THE JOURNAL OF INTERNAL - Internal Communication · THE JournaL of InTErnaL CommunICaTIon • VOLUME 9 TaCTICS How aVEVa conjured comms magic from its network of ambassadors 28 Debbie

The Journal of InternalCommunICatIon

VOLUME 9

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THE Journal of InTErnal CommunICaTIon • VOLUME 9

Foreword

There’s a sport called chess boxing. You step into a boxing ring and fight your

opponent for three minutes.

When the bell goes, you both sit

down and play chess for three

minutes – over and over again.

The hard part isn’t the boxing

or the chess – it’s the constant

switching between a full contact

bloodsport and a deep-thinking

strategy game.

People face the same challenge

at work when you ask them to

focus on where your company is

heading.

Often, they spend so long in the

ring – hopping from project to

project with inboxes they never

clear, and a growing guilt of

dozens of open to-dos – that when

you try to sit them down and show

them the big picture, they roll their

eyes and keep slugging it out.

Leadership doesn’t work if people

have to take off their gloves to

understand you.

That’s why storytelling is a great

way to lead.

With the right stories, you can

whisper encouragement from the

ropes. You can show them what

you’re fighting for while they’re

actually fighting for it.

If you’d like help crafting your

strategic story, that’s something

we can help you with. Get in touch

if you’d like to work with us. Enjoy

the issue.

Lee Smith

[email protected]

Simon Wright

[email protected]

2 www.internal-communication.com/joic

THE JournaL of InTErnaL CommunICaTIon • VOLUME 9

ContentsSTraTEGY

asking ‘Why?’ helped roche redefine its internal comms �� 4

Joanna Hall turned a stressful campaign into an opportunity for change, thanks to a ‘root cause analysis’ that revealed the way forward for internal comms…

Developing a central IC function at Laird �� 8

Starting an IC function from scratch to cover 9,000 employees from the ground up is a big task. VP of Communications and Marketing Paul Mottershead explains what steps he’s taken.

making it personal: how aXa uses communication psychology �� 12

Deborah de Satgé looks into the communica-tions psychology she applied, and the changes she made to increase engagement with HR communications at AXA.

oPInIonS

from finance to Energy – the challenges and rewards of moving between sectors �� 18

After over a decade in financial services, Chris White switched to utilities. He shares his experience of moving between sectors.

Breaking through to off-line audiences at Crossrail �� 22

Suzanne Goldberg talks about the challenge of having a disparate audience at Crossrail and the value of giving them visibility over the bigger picture.

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THE JournaL of InTErnaL CommunICaTIon • VOLUME 9

TaCTICS

How aVEVa conjured comms magic from its network of ambassadors �� 28

Debbie Install created a Global Ambassador Network to harness the passion of employees around the globe.

making the case for an employee comms app at Stansted airport �� 32

Internal Communications Channels Manager Zoe Spinks explains why creating an app was the next logical step for internal communications at Stansted Airport.

It’s ‘Show Time The Whole Time’ with aT&T’s Global newscast �� 36

Telecommunications giant AT&T beams a bi-weekly video newscast around the world to more than half its employee population. Lead IC Consultant Jimmy Rice explains.

CaSE STuDIES

How did Britvic get 94% of employees to engage with their flexible benefits programme? �� 42

Will Smith talks about the ‘back-to-basics’ approach that boosted participation to record levels and increased employee spend on optional benefits by a third.

making IT work at moody’s �� 48

Julie Pinsonneault shares the journey to a new searchable intranet, and shares her secret to a win-win relationship with IT.

Creating employee ambassadors at Coca-Cola Enterprises �� 52

Neil Jenkins has played a leading role in deve loping and delivering a programme that articulates CCE’s commitment to sustainability and its role in society.

Joanna Hall turned a stressful campaign into an opportunity for change, thanks to a ‘root cause analysis’ that revealed the way forward for internal comms…

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ASkING‘Why?’HELPEDRoche

REDEFINEITSInteRnal comms

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I’ve been Head of Internal Com-munications for the Operations division of Roche for nearly

four years. When I started here it was just me, but I’ve now grown the team to eight people. Together, we manage an audience of 2,500 people across 75 countries.

Every year, we run an end-of-year celebration campaign that showcases our division’s achieve-ments. Last year, this project caused some friction within the team, with stakeholders not being managed effectively and some efforts being duplicated.

We could have glossed over it, but instead I decided to bring the team together to find out what happened. I felt that there were some deeper issues stopping us delivering an efficient internal com-

munications service.

We had an internal facilitator come

in and run a ‘root cause analysis’.

It sounds complicated, but it’s a

simple method that helps you to

identify the root cause of a prob-

lem. We brainstormed a list of issues

to define problem state ments, like

‘We didn’t manage our stakeholders

effectively across the team’. Then

took each problem one by one and

delved into the layers of each issue by repeatedly asking ‘why’?

Why didn’t you manage your stake holders effectively? Because we didn’t all review the stakeholder management plan. Why didn’t you all review the stakeholder manage-ment plan? Because we didn’t have it as an agenda item in our full team meetings. The process helps you to


aSkInG ‘WHY’ HELPED roCHE rEDEfInE ITS InTErnaL CommS • JOANNA HALL

delve down into absolute granular detail. In this example, we now have standing agenda topics to review each of our campaigns as a full team each month, rather than just in our campaign team meetings. It gives everyone a better oversight of what’s expected of them, and insights into all the work we’re doing collectively, to see where there are touchpoints and possible opportunities to be more efficient or effective.

I was nervous about encouraging a blame culture, but it was actually a very open, honest environment. Having somebody independent was very useful because they set the ground rules, and managed the conversation with complete objectivity.

The session was a huge turning point for us. It made us realize that we hadn’t been clear on what responsi-

bilities everybody shouldered and the risks and opportunities that were present. As a result, everybody was inter preting the process differently – and it was causing friction.

Asking ‘why’ again revealed some-thing interesting: the reason we weren’t aligned was that nobody was clear on what we actually offer-ed. As a team we had a number of skills – consultancy skills, project management and of course com-mu nication expertise – but we didn’t have a strong, standardised process for how we approached each project and set our customers’ expectations.

We agreed that we needed a very clear client intake process to manage our stakeholders.

THrEE LEVELS of SErVICENow we’ve developed a process that maps everything that we do – from when the customer requests

help, through to when we deliver and close out our work. This helps us determine up front what level of service we can provide.

The first level is consultancy and advice – an hour’s worth of our time to advise them on their commu-nications projects. Some people come to us asking for help to develop a communications plan, for example. We sit down with them, then they go away and do it.

Support is our second level and provides a bit more hands-on support: they do the majority of the work, but we guide them and help them deliver.

Finally, the third level is what we call the construct level. It’s much more resource intensive – we own the project plan and deliver mostly everything ourselves. This kind of project is usually not just tactical;

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it’s long-term and is meant to have a huge business impact. We insist on measurement.

We’re also now very clear on what services we don’t offer, which is equally important. In these cases we refer our customers to another team in-house, or we have a list of preferred vendors, who we’d recommend they connect with.

BEnEfITSRealising that we had all these skills but we weren’t working in the most efficient way was a real light bulb moment. We came out of this session with huge smiles on our faces and a tangibly strength-ened team bond – we knew we’d be using our skills in the right way going forward.

Our productivity levels are much higher, because we’re clear on our responsibilities and how we

actually deliver our services. It’s definitely taken the team onto the next level of maturity, in terms of how we are working together, and how we ‘sell’ our services and demonstrate value.

Because we’ve got clear objectives and measurements in place, we can turn to our customers and actually demonstrate that we are achieving their communication ob jectives. Communications are aligned to business objectives

because we do the appropriate contracting right from the start.

