Employee Communications and Engagement

You must decide – as an organization and as an individual team leader – what spirit you intend to convey with the participation of your employees in social media.

If your intention is for them to be simply mechanical amplification vehicles for a very carefully crafted marketing message, that can work. You’ll likely see some results in terms of absolute reach and volume of short-term message resonance. You will sacrifice a degree of credibility on behalf of your individual representatives and personality and genuineness on behalf of your brand in favor of a consistent, safe(-r) message. You will also likely sacrifice culturally, since your employees will realize they’re part of a marketing machine, not someone who is entrusted to help build and shape a brand.

If your intention is for employees to become individual voices for your organization and unique representatives of your company’s values, personality and diversity, that can work too. You’ll likely see results in terms of trust and affinity for your brand as well as better identification of your advocates, both internal and external. You will sacrifice a certain amount of stability and potential consistency of message in favor of communications that are more unique and individual. You’ll also sacrifice some predictability around outcomes and need to rely on strong education and culture initiatives to guide your teams and hone their own sense of good judgment.

The bottom line: governance and guidance is important. But it’s a means to more scalable social media, not the end.

We’ve said many times here — and will continue to — that social business transformation is far more cultural than it is operational. Getting your employees involved is no different, and your policies and guidelines need to consider not just what you don’t want to happen, but instead what values, vision and intent you want your teams’ social media participation to convey.

Read full article via sideraworks.com

Having worked in internal communication in a variety of organizations since 1997, I’ve seen and heard a lot of myths and aphorisms about “good communication” which, alas, are either untrue or deeply overstated.

Here are eight of the real doozies—I’m sure there are others; if you know of any, pile into the comments below:

Social Media is new

This one is an absolute classic—the idea that employees talk with each other informally and that those informal conversations are important is one that is as old as any organization.  The only thing that’s new about social media is the technology—and how it makes this process easier.  Word of mouth is timeless.

Treat employees like customers

One of the true “doh” ideas on employee communication, even if it did spawn the “internal marketing” industry in the ‘90s.

Workplace relationships are far richer than the ones employees have with their cereals and even their cars.  Workplaces are where employees hold most of their personal relationships, exert much of their personal efforts and energies, and are where they derive most of the resources for the other aspects of their lives.

Employees are much more like citizens than like customers.
Good communication is free

I remember seeing this howler recently on some HR blog somewhere.  It somehow places no value on the time involved with preparing, delivering and understanding any message—assuming that employees don’t work for free either.  And some good communication really does cost money too.

Employees can’t say no

One of the big myths of internal communication is the assumption that, at the end of the day, the employee is not free to disagree with or resist the messages he or she is being given.  I’ve found this particularly prevalent in American companies, who take a directive tone in their communication much more frequently than do European companies.  The downside of presenting something as fact to staff who disagree is that can act as a charter for sabotage or at least reinforce resistance. And, despite the best efforts of corporations, resistance has hardly been eliminated from corporate cultures.

Use the disembodied “we”

Nothing smells of bad communication—not to mention resistance to individual accountability—like the use of the disembodied “we” to communicate an organization’s policies, stances,  or changes in official behavior.  Such use of the “royal ‘We’” can also be highly disempowering  and even feed resentment among those who don’t see themselves as part of that “we”.  My core writing principle—no quote, no story.

Good communication is all about recognition
Recognition is important—sometimes even critical to employee retention and morale.  But that doesn’t necessarily mean that every bit of employee communication needs to be larded up with 25-year service awards for staff at far-away cafeterias.  An over-emphasis on recognition in internal communication can get in the way of urgent and strategic messaging.  Where possible, keep the recognition machine ring-fenced from more pressing communication activities.

It’s all about the bosses
One online conversation I saw recently discussed the extent to which an over-emphasis on quoting CEOs and senior executives was driving down readership for a certain tool—to the point where the editors stopped quoting senior management entirely.  I personally think there needs to be a balance—CEOs and senior executives are effective at setting parameters and policies, but stories from the field are far better at bringing those things to life.

Line Management Cascades are the best form of communication

To many in corporations, the only “real” form of internal communication is the line management cascade—the formal presentation of authorized corporate information by the line manager to his/her staff, to be repeated step by step until the presentation reaches the shop floor unscathed.

But while cascades do an excellent job of reminding people “who’s the boss”, cascades fail on many other grounds.  For one thing, they move with bovine velocity, with long gaps between delivery by a boss and by his/her direct reports, magnified over geography and hierarchy.

Secondly, the further they move, the more corrupted their tone and content become—particular when managers omit sections for time reasons (or perhaps, darker motives), or when they add in inappropriate inflections or gestures (air quotes for a new bit of terminology, for instance).  Third—while less prevalent perhaps most damning—they inevitably omit information or smooth over gaps or rationales, which then prompt a surge of back-channel communication to get clarifications or seek to clarify through the distribution of rumors.

While, as my colleague Liam Fitzpatrick would say, “internal communication is not rocket science”, I would also argue that it’s neither voodoo nor witchcraft either.  Being able to take on clients and bosses who seek to play “communication strategist” and overspecify tools and tactics is one way to help ensure your own effectiveness in these interesting times.

by Mike Klein—The Intersection, Brussels

The biggest challenge I find for managers responsible for the employer brand strategy is they don’t understand the science of branding and lack knowledge in branding principle and practices which have been informed by decades of research into how brands grow. I’m going to go over that here, and then get to what you can do to grow your company brand.

