The changing communication landscape

I have worked in the communications and learning areas ever since the 90’s, and my current job is as a communications manager. One thing that has struck me is how the communication landscape has changed the last couple of years. For many, being a good communicator traditionally meant being good at writing. No matter the subject and its complexity, you could turn it into a well-tasting and beautiful dish, that was easily digested. I still see some professional communicators who seem stuck on this “write for the web” island. Now, I would argue this is not enough if you want to be a good communicator.

I recently arrived back from London, where I was invited as a speaker at the Interaction Conference. Luckily, I was also invited to be part of the panel discussion with Gerry McGovern, James Robertson, Sam Marshall, and Andy Williamson. This discussion made me think more about how the role of communicators is changing. Below are some things I think are vital for any communicator, besides the basic writing skills.

As a communicator, you should also know:

Where the company is hurting, and how you can help ease this. For example, if you only listen to top management’s agenda, you might miss a lot. Yes, the new strategy is important, but so are the fundamental communication problems in production unit X that are causing a lot of confusion and potential risk. Walk around. Listen. Make sure you are like an ethnographer at work, trying to understand the daily lives of your colleagues. Once you have this understanding, think about the communication tools and stories to tell. And once you find what is hurting, never mind the vanity figures the statistics give you. If you have 81% or 11% using your ESN is not the important question. Instead, did using the ESN solve your problem?
How people learn at work. Working and learning cannot be separated, and people such as Jane Hart and Harold Jarche (and many more) can guide us in these changes. If you know more about how people learn, then you can tailor your communication to support that.
Business strategy. We are no Robinsonados: Being a communicator should not be a solitary work on a remote island, where we produce funny and well-written stories. Your job is to stand in the middle of the action at your company. You should know where your business is heading and why. Without this in-depth knowledge, your communication skills will not guide your colleagues as well as they could. Here, also read writers like Molly Anglin and for example “5 practical tools for tackling business transformation“. Sources like this can help you as a communicator change how a transformation is done in your company. The clearer you are, the better people will understand what is happening, and new tools can help you do this.
Technology advancements. New tools for communication are arriving every month, and the existing tools are refined. As a communicator, you should know the technical potential of the tools you have, be it SharePoint, Yammer, Skype, or anything else. You should also keep updated on what happens to these tools. For example, if you use Office 365 tools, then follow Microsoft’s blogs for these products. They will tell you which changes are coming and what it could mean to you.
The future of work. As a communicator, I also think you should know how the workplaces are changing. Otherwise, you risk communicating based on older mental models of what is important. Previously, communicators could get away with top-down mass communication. Now, most users avoid this like the plague, and your job is to adjust. Here, the Marginalia blog from Gloria Lombardi can help, plus reading the excellent book “Perspectives on new work,” edited by Esko Kilpi.

I am in no way fully trained in the above areas, but at least they are on my radar. Every day I am taking another step towards being more skilled in these regions. Hopefully, it also makes me a better communicator.

Using an intranet to increase engagement

Disengagement at work is a real and big problem for companies. According to Gallup’s 2011-2012 numbers, only 13% of employees worldwide are engaged in their jobs. The rest is either Non-engaged or Actively disengaged.

Gallup’s definitions of these groups, featured Gallup’s definitions of these groups, featured in Harvard Business Review (HBR) here, are:

“Engaged employees work with passion and feel a profound connection to their company. They drive innovation and move the organization forward.”

“Not engaged employees (we use “unengaged” on our map) are essentially checked out. They’re sleepwalking through their workday putting time — but not energy or passion — into their work.”

“Actively disengaged employees aren’t just unhappy at work; they’re busy acting out their unhappiness. Every day, these workers undermine what their engaged coworkers accomplish.”

According to the map provided via the HBR article above, the figures are quite astounding (here are three examples):

In Sweden, this would mean that on average about every 6^th person you meet is engaged, drives innovation and moves things forward. The absolute majority (3/4 of all) are just there to pick up the paycheck by doing an ok job and are basically sleep walking. Finally, about every 10^th person you meet are unhappy and shows this actively in action and spirit by destroying the morale and business of others. Of course, this varies strongly between companies. None the less, these figures are alarming.

Disengagement at work is not only annoying and sad. As Stephan Schillerwein noted, also the productivity loss due to active disengagement is huge:

Also, as Chris McGrath and Ephraim Freed pointed out in their Social Intranets and Employee Engagement, the level of engagement has real business impacts:

Top-quartile companies have 37% less absenteeism, 25% to 49% less employee turnover (depending on the type of organization), 27% less shrinkage (employee theft), 18% higher productivity and 16% higher profitability.

Using the intranet to create engagement

We who are in charge of an intranet and other digital workplace tools must do what we can here. If we can help decrease absenteeism, decrease big turnovers, and increase productivity and profitability, we are sure doing a good thing.

To get started, we can look at Harvard Business Review’s Achievers Report. Here, they asked 550 executives to rate the importance of different activities on employee engagement. Some of the actions that were most important were:

Business goals communicated company-wide and understood
Senior leadership continually updates/communicates strategy
Recognition given for high performers
Individuals have clear understanding of how job contributes to strategy

This also goes fully in line with what Nonlinear Enterprise reported in their excellent article How to improve employee engagement with a great intranet:

… but virtually all of these studies agree that employee engagement increases when three things happen:

Employees clearly understand how their job contributes to the corporate mission – how they can personally make a difference
High performers are publicly recognized for their efforts
Leadership closes the loop, providing frequent, transparent updates on the success of corporate initiatives and changes in corporate strategy

Nonlinear Enterprise then goes on to mention three tactics we can use today to improve employee engagement:

Make celebration special, and clearly recognize when people are doing a great job.
Show how the contributions from individuals really matter when achieving the goals.
Clearly show the status of the company for all employees to see if what we are doing now is leading us closer to, or further away from, the goals.