We’ve also developed the compe-tency and understanding of good communications within our organi-sation. Some of our stakeholders have been shy about coming for-ward because they thought we wouldn’t want to be bothered with them. We now give an hour of our time to anybody, which is helping us have a greater impact within the business.

BIoGRaphy • JOANNA HALL Jo has a wealth of experience managing global clinical projects, business initiatives and organisational change. She has been heading-up the Internal Communications group for the Operations division at Roche, a Swiss pharmaceutical company, for almost four years. She holds an Honours degree, Post Grad Diploma and is

about to embark on a Masters in Internal Communication to fuel that passion for all things Comms!

Starting an IC function from scratch to cover 9,000 employees from the ground up is a big task. VP of Communications and Marketing Paul Mottershead explains what steps he’s taken.

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Developing a central IC funCtIon

atLaIrd

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Laird PLC is a 115 year old company which has grown through acquisition – result-

ing in businesses which operated

independently but in common

markets. Three years ago, under

a new CEO, the company started

going through huge change –

becoming more integrated and

operating as a more coordinated

company. Two years ago, I joined

Laird with part of my remit being

to put a formal internal commu-

nication strategy and team in

place. At that time, IC was main-

ly managed by HR teams and

local managers disseminating

their own messages. This was a

major challenge because of the

geographical dispersion of staff

– 6,000 of the 9,000 employees

are in Asia – and communicate in

multiple languages.

GooD PraCTICE, LImITED rESourCESThe first thing I did was to visit as many sites as I could and speak to lots of people. I found we had no real internal comms prior to my arrival, and no internal comms resources beyond a very old intranet, used initially as a document repository, with a thin communications layer over it. What we did have was a lot of good practice. Many sites did excellent regular briefings to employees. In Asia, they did some really good newsletters. The first step was identifying, and trying to get some of the other business units to adopt that good practice.

BuILDInG a STraTEGYHaving done the audit and understood where the business was going and what the challenges

were, I started to design a strategy. With the hiring of an internal comms manager, we reviewed some of the good practice and looked at how to replicate them - developing processes that could be shared across the organisation. We put some templates in place to implement a more formalized structure, a common look and feel, and language – we embedded a few controls, just to make sure we achieved some core consistentcy.

It’s been about getting the basics right first. The problem wasn’t the content – there are plenty of great stories taking place across Laird; it was surfacing it and sharing it in a timely manner. For example, we wanted to make better use of the intranet. We used to publish most things via email, now we put more on the intranet and send


DEVELoPInG a CEnTraL IC funCTIon aT LaIrD • PAUL MOTTERSHEAD

a summary email telling people what’s available; we cut down their inbox count, while providing the information in a more dynamic way.

DELIVErInG THE mESSaGEA key aim has been to be consistent in our messaging. We have an internal mantra of innovation, reliable fulfilment, and speed. That came from a management meeting a couple of years ago, it exemplifies the way we do things in Laird, and it’s stuck. It really resonates with people, so we keep going back to this as a part of our differentiation strategy. When we send out communications, we always frame it so it fosters more of the same: “This is an example of innovation,” or, “This is a really good example of delivering with speed”.

We want to keep improving the channels. I’d like to develop an app-based platform to replace or supplement our intranet. Many of our people, particularly in Asia, don’t have a PC. But everyone’s got a smartphone. We use apps more and more for our events, hooking it into an internal network to retrieve documents and processes seems to me like the right way forward whilst reducing our reliance and cost on expensive IT infrastructure (which will make our IT team happy!)

Last year we implemented an ‘Essentials of leadership’ training programme, a one week-course targeted at all of our top 250 leaders, right up to the Chief Executive. We’re currently run-ning ‘Essentials of leadership 2’. That’s been a great help in driving

understanding of the need for

internal comms at the top.

CHaLLEnGES of SuCCESSI haven’t yet done a communication

survey as such, but I can see

the benefits by the feedback we

get. Since we’ve started internal

comms, the floodgates have

opened and we’re involved in an

increasing number of projects

at a much earlier stage. It’s been

a challenge to keep up with the

workload and still have time to

continue developing the function.

The company has very dynamic

targets. We aim to treble in size

which means that none of us can

just work harder or do the same

things that we do today in a better

way. We have to change the way

the company operates and the

tools and processes we use –

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without damaging our fan tastic culture. Communication is a critical element of that. We’re introducing a new ERP system – a significant change in a global company with such a diverse geography as ours – this is a critical activity in our growth plans but one which will cause significant disruption. Getting our people to understand the need and willingly support its implementation is key to our success.

I’m developing the central team,

so we’ll have three new people by

this time next year. But I recognise

that proximity is critical and want

to also develop the network

further – people need to bring

messages together locally.

We will run our first communi-

cations survey later this year. We’ll

set up some regional focus groups

as well, to see what traction we’ve

got in the last 12 months or so.

LESSonS LEarnEDStarting an IC department from

scratch to cover 9,000 people

is a big task, but if you’re doing

something similar, these are the

two key things I would advise you

to bear in mind.

Be careful how much you take on

to start off with. Sit down with

senior stakeholders, understand

their expectations and deliver

those well. keep it narrow,

develop value in some key areas,

and then look to broaden out.

That will open up opportunities

for more resources and you can

build from that.

Be clear on messages. Get some

consistency and then some co-

hesion. Don’t change language,

especially in multinationals. Get

the language right to start off with,

and stick with it unless something

fundamentally changes.

BIoGRaphy • PAUL MOTTERSHEAD As VP for Communications and Marketing at Laird PLC, Paul is responsible for providing Laird with capabilities that deliver focused, consistent and cohesive messages to both internal and external audiences globally. Paul has held senior Communications posts for over 15 years in global organisations including Thales and BAE Systems.

Deborah de Satgé is Head of internal communication at aXa PPP healthcare. Here she looks into the communications psychology she applied, and the changes she made to increase engagement with Hr communications, as well as to collaborate with Hr more regularly.

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makInG It peRsonal: HOW aXa USES communIcatIon

psycholoGy

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HR policies and procedures are a large part of mana-gers’ lives, but by no

means their favourite topic to read about in our communication channels. A recent audit showed that HR communications were not well liked. People, and particularly managers, felt that HR communication was bossy, used too much technical jargon, put process ahead of purpose and used the word ‘mandatory’ far too freely! Armed with this evi-dence, I persuaded HR to let me experi ment with a very different approach to both language and style on a discrete HR topic – performance management.

nuDGED To CHanGEI’d long been interested in Nudge theory, as practiced by behavioural economists at the Cabinet office.

For example, a few years ago, the

government launched a campaign

to get people to insulate their

houses by offering them free

insulation. Surprisingly, very few

people took them up. The Nudge

Unit looked into it and found that

people couldn’t be bothered to

clear their lofts in order to put

the insulation down, even when

it was free. They realised that the

rewards of free insulation and

reduced heating bills were not

strong enough to win against the

sheer effort required to clear the

space. So the team advised a new

approach – offer to clear the loft

for people, but charge them for

the insulation. Far more people

took up the offer. The lesson?

Removal of barriers and making it

easy is a stronger motivator than

getting something for nothing.

Another finding of the Nudge Unit is around the power of social inclusion – you may have seen signs at supermarket checkouts telling you how much fruit and vegetables other people have in their baskets, or the recent campaign to take litter home (other people do). People like to feel part of the social norm and will take action if they feel they are outsiders.