Common employer branding mistakes

Some of the most common mistakes I see made by companies include:

• Creating recruitment advertising that doesn’t build or refresh relevant memory structures or associations about what it is like to work for the company
• Viewing employer branding as merely a recruitment strategy or short-term recruitment advertising campaign
• Failing to conduct research with the internal and external audience to determine what makes their employer brand distinctive
• Paying premiums for low-reach media that is sold by money-hungry vendors as “reaching a niche audience”
• Relying on a ranking in “best places to work” surveys as the sole metric for the employer brand strategy

When Should We Measure Communications?

Annual in depth surveys. Engagement and satisfaction surveys are typically carried out annually and can carry additional questions to provide some insights into the effectiveness of communications.

Prior to a specific communications campaign. In order to best understand the impact of communications, it is necessary to measure (awareness, attitudes, knowledge etc) before a campaign.

After a significant communication or campaign. It is important to measure the effectiveness and impact of significant communications programs and initiatives. This allows you to tailor internal communications to make sure they are effective and delivering quantifiable business value.

At intervals to track attitudes. Regular measurement helps communicators to gauge the ever shifting feelings and attitudes within an organization and to tailor messages to make sure they are appropriate to their audiences.

Pulse checks and temperature checks during and after specific events provide an insight into the issues and challenges an organization faces and to gather feedback on specific issues.

At intervals to benchmark and track against KPI’s. Measuring regularly against benchmarks and tracking trends over time provide an early warning of issues that may go undetected until they have escalated further.

What to Measure?

Determining which aspects of communication to measure will depend on the organization’s specific business and communication objectives. A few examples of useful communications measurements include:

How should employees behave as company representatives on social media platforms?

1. Transparency. Should employees acting as company agents identify themselves? Should they use their own names? Should they list their job title? Should there be specific rules that apply their use of photographs or avatars?
2. Confidentiality. What information are employees allowed to disclose? Is this information already public? If not, does it require specific approvals? Who gives permission for release of non-public information? Is the information of competitive value?
3. Financials. How should employees discuss corporate results or financial situation? This is particularly important for publically traded companies where regulatory agencies are involved.
4. Copyright. How are intellectual property (aka IP) issues to be handled? What are the internal procedures? To whom should employees address their questions?
5. Competitors. Since social media forums tend to be open to the public, how should employees treat competitors and their representatives? Are there specific procedures that they should follow?

How much planning has your organization dedicated in enhancing (or, God forbid, establishing) a creative corporate culture?

First, let’s get a grip on the “creative” in creative corporate culture. Creativity isn’t just for design firms, art studios and elementary craft projects. Creativity and creative thought is necessary for all agencies and communication professionals who seek innovative strategies for their clients. Consider your organization’s best and brightest idea—was there not a light bulb of creativity that popped on (even flickered) that lead you down the path of project righteousness?

It’s also important to recognize that culture comes from the people—it is the people. Think about the individuals within your organization—what are their personalities like? Who are they outside of work? What tickles their fancy? All of these things lend to the culture of your organization, and ultimately your agency’s product. Once we begin tapping into these quirks, culture begins to form.

As daunting as the idea of a creative corporate culture may seem, fear not my fellow PR and marcom professionals. If you are one of the bold and daring to take on the challenge of building said culture in the New Year, here are a few tips for your right brain to digest:

1. Get a desk tchotchke, already. Culture is built by sharing parts of our personality with those around us—what better place for that than your workspace? If your personality could be personified by something small that fits on your desk, what would it be? Find that thing, embrace it and share it!

2. Build a community space. Forget the archaic days of water cooler chats. People like to hang in hip spaces—gather ‘round a Wii, create a community bulletin board or have a reading nook filled with industry related publications. As the saying goes, “if you build it, culture will come.”

3. Play games and buy toys. Incorporate games (and yes, even toys) into traditional office activities. Play a round of Apples to Apples before a staff meeting, or leave baskets of building blocks around the office. Using different parts of the brain is important to creativity and improving the overall quality of our ideas.

4. Find a platform and give back. A surefire way to build corporate culture is engaging team members in charitable activities—it feels good to give back, and when you do it as a group it creates unique bonds and fun memories. Find a kooky charitable activity in your town and make a day of it!

5. Eat, drink and be creative. The easiest way to enhance an organization’s culture is eating together. Consider a monthly potluck where staff can bring their favorite fares for teammates to enjoy. Encourage exotic recipes and fanciful presentations—these always create a buzz around the office.

How much planning has your organization dedicated in enhancing (or, God forbid, establishing) a creative corporate culture?

First, let’s get a grip on the “creative” in creative corporate culture. Creativity isn’t just for design firms, art studios and elementary craft projects. Creativity and creative thought is necessary for all agencies and communication professionals who seek innovative strategies for their clients. Consider your organization’s best and brightest idea—was there not a light bulb of creativity that popped on (even flickered) that lead you down the path of project righteousness?

It’s also important to recognize that culture comes from the people—it is the people. Think about the individuals within your organization—what are their personalities like? Who are they outside of work? What tickles their fancy? All of these things lend to the culture of your organization, and ultimately your agency’s product. Once we begin tapping into these quirks, culture begins to form.

