend who works in a university told me about her school’s search for a new administrative department head. In passing she said she was surprised that the search committee hadn’t bothered to include input from the department’s current staff.
Perhaps the search committee wanted to change that department’s culture by bringing in a new leader, and they didn’t think it worthwhile to hear what the staff had to say? That was my initial (and feeble) attempt to explain their rationale. But it’s still no reason to overlook the people who have a major stake in the search’s outcome – after all, they’re the ones who have to live with the new boss.
Don’t Mind Us, We Just Work Here
The more my friend and I discussed this, the more upset we got … especially since we also recalled similar instances from our experience in nonprofit and corporate organizations. In many cases it seemed the search committees showed a blatant disregard and disrespect for the staff. Their message was loud & clear: “Why should we bother with the employees’ two cents when they’re not in positions of authority to determine who their boss should be?”
I’m not saying the staff should make the hiring decision. But they should be given the opportunity to offer feedback on the nature of their work and the type of person who might best lead their department.
I just don’t understand why the folks most invested in the department – those closest to the work – are the least likely to be asked for their input. Go figure …