Communications about perfor-mance management tended to focus far more on the process – having a review meeting and documenting it on the HR system by a certain date – than on the quality of the conversation, let alone the benefits of managing performance really well. I wanted to turn it around completely. I wanted to show managers that


makInG IT PErSonaL: HoW aXa uSES CommunICaTIon PSYCHoLoGY • DEBORAH DE SATGé

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we trusted them to be able to

do their job well, to reposition to

both employees and managers

the reason why it’s important to

manage performance properly

and to have a very light touch

when reminding people of the

deadlines (no more nagging). So

for employees we told them “this is

about you and your development,

so make your manager give you

the attention you deserve”. With

managers we made it more simple

and trusting in our manager ezine:

“You’re a manager, you know

this stuff and how to do it. But if

you want any help, here’s a one-

pager” (as opposed to the 52

page PowerPoint presentation

held on the intranet!). Reminders

were decidedly un-naggy “Just

a gentle reminder, the deadline

is coming up. I’m sure you’ve

already got it in hand, but just in case you haven’t...” and following nudge principles, “Most people have completed their reports on the systems – thank you. For the few who haven’t, the deadline is coming up”. Managers’ feedback on the new approach was that they massively preferred the new tone of voice and felt more inclined to respond to it positively. The opening rate of our electronic messages rose significantly. About 87% clicked through to the article – compared to about 30% previously. Best of all, 94% of managers completed the documentation by the deadline, which had never happened before – so a very good outcome for HR.

rESEarCH anD DEVELoPmEnTOff the back of that success, I

have started to get more people

interested in the idea of using

neuroscience and psychology in

the way we handle the people

side of change. In common

with every organisation, we do

a huge amount of change here

on a continual basis and have

well-honed project management

practices. And yet, every year in

our annual survey, people tell us

we don’t help people through

change well. Change sets up un-

certainty, and neuroscience shows

that our subconscious brain reacts

to protect us from the potential

dangers that uncertainty may

bring. Too often we focus on

getting the process or the system

in place, but don’t consider the

reaction of employees to the

change, we just expect them to

get on with it. An obvious starting


makInG IT PErSonaL: HoW aXa uSES CommunICaTIon PSYCHoLoGY • DEBORAH DE SATGé

point was in organisational design changes. Happily we don’t do huge amounts of these, but when we do we traditionally take a risk-averse HR approach, where the priority is on making sure we adhere to employment law and success is seen as no formal grievances being raised, rather than the speed at which people settled into efficient working post-change!

I spoke to people in areas where they had had restructures and found that poor communication greatly compounded the natural anxiety caused by the change itself. So we examined and rewrote everything from the initial announcements through all the formal scripts and letters, writing for the audience, not for the speaker or for HR. For example,

I found that for consistency,

every script and every letter

would start with the same long

preamble covering the rationale

– a rationale which employees

had already been given. So at a

point when all you want to know

is ‘have I still got a job?’ you

would have to read through the

best part of an A4 page to get to

the bit that tells you. And if that

wasn’t bad enough, the language

was incredibly corporate and

cold, with managers doing

consultations being advised to

stick firmly to the script. My

task, therefore, was to put some

humanity back into the process,

and to help managers through

what is a very uncomfortable

situation. Obviously, change that

involves redundancy situations

is never likely to be a pleasant

experience; my aim is to make it a

bit less unpleasant by using more

natural language, being sensitive

People like to feel part of the

social norm and will take action if they feel they are

outsiders.

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to the needs of the recipient and recognising the stress both employee and manager are under at the time.

STEPPInG onWe’re still at the early stages of using psychology and neuro-science in our communi cations. Later this year I really want to get in with the local change managers, who are responsible for the vast majority of change communication on the ground, and whose communication skills are very varied. My plan is to demonstrate success by working on a few discrete projects and then start to ‘infect’ others who have communication responsi-bilities within their departments. I wish I had done this sooner. I wasted quite a lot of time trying to persuade people to be

interested in the theory without

giving them the practical side.

Pick a problem – preferably some-

thing measurable, like perform-

ance management, but where you

could hopefully make a tangible

improvement. If you can say, “We

shifted this. We’ve got a better

result”, then people will take

notice.

BIoGRaphy • DEBORAH DE SATGé

Deborah de Satgé has been head of internal communication at

AXA PPP healthcare for 16 years. During that time her role, the

department’s purpose and the work itself have changed considerably

and internal communication is now seen as a strategic enabler for

the business,

Deborah spent many years working in politics for the Conservative

Party, firstly managing the approved list for prospective parliamentary

candidates and then managing the Political Office in 10 Downing

Street for both Margaret Thatcher and John Major.

From there she moved to an events management company where

her role was to help shift the business away from event management

and into communication consultancy. She was seconded to AXA PPP

healthcare, a client, to help with communications when they were

bought by Guardian and then AXA – and never left!

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after over a decade in financial services, Chris White switched to utilities. He shares his experience of moving between sectors as a senior internal communicator.

FROM FInance TO eneRGy -THE challenGesAND ReWaRds OFMOVING BETWEEN SECTORS

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I spent 11 years in financial services, including nine in internal communications and

engagement. However, the culture changed in the aftermath of the crisis, which prompted me to look for a new opportunity. I knew I wanted to work in a big organi-sation, as they offer good support networks and the resources to achieve a lot more. When an opportunity came up at EDF Energy, one of the Uk’s largest energy companies, I was excited at the prospect of working in a sector that plays such a vital role in our everyday lives.

orGanISaTIonaL DIffErEnCESI’ve been leading internal com-munications and engagement for the Customers business at EDF Energy for almost four years now.

A central communications de-partment oversees EDF Energy’s external communications and em ployee engagement, but the Customers’ Internal Communi ca-tions department is decentralised. My team of 10 communicators supports internal communications for a diverse audience of approxi-mately 6,000 employees: 3,000 people in call centres; a significant number of employees out in the field – meter readers, fitters, repairers; analyst roles such as the optimisation team working on hedging, even weather prediction and how that might impact supply and demand. Finally, we have approximately 1,000 people in management jobs.

Investment banking was generally controlled from the centre. We had a centralised intranet and

messages were pushed out from

one source to everybody on a

regional basis. At EDF Energy, I

work at a regional Uk level rather

than a global level. Although the

workforce I communicate to is as

big and diverse, I’m travelling to

Hove, Exeter or Crawley, rather

than New York or Luxembourg.

CuLTurE DIffErEnCESThe major change though was in

working with the trade unions.

Utilities have much higher trade

union membership and managing

communications in partnership

with the trade unions on a number

of issues was a new experience

for me. From a communications

point of view, it has been about

adapting what I do to ensure the

right processes are followed.

There’s also a difference in


from fInanCE To EnErGY - THE CHaLLEnGES anD rEWarDS of moVInG BETWEEn SECTorS • CHRIS WHITE

culture. EDF Energy is the Uk’s

largest producer of low-carbon

electricity and operates eight

nuclear power stations at sites

across the country, so health and

safety is embedded in our culture.

On my first day, I sat down at

my desk and within half an hour

somebody I’d never met before

just walked past and pointed out

that my bag was a trip hazard.

We have regular internal aware-

ness campaigns on topics such as

our ‘simple actions’. These simple actions highlight that what might be perceived as small actions could cause quite significant injuries, such as not holding the handrail on the stairs. There’s also a general focus at EDF Energy on healthy physical and mental well-being, providing things like stress management tool kits and physical fitness clubs. I enjoy the culture here; that focus on well-being, a more caring culture with better support.

There are some commonalities between my old and current role. Both investment banking and energy have a high profile in the media and politically. Therefore, it’s critical we communicate the positive stories to our people, such as where we’re innovating our customer experience, so they can share our successes.

mY PErSonaL aDVICEThe most important piece of advice I could give is to understand the organisational structure and where to go for information. That should be your first priority. I looked at the organisational charts so I could understand who did what and how they all worked with one another. If you’re going to be a successful internal communicator in a big organisation, you have to know your way around.