As daunting as the idea of a creative corporate culture may seem, fear not my fellow PR and marcom professionals. If you are one of the bold and daring to take on the challenge of building said culture in the New Year, here are a few tips for your right brain to digest:

1. Get a desk tchotchke, already. Culture is built by sharing parts of our personality with those around us—what better place for that than your workspace? If your personality could be personified by something small that fits on your desk, what would it be? Find that thing, embrace it and share it!

2. Build a community space. Forget the archaic days of water cooler chats. People like to hang in hip spaces—gather ‘round a Wii, create a community bulletin board or have a reading nook filled with industry related publications. As the saying goes, “if you build it, culture will come.”

3. Play games and buy toys. Incorporate games (and yes, even toys) into traditional office activities. Play a round of Apples to Apples before a staff meeting, or leave baskets of building blocks around the office. Using different parts of the brain is important to creativity and improving the overall quality of our ideas.

4. Find a platform and give back. A surefire way to build corporate culture is engaging team members in charitable activities—it feels good to give back, and when you do it as a group it creates unique bonds and fun memories. Find a kooky charitable activity in your town and make a day of it!

5. Eat, drink and be creative. The easiest way to enhance an organization’s culture is eating together. Consider a monthly potluck where staff can bring their favorite fares for teammates to enjoy. Encourage exotic recipes and fanciful presentations—these always create a buzz around the office.

The area of cascading can be a very perilous area for communicators at the moment.

Many of us in the internal comms business see both the fallacies behind reliance on cascading, and the power, ease and flexibility of replacements which supplement hierarchical communication with social communication.

But many of the people we report to, be they clients or bosses, aren’t particularly switched-on to current theories discrediting cascades, and some simply aren’t interested.

Cascading continues to have a seductive appeal. Many management-types believe it offers seamless and consistent delivery of important corporate messages.  Far more importantly in some cultures, cascading reinforces and strengthens perceptions of hierarchical power.

What does that mean? It means cascades are not yet going away.

But because of the problems that can happen with their delivery, cascades represent a huge risk for the internal communicator–not surprising the likelihood of delivery gaps feeding rumor mills, feedback influenced by implicit or explicit intimidation, or managers improvising and injecting own messages (even with letter-perfect delivery, a manager using “air quotes” can completely undermine the intent of a cascade).  While cascades give the appearance of total control, for the most part they are impossible to control.

Nevertheless, you’ll probably be on the hook for some soon.  So, I’ll propose some guidelines to keep you from being called on the carpet:

1) Strive to do no harm. Cascades are not places for shock and awe.

2) Never force the manager to speak with the “corporate voice”–structure so he/she can deliver in her own voice instead of the “corporate we”

3) Focus on underscoring, reinforcing and contextualizing already-delivered messages and policies, and absolutely minimize delivery of new information.

4) Give a fixed (and short) time period for delivery and ensure delivery is reported back immediately to allow real-time tracking

5) Offer multiple confidential and open feedback channels, and encourage their use in the structure of the cascade, and after it’s completed across the business.

If you’re in doubt, seek help.  Communicator credibility is inordinately tied to the success or failure of cascade processes in many organizations.  A record of successful delivery using these principles may be just what you need to get the permission to use more modern social and conversational techniques to drive the real communication.

Mike Klein is a Brussels-based communications pro focusing on networked approaches to organizational communication.  He can be reached through http://intersectionblog.wordpress.com

Despite the shock both to the economy and unleashed by the Great Recession and the Great Outsourcing before it—leaving a population of grizzled survivors clinging to their cubicles–the conventional wisdom in the internal communication industry is pounding the drum for…yet more focus on “employee engagement.”

Indeed, IABC’s Communication World intones in its introduction to the current edition, “all of the research points to the fact that engaged and motivated employees help build a successful organization. But what does this really mean? And what role should leadership play in making this happen? There is an answer, but it’s not one that everyone understands. You must inspire people.”

YOU MUST INSPIRE PEOPLE. Such is the Word as preached by San Francisco. And “LEADERSHIP” is the folks to be doing the inspiring, perhaps with the aid of the usual internal comms industry heavyweights who’ve been appearing at the last nine consecutive Internationales (or whatever IABC calls their annual hoedowns these days).

I’m not so sure.

Here’s why:

1) Surviving employees are that—survivors. Sometimes, as filmmaker George Romero said of the survivors in his “…of the Dead” films, sometimes the survivors envy the dead. Others may still most preoccupied with the deteriorated conditions of their lives—underwater mortgages and spousal unemployment. Whether they are necessarily the folks to be tasked with the organization’s revival is still likely open to question.

2) As for “Leadership”—are they really leaders in a genuinely inspirational leadership sense—or simply the toughest, technically smartest managers who’ve moved up the ranks? Are you really telling me that putting a very accomplished accountant in front of an auditorium filled with punch-drunk customer service staff is invariably going to produce enough electricity to be worth anyone’s time?

3) There’s a good sense that neither staff nor management really yet has a clue about the current environment, and when or whether the fundamental changes that have been predicted are about to take place—making it difficult for managers to make any kind of meaningful assurances about the future that constitute what most employees really want to hear.

Interestingly, having returned from an 11-day trip to Germany to meet with leading players in the internal communication and PR industries, the idea of “employee engagement” is largely mocked as “inspirational talk” and is not considered a genuine or legitimate focus.