Here, I would also add what Newsweaver mentioned in their 10 quick tips to improve employee engagement on your intranet:

Ensuring the intranet is accessible to remote workers. If you want all employees to use the intranet, then it must be mobile-enabled so they can access it wherever they are. Don’t cut corners in your mobile design. It is frustrating for those working remotely to not have access to the full functionality of the intranet – and gives them a reason to not use it.

In companies with a lot of production workers and traveling staff, we sure need to reach them with the celebrations, company goals, and strategies.

To conclude, low engagement is a real threat to companies and we need to deal with it constructively. Make sure you also use the intranet to:

Display and describe the company strategy and goals on your intranet, and keep them updated.
Make sure each individual understands and sees how they as individuals plus their departments and teams contribute to the bigger picture.
Praise people in front of others, and have them share successful stories with others.
Enable access for all employees, no matter where they are.

We will continue this journey, and look forward to hearing more about how others succeed.

Create – the fifth C and the humane digital workplace

This is the sixth post on my journey towards working with a humane digital workplace. It started with “Building a humane digital workplace” (listing the 5 Cs) and was followed up with “Connect“, “Communicate“, “Collaborate“ and “Coach“.

The fifth and final C is Create, and the 30.000 feet overview of our intent with Create is that we:

Are responsive, adaptive and open to new ideas
Dare to do things differently
Challenge the traditional ways of working
Come up with continuous improvements

Over the years, all companies change and create new ways of working. The idea here, is to being in charge of these changes, instead of only letting the outside world demand them from you. And these new, creative ways of working don’t always need to be revolutionary. For example, upgrading to a very well functioning intranet can make paper forms and administrative tasks a distant memory. Virtual teams distributed in time and space can work together, complementing traditional structures. And by introducing tools such as Yammer, we can replace some of the dark silos created by e-mail.

As a customer oriented company, we also constantly see if there are new ways to innovate. Also here, it is not always about revolutionizing everything at once. Rather, we constantly make sure our processes, tools, and skills evolve. Here, I also come back to the people that inspire me to do more and better:

Use Working Out Loud by John Stepper to bring ideas in to the open, and see where they take us.
Be inspired by other ways than e-mail to collaborate thanks to Luis Suárez, and others.
Use the current methods for communicating internally and externally thanks to experts like Rachel Miller and Gloria Lombardi.
Don’t journey alone. Let the Digital Workplace Group (DWG) and their friends guide you in modern ways of working.
With a new world comes a new way of learning. Let Harold Jarche and others guide you on this journey.
Collaboration is at the center of everything we do, as Oscar Berg and others clearly emphasize.

Now, the next step is to make sure we truly bridge the 5 Cs with the ideas from the digital workplace domain. The goal remains: Creating a humane digital workplace, based on our values and culture.

Communicate – the second C and the humane digital workplace

This is the third post in my journey towards working with a humane digital workplace. It started with “Building a humane digital workplace” (listing the 5 Cs) and followed up with “Connect – the first C and the humane digital workplace“.

The second of the Cs is Communicate, and the 30.000 feet overview of our intent with Communicate is:

Open, transparent and active communication are the keys to our success
Listen to others
Share information and knowledge

Here are my first thoughts when relating Communicate to typical things mentioned in the digital workplace:

Use the best available systems for communicating easily with any audience, including between employees. Move away from e-mail as far as possible, since it builds silos without meaningful context. Learn how to move from e-mail from experts like Claire Burge and Luis Suarez.
Create an updated communication plan based on our own needs, while learning from experts like Rachel Miller, Gloria Lombardi and more.
Ensure it is very easy to reach anyone, anywhere, from any device.
Don’t try to convince everyone at the same time when launching new tools. Instead, begin with the people that need it the most and build a solid business case from that.
Business intelligence must be channeled to the correct people in the right time.
All departments must share best practices and stories regularly.
Continue to keep a very detailed and clear use of our documents including archives.
Deliver and execute a new Learning & Development plan, including our version of learning at the workplace. Here, the ideas of experts like Harold Jarche, Kenneth Mikkelsen, and Jane Hart can help.

Yes, all of the above are major tasks for any organization. But they are for sure worth looking into. Going forward without effective ways to communicate, is a dead end for any company.

Connect – the first C and the humane digital workplace

A few weeks ago,, I published “Building a humane digital workplace“. It included a video from my employer Haldex, where we introduce you to the 5 Cs. These are 5 Cs that all employees should embrace and express in our work.

The first of these is Connect. Now I have started relating what we mean with Connect, to some items others have created regarding the digital workplace. Let’s start with the 30.000 feet overview of the meaning of Connect:

One Haldex approach
Connect the dots and understand the bigger picture
Connecting with each other to become a team

My first attempt at relating this to the digital workplace ended up in ideas like these:

Help all employees understand how we do business, so we move in the same direction.
We serve the users with news from the industry we act in.
Ensure people have full access to all necessary systems no matter where they are.
Ensure it is very simple to contact anyone directly, preferably from your mobile.
The Management Team should vocally support the Humane Digital Workplace.
The governance plan must include all aspects of the Humane Digital Workplace, and not only the intranet.
We must connect services to our mail, to draw the structural capital from individual mailboxes into open forums where we can discuss them.
Apply techniques like Working Out Loud (WOL) and Personal Knowledge Mastery (PKM) to let knowledge into the open and build a networking sharing habit.

Am I going in the right direction? Is something vital missing? This is hard but fun work, and all input is welcome.