In a big organisation how you get there might be different, but

the core skills are often the same.

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I’d also advise choosing a com-pany that you genuinely like. At EDF Energy, my colleagues and I are all passionate about doing the right thing for customers, in particular supporting our vulner-able customers. We’re also trying to address one of the biggest challenges facing the sector at EDF Energy – climate change and our future energy mix.

Lastly I’d tell you to focus on similarities. The sectors I’ve spent most of my career in are quite different, but there are similarities. The scale is similar, so are the channels. In a big organisation how you get there might be different, but the core skills are often the same. You need to write well, understand your audiences, be a good relationship builder, you

need to plan and influence your

stakeholders. One of the first

things I did at EDF Energy was to

go around and speak to people,

doing so gave me a great deal of

insight. That’s the same in any

sector because you’re dealing

with people and the messages

you have to give them. You can

learn about any company, but

the key skills are harder to teach,

and they’re transferrable.

BIoGRaphy • CHRIS WHITEChris White is Head of Internal Communi cations & Engagement for EDF Energy’s Customers business, an operation of over 6,000 employees responsible for the supply of gas and electricity to residential and business customers across the Uk. Since joining EDF Energy in 2011, Chris has led a large team of communications &

engagement professionals, overseeing a wide range of projects from major organisational restructures to the business’s sponsorship of London 2012.

Before that, Chris spent 11 years at J.P. Morgan Asset Management, most recently as Vice-President of Internal Communications, EMEA. Originally from Derbyshire, Chris now lives in Stockwell, South London and counts singing tenor in a choir, overseas travel and supporting Derby County F.C. among his main interests.

22

Suzanne Goldberg talks about the challenge of having a disparate audience at Crossrail and the value of giving them visibility over the bigger picture.

BREAkING THROUGH TOoFF-lIne audIences AT cRossRaIl

23


I’m currently working as an internal communications officer for Crossrail, Europe’s

largest infrastructure project, building the new high frequency, high capacity railway for London and the South East.

Crossrail is unique from any other organisation I’ve worked at before. At any one time we have up to 11,000 people working on the project. Around 3,000 of them work for Crossrail Ltd or one of our project partners, and are on the Crossrail IT system; the other 8,000 work for contractors across 40 construction sites. Each of these construction companies has its own communications systems; so how do we reach out to all the contractors who are digging the tunnels, building the stations, or are getting ready to lay the

tracks in early autumn? We want

to make sure that everyone from

carpenters to crane drivers feel

part of Crossrail as a whole, not

just their own company or the site

they’re working on.

I manage a series of channels

including: the Crossrail intranet

news pages, a weekly email

newsletter, a senior leader blog,

and Toolbox Talks – talks about

health, safety, the environment

and sustainability, which each

site delivers every week. I also

provide content for our monthly

newspaper that goes out to all our

construction sites.

GIVInG VISIBILITY of THE BIGGEr PICTurEI always get really excited about

wanting people to see the bigger

picture. Once a month I join our

CEO at a breakfast meeting at one of the sites with about 15 construction workers. He likes to get a feel for what people working on the project think. He always wants to know about health and safety on site, but he also asks people, ‘what are you working on?’ People usually answer Farringdon station or Paddington station rather than Crossrail – because their focus is on the specific contract they’re working on. It’s important to remind people what a huge project they’re contributing to, and that they’re helping to build this brand new railway that’s going to make a massive difference to London and leave a lasting legacy.

We like to celebrate milestones. Tunnelling has been a major milestone in the project. At the


BrEakInG THrouGH To off-LInE auDIEnCES aT CroSSraIL • SUZANNE GOLDBERG

beginning of June our final tunnel boring machine, Victoria, broke through into Farringdon station – joining up all our tunnels under central London. This means our heavy civil engineering work is coming to an end, and a whole new team of systems and operations people are coming on board to build the trains, install the power, signalling and communications systems, and lay the track. We had 11,000 commemoration badges made and shipped to our sites to mark the end of tunnelling; every person who wants one can have one to show that they worked on this project. I wear mine with pride on my jacket lapel – which my friends think is hilarious!

We also have operational messages to share with anyone involved in the project. For

We run big briefings at sites as well as

smaller group discussions – where senior directors

talk to the teams about their challenges.

It’s important for directors to recognise the people, the successes and the

challenges on site.

25


example, safety is our most im-portant value, and one of our principles is that ‘we all have the right to go home unharmed every day’. Here again, we try to make sure we reach everyone. Each site and contractor does its own local safety briefing that you have to go through before accessing the site. We’ve recently launched a new Project-wide Induction to try to make it more joined up; anyone who regularly works at any of our sites has to do this induction – no matter who they work for.

rEaCHInG ouT rIGHT aCroSS LonDon We run big briefings at sites as well as smaller group discussions - where senior directors talk to the teams about their challenges. It’s important for directors to re-cognise the people, the successes


BrEakInG THrouGH To off-LInE auDIEnCES aT CroSSraIL • SUZANNE GOLDBERG

and the challenges on site. And it’s also really important for anyone working on the project to see the senior leaders speaking passionately about what they believe in. People need to see the passion and enthusiasm right from the top.

Probably the most efficient chan nel is the smaller, face-to-face briefings teams have at the start of their shifts. They’re generally led by the contractor site managers and are operational; focused on the tasks they have to perform that day. One of our ideas is to use those briefings to communicate wider messages. We’re about to trial a new process where we provide a nugget of news from across the project to be included in the next day’s briefing, for example a successful handover, or a milestone reached –

27


so people can feel the excitement

when something important has

happened, and know how it may

impact their work.

We have a really great awards

scheme, based on our five values:

Safety, Collaboration, Integrity,

Inspiration and Respect. Monthly

values awards recognise the great

work people (or teams) have done

on a local level. Monthly winners

are then put forward for a quarterly

award, and then the quarterly

winners are invited to an annual

awards ceremony – where they

could win an annual award. It’s not

particularly fancy, but it’s a great

opportunity for people to come

together from right across the

project – and we make sure we tell

the stories using all our channels.

Top of my wish list for Crossrail,

would be a news app for site-

based staff. It would mean that it

also doesn’t matter what email or communications system you’re on – so long as you have a smartphone or tablet. I know Balfour Beatty have trialled it with construction workers with great results. But as a publicly funded project we need to be smart about where we invest – so there’s a bit more work to be done to see if it’s a viable opportunity.

For me, though, the best thing about working on Crossrail is knowing what a difference it will make to people’s lives. Whenever I visit our site at Farringdon it takes me about 40 minutes from our office in Canary Wharf, with at least one interchange. In three years time I’ll be able to do it door to door in less than 10 minutes. Now that’s something worth shout-ing about!

BIoGRaphy • SUZANNE GOLDBERGSuzanne worked for the BBC making children’s radio programmes until she decided to take a career break to do an MA in Acting at East 15 Acting School. Since then she’s juggled acting on stage and screen with contracting work in some high profile organisations including the Department for Business, Innovation and

Skills, Barnardo’s and the Metropolitan Police. She’s been at Crossrail since January 2015.

28

aVEVa’s Debbie Install created a Global ambassador network to harness the passion of employees around the globe.

HOW AVEVA CONJURED comms maGIcFROM ITS NETWORk OFamBassadoRs

29


AVEVA is a technology company. We create engineering, design and information

management software that helps

the process plant, power and

marine industries design, build

and operate facilities and ships

across the globe.