I’m not sure if much conclusive research has been done looking at “employee engagement measures” in Germany relative to Britain or the US, but if you look at the general health of the German economy, its ability to relentlessly export high quality goods indicates that Germany may have a thing or two to teach us—or at least to the point where we can question some of what’s currently sacred around “engagement”.

I believe there is much that effective, strategic internal communication can do in this environment:

• to help organizations and their leaders figure out where to begin to clean up the mess that’s been made over the last five or so years, and how to create a new set of expectations as a basis for rebuilding trust

• to help organizations involve their people in defining and creating futures that are worth staying for and fighting for—and not just continuing to survive

• to work with organizations on understanding the full range of stakeholder relationships that require active re-engagement, and to help define ways employees can play a meaningful part in this re-engagement

• most of all, to identify and effectively harness the real “employee engagement”—the contribution of energy, activity, ideas, social connections and relationships—that’s taking place in all viable organizations today.

But the first step involves understanding that top-down, one-size-fits-all “inspiration” may hardly the best next step for all organizations—and that it may be best to start by focusing on what actually is working. And you don’t need to ask me—just ask the Germans.

Mike Klein is a Brussels-based communications pro, and long-time member of IABC boards at the country and regional level, and can be reached at http://intersectionblog.wordpress.com.

Are you prepared for the challenges that await corporate communicators in the not so distant future?

Much has been said about the advent of social media tools heralding the launch of a turbocharged internal communication 2.0, going beyond old-school, top-down communication tools and towards a more empowered, decentralized and fast-moving approach.

Of course, changes in technology often rapidly accelerate larger societal changes—and none are more apparent than the ones that are engulfing the realm of corporate communication:

• The accelerated take-up of social media tools has provided free and easy-to-use infrastructure for disseminating hostile messages aimed at organizations and their industries (be they factual or slanderous), and for organizing citizen movements with considerable speed and potency. These citizen movements are not only attacking specific corporations and industries directly, but are also opening governments and civic institutions to citizen pressure to an unprecedented degree.
  
• Due to activist pressure, corporate operational and sourcing practices are under intense scrutiny on sustainability grounds, and some organizations are seeking competitive advantage by visibly moving towards  more sustainable practices
  
• The “Great Recession,” and the “Great Outsourcing” which preceded it, have both contributed to eroding public trust in corporations. Employees are now seen as far more credible than corporate spokespeople

In essence—corporations are now facing an unprecedented political and activist threat. Traditional, controlled methods of external communication are neither sufficiently potent nor credible to address that threat, and that one viable—and potentially powerful—alternative is to mobilize the internal workforce as an external communication channel

Citizen power, citizen responsibility

The challenges facing organizations that want or need to empower employees as external communicators appear formidable. One massive challenge involves reorienting the tone and content of internal communication and leadership messaging to recognize the “citizen power” of staff. Citizen power is the right and ability of staff to accept, reject, reinterpret and replay messages and positions in their own way, and for the most part, on their own terms, with those they choose to interact with. 

A second challenge is to imbue a sense of “citizen responsibility”—identifying opportunities for mutual benefit to be derived from employee citizenship and an expanded communication role. Couple that with an understanding of the impact of messages being inaccurately perceived, inappropriately delivered, or withheld from an otherwise hostile public or political process. 

Beyond this tectonic shift in orientation, another challenge involves integrating messaging, training and educational efforts capable of empowering internal participants to communicate effectively externally using approaches that have historically been geared toward improving productivity.

Productivity will be no less important in the turbulent economic times ahead, and require organizations to take stock of how exposed they are to the current political, environmental and reputational risk. Such stocktaking will lend itself well to rigorous study and analysis of internal structures, communication processes, operational practices, and threats present in the current environment.

Exposure is key

The most important element in this picture is a thorough analysis of where an organization is exposed—politically, commercially, organizationally, and operationally.

Organizations that are most exposed will face the greatest urgency to integrate their workforces as advocates in the marketplace, the “twittosphere,” and, where advisable, with the media and political systems. They will need to develop new, interactive veins of internal communication that complement and sharpen the current productivity-focused streams, and allow for some degree of management of the networks of conversation surrounding each organization.

Those less exposed have a bit more breathing space, but will also need to recognize that they aren’t immune from the current trends. Corporate leaders will need to become increasingly adept at weaving the organization’s key brand messages, sustainability messages, corporate strategy points and organizational values into their formal and informal conversations. Above all, corporate cultures will need to start recognizing the “citizen” role of those who work therein.

Why this is good for internal communicators

Of course, the role of employee as advocate/citizen/spokesperson is not new, but dates back to the earliest forms of prehistoric employment. But as it was difficult to track and manage informal conversations and networks, organizations embraced what was then an easier-to-manage top-down approach that has proven largely unidirectional in flow and paternal in tone.  

While the culture change facing internal communication as this transition plays out will be considerable, internal communicators have much to gain.

As was seen with the failure of internal marketing, merely applying external strategies and tools on internal audiences has the potential to be fiercely counterproductive. The understanding that internal communicators have of the sensitivity, behaviour, structure and passions of internal people—and the depth of their relationships with their organizations—will require that they play a lead role. 

Political, environmental, and external communicators will bring a lot to the party, but the integration of the workforce as a structural component of the corporate communication architecture represents a revolution, and a transformation, for internal communication. 

Welcome to internal communication 3.0—workforce citizenship.