I’m the Head of Global Internal

Communications, and one objec-

tive that I’ve been set by the

Executive team is to stop us

appearing to be too Cambridge-

centric to our 1,700 employees in

50 countries.

GLoBaL amBaSSaDor nETWorkOne way we’re addressing this

is through a Global Ambassador

Network. The idea itself isn’t new

– many organisations have comms

champions. In fact, when I joined

we already had a similar network

of 50 people across the globe.

However, like a lot of organisations

we weren’t using them effectively.

Some of them were only on the

list because they’d been told to

be a champion.

We decided that what we really

wanted were people who were true

ambassadors for AVEVA. People

who really felt passionate about

the organisation, but who wanted

to develop themselves as well.

To elevate the programme, and

communicate that it’s something

really important to the organisa-

tion, we decided that we didn’t

want people to take on the full

role of ambassador forever but

that they’d do it for six months,

and pass on the duties to another

suitable candidate in their region,

but of course remain an ‘ambas-

sador’ in spirit. Eventually, we’d

end up with quite a lot of the

organisation having experienced

being ambassadors and continu-

ing to support the cause in their

daily roles in AVEVA.

We also branded this as an

exercise from two senior

executives – rather than an

initiative from internal comms.

They champion the network,

and personally welcome all the

ambassadors, underlining that it’s

taken seriously.

CHooSInG amBaSSaDorSRecruiting good ambassadors is

where ‘comms champion’ networks

often falter. Instead of waiting for

people to apply, we reached out

to individuals we thought would

be great. We asked our Regional


HoW aVEVa ConJurED CommS maGIC from ITS nETWork of amBaSSaDorS • DEBBIE INSTALL

Operations Managers around the world to work with line managers to identify and invite people they thought would be right for the role.

We’ve been able to recruit people who are developers, finance people – we’ve even recruited a sales person. It’s quite an achievement to convince a sales person to focus on something other than their targets for the quarter! I think we’ve got one from most of the different roles we have in the organisation.

Often with comms champions, people aren’t clear what responsi-bilities they’re taking on. We came up with a formal role profile for our Global Ambassador Network. We make it clear that this is addi-tional to their current role, and that they don’t get paid extra – but what they can do is put this on their per formance record, and it’ll be

recorded at the end of the year that they’ve done this extra piece of activity. We effectively strike a deal: there’s something for you and there’s something for the organisa-tion. We also provide communi-cation skills development through professional networks, Webinars and the sharing of case studies etc.

Don’T PICk JunIor PEoPLEIn the past, people selected very junior roles to be internal comms champions. You’d ask the receptionist, or the admin assistant.

That’s because these schemes are sometimes made to sound like a ‘post box’ job – putting up posters and printing name badges for events.

I think that’s a mistake. We actually chose people based on their skills, so we cut across a spectrum of

roles. We’ve got a couple who are senior managers, and then we’ve got middle managers. We’ve tried to avoid just going for people in junior positions – we wanted people who could talk with lots of credibility, and people who others would come and talk to.

With the Global Ambassador Network, if one of our Executive Team is preparing for a regional

31


visit and we’re going to run a meet and greet event over there, the appointed Regional Ambassador will actually be hosting it with the Executive team. It’s a completely different ball game than somebody who’s just sending stuff out.

amBaSSaDor fEEDBaCkIt’s early days, but we’ve already had several successes.

Obviously, AVEVA has the usual employee survey and a few other carefully chosen channels. What we didn’t have is really good, instant feedback – a temperature check that we could call on at any time. That’s definitely one thing the ambassadors excel at.

Recently we had to send a message out that wasn’t positive, and we wanted to make sure we gave some honest and direct feedback to our

Executive team about how it had landed. So, as it was going out we sent a note out to our ambassadors to give advance notice that a message was about to go out, and could they give us any feedback as it hit their areas. They came back within minutes. We had a full report that we could take straight back to our leaders, to help us understand the reaction across the globe.

oTHEr THInGS You Can DoIt’s got to the point now where our ambassadors contact us when

some thing’s happened. They’ll share bril liant community news stories, CSR activities, or any great events that are happening in the regions.

That information goes out onto our intranet on a section that’s called ‘all about us’. At the end of May, we probably only had two stories that were from Cambridge – the rest of them were from our regions.

That’s something we wouldn’t have been able to do without our global network of ambassadors.

BIoGRaphy • DEBBIE INSTALL Debbie Install wants to live in a world where shoes, chocolate and bottles of wine are free… and good manners are compulsory. When she’s not communicating with lots of people in lots of countries about important stuff (of course), you can find her sat in the garden – weather permitting – reading a book and relaxing.

32

Internal Communications Channels manager Zoe Spinks explains why creating an app was the next logical step for internal communications at Stansted airport.

MAkING THE CASE FOR AN employeecomms app AT STANSTED AIRPORT

33


I love the variety of my job and the fact that we are normally the first point of contact for

our colleagues, as it helps me

understand what is happening

across our business. We are

often the eyes and ears for the

organisation and it’s important

that we find out what’s going on.

Our colleagues trust us and they

need to feel confident that we

are going to address issues or

concerns which can range from

their rest room being a mess

to questions around the latest

balanced scorecard. Being the

first point of contact also helps

us build trust with our directors

– they understand that we are

normally the team who has a good

overview of what’s happening

across the airport and generally

find out what’s going on.

Across Manchester Airport Group

we have more than 4,500 col-

leagues who are based at four

different sites, Manchester, Stan-

sted, East Midlands and Bourne-

mouth. From these 4,500, more

than half are colleagues who

are at the front line and are the

face of our business. These guys

generally don’t have access to

emails or PCs, so it can be difficult

to get a message to them. One of

the first questions I asked when

joining was “Do we have an app?”

as it seemed the logical thing to

me. The operation is so busy that

having time to sit down and absorb

a newsletter isn’t always possible.

Given that, it seemed logical to

develop an app to reach this

audience; it’s accessible by many

more people than we can reach

by email and you’re not pushing

the content in their faces. It’s on their personal devices and is free to download. We undertook a big project and had Wi-Fi enabled in all nine of our colleague rest areas at Stansted, because we know people are likely to download it if they don’t have to use their own data packages.

makInG THE CaSEThis was the first business case I’d had to build, and was quite a daunting task to begin with. However, with a strong supportive team and clear guidelines I built the case for moving forward with an app. That was one of the first lessons in terms of a business case; how to make it strong. I knew what I wanted it to say and do but that passion and faith has to be backed up with solid data and evidence. I collated data on


makInG THE CaSE for an EmPLoYEE CommS aPP aT STanSTED aIrPorT • ZOE SPINkS

the number of colleagues with PC

access, the scores they gave us in

our annual colleague survey with

regard to communications and

also data from the outside world

around smart phone usage.

The arguments for proved to be

really compelling, and pre sent ed

as a package of other activity

to build engagement, the app

concept really captured every-

one’s imagination. The app was

mentioned in a presentation along-

side our engagement strategy

which was presented by Head of

Internal Comms Anna Russell. It

was picked up on quickly. “Ooh,

an app?” Tell us more about that.”

It was then a case of yes, we love

it, go for it!

From the initial idea, to having

an app ready to go was about

6 months. The team at The-

AppBuilder are just fantastic to

work with.

There were some challenges as we

worked through the various risk

and assurance processes which

large organisations have for safe

guarding purposes, but ensuring

we had the right measures in

place to monitor content going

into the app and making sure it

was compliant was essential.

As a result of the business case

and for the benefit of future app

developments we identified a

need for all colleagues to have an

email address and using these as

unique log-ins. We can then look

to personalise the app and tailor

it to each colleague. Colleagues

could securely access their annual

leave, wage slips etc. via the app.

It’s about the opportunity to

build on the app’s capability and

functions.

Since launching two weeks ago

over a quarter of the population

have already downloaded the

app, and almost all of those have

supplied feedback and suggestions

for the next phase, we which we

are working to implement.

35


WHaT’S on THE aPP?There’s a lot of content going in to

the app which will be updated on

a daily basis. There’s a group page

and one for each of the airports,

all with the same structure; group

news headlines, localised news,

leadership galleries, key contacts,

MD news, links to social media,

vacancies, Google Translate (for

our operational teams), our

weekly newsletter and lots more!

We also have nomination forms

for our employee recognition

scheme, VIP, Values in Practice.

The direct link allows colleagues

to nominate their peers in recog-

nition of going above and beyond

in their role against one of our

values. We have five values:

‘Finger on the pulse’, ‘Brilliant

at what matters’, ‘Why not?’,

‘Power of team work’ and ‘Safe

Hands’. For example, ‘Why Not?’

is about allowing our people to

be innovative, to ask, “Hey, why

not? Why can’t we do this?” I’m

actually awarding a Why Not?

pin badge today. A member of

our security team came up with a

design for a poster to display the

data from the annual employee

survey. It was a brilliant design

and one which can be duplica-

ted across other departments. A

perfect example of Why Not?

LESSonS anD aDVICECreating an app was the next

logical step for our communica-

tions. We needed a solution for

reaching our frontline teams and

the app solved that for us. It puts

news, information at their finger-

tips and encourages that two way

conversation.

If I was to offer advice, I’d say

surround yourself with a great

team, listen to your stakeholders,

build your business case, believe

in it, be passionate about it and

most importantly, want to be the

driver for change.

BIoGRaphy • ZOE SPINkSZoe Spinks is Internal Communications Channels Manager at Stansted Airport. After working in finance in the early part of her career she retrained in HR, joining Stansted in her current role two years ago.

36

Telecommunications giant aT&T beams a bi-weekly video newscast around the world to more than half its employee population. Lead IC Consultant Jimmy rice explains…

‘shoW tImeWhole tIme’WITH

AT&T’S GloBalneWscast

THE

IT’S

37


AT&T is a global telecommunications company with over 240,000 employees around

the world. We run a bi-weekly TV

newscast called ‘Around The Globe’

that covers what is happening

with in our company as well what

might impact us externally. It goes

out every Tuesday and Thursday.

Most shows are less than three

minutes long. The newscast gives

employees the headlines, and

they can then visit our intranet for

more details.

Most employees watch it from

their desktop or laptop, but also

increasingly from mobile devices. Some of them are desk-based but a lot of them are mobile in the field – technicians or sales representatives.

ToPICS CoVErEDOur company is increasingly mov-ing towards being a tech nology company, and the stories we cover help our employees understand what it means. We cover all sorts of stories – customer stories, marketing campaigns, HR updates or leadership messages.

We also talk about HR messages, which in many organisations don’t

resonate with people. However, the latest big changes to our vacation policies happen to be our biggest story so far. Over 70,000 people watched that episode because we managed to show how it would impact them personally, so it resonated with them.

The newscast has also proved to be very effective at making our CEO and other leaders more ap-proachable. Throughout the year we run our Leader Series where we interview our executive team on or off set about the direction of the company. It lasts around

The newscast has also proved to be very effective at making our CEO and other leaders more approachable.


IT’S ‘SHoW TImE THE WHoLE TImE’ WITH aT&T’S GLoBaL nEWSCaST • JIMMY RICE

five minutes and we get about 38,000 views from the first show. The CEO is always a hot topic. Frontline employees don’t really know him so those shows are very helpful. People like seeing leaders in such a casual way, and in a short amount of time. Town halls last an hour and people can’t always con-sume that much information. The newscast gives them those high level views of where we’re heading as a company – they love it.

Around The Globe goes out to every single employee. But we have started to develop local ver-sions of it – there’s Business Beat which is just for our mobility and business solutions teams – about 12,000 employees in that area. We update them on what we’re doing to support B2B, business to business activity, as well as our

mobile activity – what’s happening

in those worlds. We have plans to

develop other local versions.

CHaLLEnGESOne of our initial challenges was

wondering if we would have

enough to share. Now it’s the

opposite. Some people come to

us with stories that are not appro-

priate for this medium. The other

issue is that you always need some

sights to go along with the sound

– it has to be visual.

There have been good stories with

technicians out in the field helping

people. Once a plane crashed on

the highway and we showed how

our technicians used their training

to respond. We used pictures that

people had taken on their phones

and then interviewed a few people

who were there. This type of story

works really well because it’s visual.

Of course that content doesn’t

come every day.

We’ve also tried to educate people

on what this medium has to offer

and what is a good story. We always

ask, “Why should they care?” If it

doesn’t really apply to every single

employee across the company, we

tell them to use a different medium.

The timing is also a challenge. The

stories have to be approved before

people leave work, so we need to

be very responsive and quick. We

also need to capture each story

in about 20 seconds. Writing for

a broadcast is very different from

writing for an intranet, where you

can go into immeasurable details.

We’ve been teaching people to

take a 1500-word story and edit it

down to a 50-word script.

39



IT’S ‘SHoW TImE THE WHoLE TImE’ WITH aT&T’S GLoBaL nEWSCaST • JIMMY RICE

The print version of a story might be, “Johnny was headed towards San Francisco when a huge storm came and blew him off of his bike. He fell and rolled over three times, scraping his knee and breaking his leg. One of our technicians was right behind him, helped him up, put band-aids on him, stopped the bleeding, called 911”. In television you don’t have that luxury. You need to figure out what the headline is: “Johnny fell off his bike, the tech was there

to help him back up, got him to

the hospital, he’s recovering and

doing well”.

ImPaCTOur average viewership is around

21,000 views per episode, while

intra net articles typically get around

10,000 views. This medium has

proved to be a blockbuster when

it comes to employee engagement.

More people want to watch and

listen to company news than want

to read it on a website.

Last year we ran a survey. We found that around 108,000 people have watched the newscast at least once, so almost half of our employees. Around 30,000 of them stay with us for a 70% play-through ratio. 96% of respondents thought our content was interesting, an-other 94% said it’s relevant. And 93% would recommend to other co-workers.

I think the newscast speaks to the power of sight and sound in this generation. People want something they can take in in a bite size, snack-able way, but feel like they’ve been very, very well informed. They want to be able to listen to it or watch it whenever they feel like it. That is what Around The Globe is providing to our employees – something fresh and unique they can watch on demand.

BIoGRaphy • JIMMY RICEJimmy is a dynamic, innovative and bold producer and communications specialist. He is currently a multi-media storyteller at AT&T. With attentive eyes and ears, he captures company news and creatively shares it with colleagues.

Are your internal comms hitting the spot?

Call us today on +44 (0)20 7754 3630 or visit www.gatehouse.co.uk to find out more.

Research is a critical part of the internal communication mix. Without it you can’t demonstrate your value to senior leaders, build a robust strategy or know whether your channels or messages are really making a difference.

Over the past decade Gatehouse has conducted internal

communication audits for some of Europe’s biggest businesses –

from Bupa to GSK; Barclays to Virgin Media – as well as a host of

public and third sector organisations.

The insights we deliver help our clients get a handle on their

internal comms and drive through improvements.

C

M

Y

CM

MY

CY

CMY

K

JOIC_audit_ad_Final.pdf 2 17/08/2015 15:17

Will Smith is Britvic’s Senior reward & Per-formance manager. His

team worked with Gatehouse to develop a high impact campaign to improve employee take up of Britvic’s flexible benefits.