Mike Klein is a Brussels-based communications pro, and long-time member of IABC boards at the country and regional level, and can be reached athttp://intersectionblog.wordpress.com.

A serious pleasure of living in Brussels is the company of experts from across Europe who are pursuing interesting and progressive thinking in a wide variety of endeavors. 

One such expert, Briton Cheryl Cooper, is an innovative knowledge management expert with whom I shared a recent dinner, discussing among other things, how best to integrate what’s considered “knowledge management” with the various streams of activity and messaging that’s increasingly being called “enterprise communication.”

With benefit of a well-prepared meal and a modest amount of Cremant de Loire, we distinguished four distinct streams of information flowing through organizations at the same time:

Positioning: The organization’s core promises and behavioral boundaries—embodied in the organizational brand, along with its values and ongoing practices. This flows through the organization’s external communications, is generally embedded in the in the tone and content of the news and direction it circulates, and is often reinforced by peer behavior.

News/Direction:  The information that tells people what to do and when.  This flows mainly through formal internal communication and line management channels, and incorporates official definitions of the impacts of external news.

Opinion: This information is designed to influence the recipient and how he or she acts.  It mainly comes informally from peers and colleagues but may also come from external stakeholders, or as embedded justification in official news and direction.

Knowledge:  Knowledge is the information that tells an individual how to act effectively on the news and direction he/she receives.  It is again generally found from peers and colleagues, though it can come as embedded instructions or can be harvested from intranets, databases and case studies.

What is significant here—indeed, what opens up the possibility of an integrated communication model that takes both the formal and informal flows of information into account, while differentiating it into its factual, instructional and attitudinal components—is that this model recognizes the legitimacy and importance of peer opinion and influence as a behavior and performance driver within organizations.

Moreover, news/direction, opinion, and knowledge do not flow in isolation.  In fact, the flow often requires conscious effort to differentiate, and the spread of social media inside and outside the enterprise boundary will only accelerate the flow of unofficial information, be it what normally constitutes ‘communication’, ‘knowledge’ or intertwined information. 

In my view, recognizing the role of the peer as a core channel of communication and knowledge holds the key to developing a durable information system in the face of radical changes in organizational shape, and in communication technologies.

Mike Klein is a Brussels-based communications pro, and long-time member of IABC boards at the country and regional level, and can be reached athttp://intersectionblog.wordpress.com.

A popular prediction making the rounds in early 2010 is that of far greater integration of internal and external communication, as employees are likely to play a more crucial role as the outward face of the organization, and as a key source of organizational credibility.

While this prediction, if true, will have a major overall impact on the communications profession, its fulfillment is likely to spark a considerable shift in how employee communication is delivered–giving the mainstream PR industry a renewed foothold in the internal communications game.

For most of the last decade, internal comms has devolved into a balkanized field. Indeed, Kevin Keohane, my partner in the CommScrum joint-blogging venture, has developed a typology. In this typology, Kevin calls out the “PR-centred influencer tribe” as “one of the most flawed” sources of internal communication practice.

But the social-media fuelled transition internal communication is undergoing turns those flaws into core components of success. While traditional internal comms models have been hierarchical, mechanical and slow-moving, the influencer model has a number of advantages that merit exploitation in the current environment:

• speed–Twitter and Yammer have the ability to move messages quickly, not just through their core technology, but also through the re-tweet feature.

• mapping–those who retweet, and those who are frequently retweeted, can be mapped to identify the most active communicators and the most credible sources

• penetration–rather than focusing on one-size-fits-all cascade delivery, the influencer approach focuses on identifying, connecting and mobilizing strategically placed individuals, and leveraging their credibility and vocality.

• parallel coverage-while traditional internal comms models place extreme importance on the role of the manager as the key communication channel, these models involve considerable risk if managers are hostile and/or distracted. An influencer model can provide complementary or parallel coverage, and can allow motivated staff to take the lead on issues, while allowing managers to focus more on managing.

To be sure, the applicability and speed with which the influencer model can be adapted from a workplace and enterprise perspective needs to be balanced against an understanding of the nature of workplace relationships. Contrary to the view of the near-buried internal marketing approach, employees resemble citizens far more than customers, deriving their livelihoods, and for some, identities and core personal relationships from their workplace associations. Most importantly, workplace relationships will need repair and redefinition as the economic crisis draws to a close.

Nevertheless, speed will be of the essence. Organizations are exposed to their external environments to an unprecedented degree this decade, and they will need their employees involved like never before. Influencer/PR approaches are well suited to get this process moving.

Mike Klein is a Brussels-based communications pro, and long-time member of IABC boards at the country and regional level, and can be reached athttp://intersectionblog.wordpress.com.

Everyone is familiar with corporate culture. But you may be surprised to learn that, less than a generation ago, it was unheard of. Indeed, the concept was initially controversial.

Companies resisted the notion they were about anything more than their numbers.
Terrence Deal and Allan Kennedy introduced the term in their trailblazing 1982 book, Corporate Cultures: The Rites and Rituals of Corporate Life. Since then, companies have come to compete on culture as much as on goods and services. You see it whenever a company touts its ranking on the Best Places to Work list.

Sociologists define culture as the totality of attitudes and behaviors that distinguish one group of people from another. In business, culture is commonly regarded as “the way we do things around here.”