HOW DIDBRItvIc GET 94%

employeesTO ENGAGE WITH THEIRFleXIBle BeneFIts pRoGRamme?

42

OF

43


DrIVInG EmPLoYEE DEmanDWe set out to address three main challenges. First, like many large organisations we suffered from a relatively low level of engage-ment around the programme and par ticularly amongst employees at manufacturing sites. We relied heavily on electronic channels and this wasn’t really cutting through, we needed to figure out a different approach and develop a sustain-ed programme of communication to build awareness, understand-ing and, most importantly, drive action.

The second challenge was out-side of the manufacturing sites, engage ment was actually okay. However, the question we kept getting back from discussions with those em ployees was, “that’s

all good, but what should I pick?”

They wanted more help and guid-

ance in what to select based on

their lifestyle needs. I think this re-

flects a wider change in consumer

attitudes; when ever you go online

to buy any thing you get feed back,

reviews and recommendations

such as “If you bought this, you

might be interested in this”. People

are used to that way of purchasing

online and this expectation was

beginning to affect our benefits program. It’s no different than any other consu mer experience, so how do we start answering that question up front?

The third issue was messages were getting lost in the ‘background noise’ of other communication. How did we make sure employees knew what they needed to know, what the program was all about and what was right for them


HoW DID BrITVIC GET 94% of EmPLoYEES To EnGaGE WITH THEIr fLEXIBLE BEnEfITS ProGrammE? • WILL SMITH

personally? We spent a lot of time and effort asking, “how do we create high impact statements that grab people’s attention?” For some reason, we had ignored the all important messaging piece up until that point.

STronG BranDInG anD GrEaT CrEaTIVE EXECuTIonDuring initial planning the big insight was that, especially at the manufacturing sites, low levels of awareness and a lack of know-

ledge was the problem. We had focused previously on email and online communication, but the message wasn’t getting through to the manufacturing side, because they have little or no time to use a computer during their working day.

45


So, working with Gatehouse, we

took a “back to basics” approach,

using impactful high visibility

communications. The first task

was to communicate specifics

particularly directed at the sites.

They wanted something we could

put in their hand and say “this

is all the information you need.”

The best way of doing that was

to go back to basics and produce

a booklet – it’s what works best

for non-wired employees. People

engage with the booklet, scribble

on it, make choices and then use

the online portal to select their

benefits. We also used visually

interesting posters that had less

of a ‘corporate’ feel. Although

we maintained email communica-

tion, which worked in a lot of

cases, we also focused on less

obvious ways of communicating

– for example, using vinyl static decals in the coffee area to create more interest.

We maintained email communi-cation because what we were doing wasn’t failing – it just wasn’t working for everyone. We wanted the big drive to be in educating employees, guiding them through the selection process – instead of just giving them a list of stuff they could have, actually going into the detail. We simplified the messages. Across the booklet, the

decals, email and online channels, we kept it simple. It was a pro-ductised, expert approach. We wrote the booklet in consumer friendly lan guage. “This is what this benefit is, this is what it does for you, and this is how much it’s going to cost.”

We wanted to come up with a consistent internal brand, so we used colour coding to distinguish between different types of mes-saging. We went a bit further with our look and feel than we

We took a “back to basics” approach, using impactful high

visibility communications.


HoW DID BrITVIC GET 94% of EmPLoYEES To EnGaGE WITH THEIr fLEXIBLE BEnEfITS ProGrammE? • WILL SMITH

have done with other corporate

materials. It was a lot glossier than

anything else we’d produced. I

think it was a great example of

how you can stay within corporate

guidelines but create something

that stands out from the crowd,

to make it more engaging for the

intended audience.

THE kEY To SuCCESS: mEanInGfuL auDIEnCE SEGmEnTaTIonWe recognised three key groups

within our people: Family-orien-

tated people who had chosen

family-focused benefits; an older

population whose key interests

were in retirement and savings and

a population of users who were

more interested in activity and

fitness-related benefits.

We tried to take an ‘Apple genius’

approach: You’ve told us what

you like, here are some benefits

that you may be interested in,

how it will all work and this is what

it costs. We saw big increases

in the uptake of things people

probably had bought elsewhere

47


– like critical illness cover. People

were saying, “I’ve been paying

a fortune for this through my

mortgage provider”. People were

basically moving their business

in-house, and saving themselves a

lot of money in the process.

Finally, we spent more time face-

to-face with our people, guiding

them through the process. We

can really see it working; people

are helping others, actively en-

couraging them to go online and

make purchases for themselves.

DrIVInG EnGaGEmEnT To nEar unIVErSaL LEVELSResults were better than we

could have hoped. There was a

13% improvement in overall en-

gage ment. 89% of our overall

population actively went online

and made their choices. At the

manufacturing location that we specifically targeted, engagement went from 60% to 94%, way beyond our target of 75%, which is incredible.

We saw a 26% increase in core bene fits selections; classic insu-rance based products. We doubled purchases of voluntary benefits; cycle to work, computers for home and gourmet cards. Overall, we saw a 33% increase in employee expenditure through the flexible benefits portal. Our

employees have become savvier

buyers and they ask more ques-

tions now, so we want to address

those in the future too.

We started off in a good position,

but we’ve constantly improved

it by continuing to invest in –

and getting returns from – good

communication. Our people are

engaging with the process much

more. It just shows what clear

communication, done well, can

actually achieve.

BIoGRaphy • WILL SMITH Will Smith is Senior Reward & Performance Manager for Britvic plc responsible for Pay, Bonus and Benefits strategy and related communications across the organisation. He has global experience in reward, buying and strategic marketing across different sectors including FMCG, retail & financial services.

48

moody’s Julie Pinsonneault shares the journey to a new searchable intranet, and shares her secret to a win-win relationship with IT.

MAkING It WORk AT moody’s

49


When you mention ‘Moody’s’, people usu-ally think of our rating

agency business. That is one of

our core business, but there’s

another half of the business that

focuses on providing solutions

and training to help companies

assess and mitigate their risk.

Our company has been growing

exponentially over the past 4 years.

We’ve grown from approximately

4,500 to 10,000 employees. Much

of that expansion is happening

internationally, so I’m about to

move to London to set up a

regional presence in EMEIA.

BuSInESS CaSEIn February 2015, we launched

a new company intranet called

MINT, which stands for Moody’s

intranet. Like many global cor-

porations we’re a very email-

heavy company, and one of the

reasons we wanted to overhaul

our intranet was to try to reduce

our reliance on email.

We had identified a number

of issues with our previous

intranet. Our previous intranet

– ‘MoodysNet’ – was based on

SharePoint 2010. The search didn’t

really work, which is a problem

because people are so used to

Google. They expect the search

to pull up what they’re looking for.

We wanted our new intranet to

be a consolidated space; a go-

to platform where employees

could access internal news, but

also quick links to all sorts of

applications and systems that they

use on a regular basis. Instead of

having to save those links in their

favourites or in an email, they can

access all they need at the click

of a button: our time keeping

system, our compliance policies,

our ADP-pay portal, and a link to

book travel. Some people come

here for informational purposes,

but for the most part they come

to get something they need in

order to fulfil a task.

ConTEnT STraTEGYBefore, the big problem was that

the content was rather outdated.

People would just end up emailing

and asking questions instead

of using the portal for self-

service purposes. One priority

was to make the new intranet a

trusted source of information for

employees.

So we decentralized the govern-

ance. Representatives from each


makInG IT Work aT mooDY’S • JULIE PINSONNEAULT

of our business units now “own” the content in their particular space. We’ve hired a full-time intranet content manager to help them shape content; but the business representatives are really the subject-matter experts. This ensures that content is as current and relevant as possible – they’re better placed to talk about the benefits packages that we offer in different locations for instance.