There are profound cultural differences between Google and Microsoft, between Toyota and General Motors, between Southwest Airlines and Delta Air Lines, between Nordstrom and Macy’s, between Bank of America and Chase Bank. The list could go on.

Now just as cultures vary from company to company, so do cultures vary within a single company. Each corporate culture consists of many smaller subcultures. The closer you look at subcultures, the more variability you see.

For example, in any one company, you may notice cultural differences between headquarters personnel and field representatives, between the engineering geeks and the marketing mavens, between salaried staff and hourly workers, between the day shift and the night shift, between manufacturing and sales, and so forth.

All these fault lines reflect the priorities and sensitivities of various perspectives, owing to the divergent circumstances, backgrounds, and values of people.

Another kind of subculture, equally important, gets too little attention. It reflects particular processes, such as quality or planning. Of special importance to me is the culture around communication of business issues and information.

By culture of communication, I mean the tendency of people throughout a company to share information, ideas and their intuition on business matters in a particular way. It is less about the flow of official information and more about the countless decentralized eddies of information converging and diverging throughout a company.

Ideally, any company’s culture of communication would have as its hallmarks eight descriptors that just coincidentally begin with the same letter: clear, credible, compelling, constructive, continuous, collaborative, civil, and concise. That’s a tall order, but it’s mightily important to a company’s success.

You can easily think of examples, for better and for worse. A worst-case scenario might involve the proverbial Mushroom Theory, keeping employees in the dark and feeding them–well, you get the idea. A best-case scenario would embrace employees as intellectual partners in the enterprise, whose thinking is integral to the company’s success. You can see just how critical communication is to performance. 

Most leaders agree that effective collaboration is more important than ever in today’s turbulent business environment. In a “do-more-with-less” reality, it takes ongoing teamwork to produce innovative, cost effective and targeted products and services. In fact, a company’s very survival may depend on how well it can combine the potential of its people and the quality of the information they possess with their ability (and willingness) to share that knowledge throughout the organization.

But here’s the problem . . .

The collaboration that is so critical to organizations is being blocked by knowledge-hoarding silo structures and the accompanying “silo mentality” that has become synonymous with power struggles, lack of cooperation, and loss of productivity.

So what’s to be done? Here, from A to Z, are my most successful strategies, based on 25 years of helping clients around the world tear down silos, reduce conflicts, and increase collaboration.

A. Find ways to ACKNOWLEDGE collaborative contributors. Recognize and promote people who learn, teach and share. And penalize those who do not. In all best-practices companies, those hoarding knowledge and failing to build on ideas of others face visible and serious career consequences. In those top companies, employees who share knowledge, teach, mentor, and work across departmental boundaries are recognized and rewarded.

B. Watch your BODY LANGUAGE. All leaders express enthusiasm, warmth, and confidence — as well as arrogance, indifference, and displeasure through their expressions, gestures, touch, and use of space. If leaders want to be perceived as credible and collaborative, they need to make sure that their verbal messages are supported (not sabotaged) by their nonverbal signals.

C. Focus on the CUSTOMER. Nothing is more important in an organization – whether it’s a for-profit company or a non-profit group – than staying close to the end user of the service or product you offer and encouraging feedback and 2-way dialogue. When you build collaborative relationships with your customers, you give them power and investment in your organization’s success.

D. DIVERSITY is crucial to harnessing the full power of collaboration. Experiments at the University of Michigan found that, when challenged with a difficult problem, groups composed of highly adept members performed worse than groups whose members had varying levels of skill and knowledge. The reason for this seemingly odd outcome has to do with the power of diverse thinking. Group members who think alike or are trained in similar disciplines with similar knowledge bases run the risk of becoming insular in their ideas. Instead of exploring alternatives, a confirmation bias takes over and members tend to reinforce one another’s predisposition. Diversity causes people to consider perspectives and possibilities that would otherwise be ignored.

E. ELIMINATE the barriers to a free flow of ideas. Everyone has knowledge that is important to someone else, and you never know whose input is going to become an essential part of the solution. When insights and opinions are ridiculed, criticized or ignored, people feel threatened and “punished” for contributing. They typically react by withdrawing from the conversation. Conversely, when people are free to ask “dumb” questions, challenge the status quo, and offer novel–even bizarre–suggestions, then sharing knowledge becomes a collaborative process of blending diverse opinion, expertise and perspectives.

F. To enhance collaboration, analyze and learn from FAILURE. Leading innovators like Apple see their failures as being as insightful as their successes. The goal is not to eliminate all errors, but to analyze mistakes in order to create systems that more quickly detect and correct mistakes before they become fatal.

G. Collaboration takes GUIDANCE by managers who know how to harness the energies and talents of others while keeping their own egos in check. Successful organizations require leaders at all levels who manage through positive influence and inclusion rather than by position.

H. Eliminate HOARDING by challenging the “knowledge is power” attitude. Knowledge is no longer a commodity like gold, which holds (or increases) it’s worth over time. It’s more like milk – fluid, evolving, and stamped with an expiration date. And, by the way, there is nothing less powerful than hanging on to knowledge whose time has expired.

I. Focus on INNOVATION. Creativity is triggered by a cross-pollination of ideas. It is in the combination and collision of ideas that creative breakthroughs most often occur. When an organization focuses on innovation, it does so by bringing together people with different backgrounds, perspectives, and expertise – breaking down barriers and silos in the process.

J. JOIN the social media revolution and utilize Web 2.0 technologies – tools and processes that allow people to share opinions, insights, experiences, and perspectives in order to collaborate and to self-organize.

K. Realize that there are two kinds of KNOWLEDGE in your organization: Explicit knowledge can be transferred in a document or entered in a database. Tacit knowledge needs a conversation, a story, a relationship. Make sure you are developing strategies to capture both.

L. LEADERS at all levels of an organization can nurture collaboration within their own work group or staff. And the most successful of these leaders do so by taking the time and effort necessary to make people feel safe and valued. They emphasize people’s strengths while encouraging the sharing of mistakes and lessons learned. They set clear expectations for outcomes and clarify individual roles. They help all members recognize what each of them brings to the team. They model openness, vulnerability and honesty. They tell stories of group successes and personal challenges. And most of all, they encourage and respect everyone’s contribution.

M. MIX it up by rotating personnel in various jobs and departments around the organization, by creating cross-functional teams, and by inviting managers from other areas of the organization to attend (or lead) your team meetings.

N. Employees with multiple NETWORKS throughout the organization facilitate collaboration. You can accelerate the flow of knowledge and information across boundaries by encouraging workplace relationships and communities. Use a tool like Social Network Analysis (SNA) to create a visual model of current networks so you can reinforce the connections and help fill the gaps.

O. Insist on OPEN and transparent communication. In an organization, the way information is handled determines whether it becomes an obstacle to or an enabler of collaboration. Employees today need access to information at any time. From any place.

P. Collaboration is a PARTNERSHIP. As one savvy leader put it, “To make collaboration work, you’ve got to treat people the way you want to be treated. It’s pretty simple, really. Treat all employees as your partners. Because they are.”

Q. Ask the right QUESTIONS. At the beginning of a project, ask: What information/knowledge do we need? Who are the experts? Who in the organization has done this before – do we have this on a database? Who else will need to know what we learn? How do we plan to share/hand off what we learn?

R. The success of any organization or team – its creativity, productivity, and effectiveness – hinges on the strength of the RELATIONSHIPS of its members. Collaboration is enhanced when employees get to know one another as individuals. So when you hold offsite retreats, organization-wide celebrations, or workplace events, be sure to provide opportunities for “social” time and personal relationships. Taking time to build this “social capital” at the beginning of a project will also increase the effectiveness of a team later on.

S. Collaboration is communicated best through STORIES – of successes, failures, opportunities, challenges, and knowledge accumulated through experience. Find those stories throughout your organization. Record them. Share them.

T. TRUST is the foundation for collaboration. It is the conduit through which knowledge flows. Without trust, an organization loses its emotional “glue.” In a culture of suspicion people withhold information, hide behind psychological walls, and withdraw from participation. If you want to create a networked organization, the first and most crucial step is to build a culture of trust.

U. Combating silo mentality requires UNIFYING goals.  Business unit leaders must understand the overarching goals of the total organization and the importance of working in concert with other areas to achieve those crucial strategic objectives.

V.  The incentive to collaborate is the VALUE of the exchange to both the organization and the individual. When the assets and benefits of productive collaboration are made visible, silos begin to break down.

W. Your WORKPLACE layout encourages or impedes the way the organization communicates. To facilitate knowledge sharing, you need to create environments that stimulate both arranged and chance encounters. Attractive break-out areas, coffee bars, comfortable cafeteria chairs, even wide landings on staircases – all of these increase the likelihood that employees will meet and linger to talk.

X. Take a tip from XEROX. It discovered that real learning doesn’t take place in the classroom – or in any formal setting. In fact, people were found to learn more from comparing experiences in the hallways than from reading the company’s official manuals, going online to a knowledge repository, or attending training sessions.

Y. Collaboration is crucial for YOUR success. We’re witnessing the death of “The Lone Ranger” leadership model, where one person comes in with all the answers to save the day. We now know that no leader, regardless of how brilliant and talented, is smarter than the collective genius of the workforce.

Z. Forget about reaching the ZENITH. Collaborative cultures are learning cultures – and knowledge sharing is an ongoing process, not an end point.

Carol Kinsey Goman, Ph.D. is the author of nine books including CREATIVITY IN BUSINESS and  “THIS ISN’T THE COMPANY I JOINED” — How to Lead in a Business Turned Upside Down. She delivers keynote speeches and seminars to association and business audiences around the world. For more information or to book Carol as a speaker at one of your events, please call: 510-526-1727, email: CGoman@CKG.com, or visit her website: http://www.CKG.com.

Sometimes it’s darkest just before the light.  Here are 11 great articles to assess the times we’re in, and plan for better days.  

Five C’s for Communicating in this Crunch

We’ve developed a gut-check list of “Five C’s” to help guide communications on dire economic subjects, from news releases to corporate Web sites to internal communications.

10 Tips for a Challenging Economic Environment

9. Communicate authentically. Strong leaders acknowledge the challenges they struggle with and, by doing so, build trust among followers. Rather than being a sign of weakness, it’s a sign of strength.

Marketing and PR tactics, budgets likely to change during recession

What companies don’t realize is their marketing budget will go a lot further and create much more buzz in a down market. As your competition pulls back, you should become much more aggressive. When you do, you will achieve top-of-mind status and grab market share as the economy stabilizes and will be able to remain on top during the next upswing in the economy.