Soon, we will also have an auto-mated archive to ensure that

content remains up-to-date. The idea is that business represen-tatives will receive an alert when a piece of content has been on the portal and untouched for a year so that they can either update it or remove it.

We only just launched MINT, so it’s still early days. We’ve just sent out a survey and we will soon be running a few focus groups. We’re also in the process of setting up our Webtrends reporting so we can start reviewing metrics

quarterly and understand how people are using it.

We still need to do more to develop content and make the portal as robust as possible. A lot of content still sits outside of MINT – team sites and operational content that people have built up over the years because MoodysNet didn’t offer the workflow they needed. I’d love to see this incorporated into MINT as it would offer a seamless end-user experience where anything can be found on MINT. My mission

As an internal communication expert, I often feel that we bring a more

customer-centric approach to IT projects

51


over the next year will be to

persuade people into valuing the

intranet and make them want to

come into the fold.

WorkInG WITH THE ‘IT GuYS’One big reason I think we were

able to launch this successfully is

the fact that we have a close rela-

tion ship with IT, so much that the

same people have continued to

sup port our portal. Every single

quarter we work with them to

build out requirements for new

enhance ments and fixes and

things of that nature.

One of my major relationships is

with IT. Companies are investing

a lot in technology, which means

there’s always projects coming out

of the IT department. I like to get

involved with the IT managers, and

make sure they understand the

potential impact of their products

on employees.

Typically when you’re working with

an IT project manager, engineer

or developer, they’re focused on

getting the product to work. Their

focus is not user interface, or the

best way to apply the technology

to the employee base.

Because they’re not thinking

about the end user impact of these

sorts of things – and I am always

focused on the end user impact

– sometimes I’m able to identify things and say: “Oh, does that really have to be 10 steps instead of one?” It’s my job to bring those things to the table. Sometimes I feel like I’m the inquisitor! When you’re managing an internal rela-tionship with people who are technically minded, they key is to ask them a million questions.

As an internal communication ex-pert, I often feel that we bring a more customer-centric approach to IT projects.

BIoGRaphy • JULIE PINSONNEAULT Julie Pinsonneault is an experienced strategic commu-nicator for internal audiences with a special interest in increasing employee engagement by reinforcing the connection between everyday activities and overall business goals. She is currently an Assistant Vice President – Internal Communications at Moody’s.

52

neil Jenkins is Director of Internal and Digital Communications for Coca-Cola Enterprises (CCE). Since 2013, he has played a leading role in developing and delivering CCE’s ambassador programme – designed to help employees understand and articulate CCE’s commitment to sustainability and its role in society.

CREATING

employee amBassadoRs AT COCA-COLA ENTERPRISES

53


Corporate responsibility and sustainability (CRS) has been alive in Coca-Cola

Enterprises for over a decade; this year we published our tenth annual CRS report. Over time, it has grown to be embedded in almost every business process. It is also a high engagement driver, typically one of the top three based on our employee survey.

In 2011 we published our first sustainability plan, to set challeng-ing and measurable targets and push ourselves further in areas such as energy and water reduction, packaging and recycling, wellbeing and our work in the community. Every year we measure our pro-gress, and we ask ourselves: “Are we doing enough? Can we do more to achieve our sustainability commitments?”

Over the years, we’ve rolled out a number of initiatives to promote CRS to employees – including an annual week of activities and learn-ing relating to our commitments. While they have valued this, they

wanted more – and a focus that

could be sustained throughout

the year.

BuILDInG ConfIDEnCECCE’s Ambassador programme

started in 2013, at the same time

it was being introduced by Coca-

Cola and its system of bottling

companies across the world. We

wanted to ensure employees un-

der stood our sustainability goals

and commitments in detail – and

in particular, ensure they felt confi-

dent to answer questions from

friends, family and customers about

our business and brands. When

you say you work for Coca-Cola,

you get lots of questions about the

heritage of the company and our

products and their ingredients.

Our Ambassador programme is

designed to help maintain the high


CrEaTInG EmPLoYEE amBaSSaDorS aT CoCa-CoLa EnTErPrISES • NEIL JENkINS

level of pride that people have to work for us and allow them to feel confident answering questions about our role in society and our sustainability commitments. It’s about equipping our employees with the knowledge to help them understand how the business operates and what we stand for, and the skills to deal with the questions that might come their way.

Our first step was to engage our leaders, using our annual leader-ship conference as the launch pad. We explained Ambassador in an engaging way, using videos and featuring the CEO and his executive leadership team to demonstrate their personal com-mit ment to the programme. Be-yond the sustainability elements, we made it clear that being an Ambassador was also about being

proud to drink our products and

to share them with family and

friends, support our customers by

shopping in their stores or eating

at their restaurants, and being

active in the communities where

our business operates.

Leadership buy-in is essential to

the success of any new program-

me, and it gave us a solid start –

they understood the goals of the

programme and how they and

their teams could support it and

get involved.

We’ve designed the Ambassador

programme so the majority of

content is shared with employees

through regular channels – includ-

ing our magazines, e-newsletters,

intranet and internal social net-

work. This helped to build an

understanding among employees

55


about what it meant to be a Coca-Cola Ambassador – whether they work on a production line in our plants, are on the road in a field sales team or as a service tech-nician, or based in an office.

But information has to go hand-in-hand with involvement. We created a one-hour roadshow experience, bringing a pop-up area to offices and sites so employees could listen to key facts in a fun way, linking it to brand initiatives like the FIFA World Cup. These even ran through the night at our factories so shift workers didn’t miss out. We’ve also partnered with our learning and development team to design and deliver intensive training for more than 200 customer-facing em-ployees – the key account mana-gers who have the day-to-day relationship with major customers

like Tesco, ASDA and Carrefour. We’re equipping them to have conversations about where our sustainability commitments have a natural fit with their customers’ own commitments, because it can

drive competitive advantage for

our business.

aCHIEVEmEnTSIt’s been a promising start. Feed-

back from the roadshows and


CrEaTInG EmPLoYEE amBaSSaDorS aT CoCa-CoLa EnTErPrISES • NEIL JENkINS

training programmes has been strong, with almost every employ-ee saying they feel more confident to answer questions about our business and brands. In our last internal communication survey, about 12 months after the launch of Ambassador, 70% of employees told us they were aware of and understood the programme. In September, our next employee engagement survey will be a measure of the programme’s impact on engagement at CCE.

As well as the impact on employee engagement, our Ambassador programme is also about trust. At a time when trust in big businesses is so low, it’s vital to build it from the inside out. If CCE’s 12,000 employees trust the company they work for, because it’s transparent about the way it does business

and honest about where it can do more to support society, that radiates to the outside world – and one of the most trusted sources about a business is its people.

Just like our reputation for sus-tainability leadership, engagement and trust take time and effort to earn and maintain. This means our Ambassador programme is only really just beginning - and it’s why it’s here to stay.

BIoGRaphy • NEIL JENkINS Neil Jenkins joined Coca-Cola Enterprises in 2008 and is responsible for the company’s internal communications strategy, channels and content. Before joining CCE, he held senior internal communications roles at Vodafone and Siemens. Follow him on Twitter: @neil_jenkins.

Coca-Cola Enterprises manufactures, markets and distri-butes Coca-Cola products in Great Britain, France, Benelux, Norway and Sweden, employing 12,000 people. Find out more at www.cokecce.com.

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THE JOURNAL OF INTERNAL - Internal Communication · THE JournaL of InTErnaL CommunICaTIon • VOLUME 9 TaCTICS How aVEVa conjured comms magic from its network of ambassadors 28 Debbie