Are You a Media Savvy Leader? How Agency Heads Can Boost Results in a Tight Economy

I think the inability of the PR business to really comprehend what Web 2.0 is about is shocking. So, real leaders get in there and they take a look at the trends in media and online and get active there. For example, if you’re going to offer a CEO blog, you have to be prepared to spend an hour a day doing it—not every other day. Also important is understanding and respecting the online world’s mindset of sharing—it’s all about developing conversations with constituents.

Your website can thrive in a recession

It is 14 times cheaper to allow a customer to complete a task on a website than to have the customer complete the same task over the phone. The Web is 35 times cheaper for completing such a task than a face-to-face interaction. Isn’t that a compelling business case for a website during a recession?

Leading through uncertainty

The range of possible futures confronting business is great. Companies that nurture flexibility, awareness, and resiliency are more likely to survive the crisis, and even to prosper.

Time to Reboot: What to Expect in Politics, Policy and PR in 2009

For those in consumer PR, this will be a tough year as product-side clients retrench. But if you are engaged in advocacy PR, public affairs or crisis communications, 2009 may be a robust year for your business, especially if you can hitch things to the “change” agenda in Washington and on Wall Street.

Social Media Begins Forcing the Totally Transparent Layoff

The combination of social media technology such as Twitter—where people post updates about themselves online at Twitter.com—and a cultural shift toward greater personal disclosure means more and more employees will document details of their dismissal, said Jennifer Benz, a communications consultant based in San Francisco.

Give Data a Human Touch to Weather the Economic Storm

The key, say many experts, is to use customer data and analytics for its original purpose: forging stronger customer relationships.

Market Smarter in 2009: Make the Right Choices

Remember two words: frequency, consistency. Even with finite resources, it’s vital to maintain a level of frequency and consistency. It is crucial to stay in front of your customers and prospects. You should never disappear for stretches at a time. If that means you need to focus marketing efforts on a few of your strongest market sectors, do it.

5 Lessons on Marketing for the Recession

Lesson: Keep hiring channels open and be pickier than ever. For anyone who hasn’t read Hard Times or any of the Studs Terkel interview compilations, they are an incredible insight into people’s attitudes and behaviors throughout history. I highly recommend 

If you put a microphone in every hallway, stairwell and coffee station in your organization, what would you overhear?

Well, according to a variety of studies, the breakdown would look something like this:

Gossip (14%). People talk about office intrigue: Who’s sleeping with whom? Did so-and-so really quit “to pursue other options” or was he fired?  How did that jerk get promoted? Who does the boss currently loathe or love?

They also compare childcare facilities, restaurants, television programs and sporting events. And in doing so they bond and build relationships that will become the foundation for trust and knowledge sharing. But all of this is only a fraction of what’s being discussed when employees get together.

Business (86%). Most of the conversations in your organization have a work-related focus: Who’s reliable – trustworthy – informed? How am I supposed to behave in this situation? Have you ever dealt with this customer – problem – manager before? What does it take to succeed in this culture?

People share information about their projects, collaborate to develop innovative products and services, and have real-world discussions about “how things get done around here.”

And that’s how “office buzz” becomes money in the bank for an enterprise.

An organization’s cumulative knowledge is contained in the heads of individuals and disseminated through the information and stories they exchange within the networks they access. People learn more from comparing experiences in the hallways than from reading the company’s official manuals, going online to a knowledge repository, or attending training classes. And, as a result of these informal conversations, the organization builds its worth.

Which is not to deny the importance of classes, databases and books, but only to point out the (often overlooked) value of simply getting people together and encouraging them to talk.

Xerox Corporation learned this lesson when it was looking for a way to boost the productivity of its field service staff. A cultural anthropologist traveled with a group of tech reps to observe how they actually did their jobs – as opposed to how they described what they did, or what their managers assumed they did. The anthropologist discovered that the reps spent more time with each other than with customers. They’d gather in common areas like the local parts warehouse or around the coffee pot and swap stories from the field. And it was here that the reps asked each other questions, identified problems, and shared new solutions as they devised them.       

Impressed by the potential of these employee gatherings, Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC) added a technological element, and wired the coffeepot to computer monitors. Any time that someone brewed a fresh pot of coffee, an icon flashed on employees’ screens. People would come out of their offices from various parts of the building for a cup, and they would collect in front of the coffeepot.  As the ensuing conversations became more complex, PARC installed huge white boards around the coffee area, so that people could draw diagrams and write out key points. This, in turn, allowed others who were in the area to see where the discussion was heading, and to also join in.

To encourage employees to linger and chat with one another, some companies have designed wide stairwells with large landings, many organizations have created attractive employee “commons” areas, and meeting planners have been asked to designate more time for informal interaction at business conferences.

Did you ever think you’d see the day?  In a complete reversal from the old “stop wasting time – and get back to work” mentality, the most progressive companies today are helping employees find ways to stop “working” and start talking!

 Carol Kinsey Goman, Ph.D. is the author of nine books including CREATIVITY IN BUSINESS and  “THIS ISN’T THE COMPANY I JOINED” — How to Lead in a Business Turned Upside Down. She delivers keynote speeches and seminars to association and business audiences around the world. For more information or to book Carol as a speaker at one of your events, please call: 510-526-1727, email: CGoman@CKG.com, or visit her website: http://www.CKG.com.