Talking Internal Communication...

Singing the praises of corporate choirs

A few years ago Ernst & Young, the big 4 accountancy firm I used to work for, launched a corporate choir in London. It went down a storm as I remember, with employees signing up in droves to sing together in sweet harmony. Their occasional performances were also extremely popular with fellow employees – a real head office spectacle that entertained and lifted the spirit in equal measure…

Now I read (Human Resources, April 2009) that call centre staff at Admiral, the British insurer, are receiving singing lessons from two opera divas in a bid to boost morale and, wait for it… to reduce absenteeism. 

The musical pair, Georgina Jones and Andrea Beardshaw, have been ‘making sweet music’ with a 40-strong call centre team based in Cardiff.  Like EY, they have formed a staff choir which will perform in front of thousands of colleagues at various internal meetings this year. 

And there’s a health benefit too, with staff being taught how to use their voices to combat sore throats, manage infections and so on – all rather helpful for pressured call centre people. Apparently this initiative has been a big hit too, with the Admiral top team singing its praises from the rafters.

In a similar vein I was talking to a contact of mine who works in central Government recently and he told me that his department has been running stand-up comedy sessions internally. Nice.

Could these be the tactics we need to lift employee spirits during the deep, dark recession?

Enjoy Easter!

L

Engagement lessons from Bono

I'm a big fan of U2, the Irish rock band, so I was intrigued to see them mentioned recently on a blog all about employee engagement. Author and consultant Michael Lee Stallard published an interesting post this week on the lessons Bono and co can provide to those of us who work in employee engagement.

Michael suggests that there are two key factors that make U2 such a unified and enduring band - the fact that profits are split equally between the band members and manager, and the fact that they have a very clear vision and shared values. Fascinating stuff.

The lessons are pretty clear.  Fairness and equality in the workplace is one of the keys to unlocking employee engagement and reward and compensation is definitely one of the areas where that belief - or its complete absence - is most visible. Likewise, a clear identity, sense of strategic direction and a set of values that are 'lived and breathed' from the top down will help create a more unified, aligned organisation - whether its a band or a business.

For me there are other factors too - like the importance of shared history, shared struggles and national identity and pride. The U2 boys are proud to be Irish and grew up in Dublin's northside in the last late 60s and 70s, a particularly volatile period in Ireland's political history. Like the populations of countries under siege, employees within organisations that are going through tough times often come out the other end a tighter, more unified unit. Like I said, really interesting stuff.

I will keep an eye on Michael's blog to see how his thoughts develop over the coming weeks and months.

Global study highlights communication issues

The HR consultancy Towers Perrin has just published its latest Global Workforce Study and, once again, it makes interesting - and sobering - reading for internal communicators. 

The survey - of more than 90,000 workers  in 18 countries - reveals that many employees still do not believe their organizations are doing enough to motivate them and feel that senior managers do not communicate in an open and honest way.

Of the 5,000 UK employees surveyed, less than a third believe that senior management communicates  openly and honestly with them and two-thirds feel that senior leaders "treat us as just another part of the organization to manage" or "as if we don't matter".  Just 29% feel their leaders have a sincere interest in their well-being and satisfaction. For all the talk about engagement, it seems many organizations are still a long, long way from achieving it.

The study highlights the importance of senior leadership in the engagement mix - having highly effective line managers is one thing, but the top team also has a critical role to play in setting the tone, providing direction, being visible and accessible and demonstrating and rewarding the right values and behaviors.   

The good news is that many employees now want and expect a rich and honest dialog with their bosses - the problem is that far too few get it. Until we can create a conversation culture inside our organizations, disengagement and apathy will remain strong. 

The study also reveals that employees are increasingly concerned about the reputation of the organization they work for - a factor that is having a bigger impact on engagement than ever before. Indeed, an organization's reputation for social responsibility was found to be one of the top five engagement drivers here in the UK. 

This underlines that employee engagement is as much about 'external' policies and communications, as it is about the internal workings of an organization.  I've always held that internal and external communications should be closely aligned (if not joined at the hip) and findings like this demonstrate just why that is so important.

Happiness at work - the next big thing?

Happiness at work is something I'm hearing more and more about these days and it's a subject that's being hotly debated at the CIPD annual conference in Harrogate this week (unfortunately I couldn't make it, but I'm keeping an eye on things from a distance). 

According to Nic Marks, founder of the centre for well-being at nef (the new economics foundation) and a speaker at the event, feeling good at work actually enhances organisational performance. He points out that positive emotions are linked to several key performance indicators such as job satisfaction, engagement, loyalty and job meaning. CIPD research backs this up, showing that happy and engaged employees perform better than others, are more likely to recommend their organisation to others, take less sick leave, and are less likely to quit.

I guess very few of us would be surprised by this - for most of us who work in internal communications, it's just good old common sense. But that doesn't make it any less true.

Many organisations are now experimenting with well-being prorgrammes designed to make the connection between between happy, healthy staff and business performance. I'm always a bit sceptical about anything that smacks of a HR fad (diversity is another area that's often characterised more by spin than by substance), but approached in the right way, there's no doubting the impact a strategic approach to well-being can have. You only have to glance through the annual Best Companies to Work For report to see the evidence, whether it's labelled well-being or not.

Research shows that challenge and interest are key drivers of well-being in the workplace. If jobs aren’t challenging or interesting enough this will be reflected in lack of commitment, underperformance and satisfaction.  By measuring and focusing on well-being at work we can create better experiences for employees and foster more positive emotions at work.

If you're interested in exploring this subject some more, check out the folloiwing links:

• An earlier Talking IC post on the subject
• Wikipedia on happiness
• The Chief Happiness Officer, Alexander Kjerulf's blog
• The Happiness Project website
• The Business Creativity & Happiness blog
• An entertaining look at happiness research

Having fun at work is a good thing and there's no doubting that positive emotions and engagement are closely linked. The idea of a happy-clappy workforce may sound laughable, but there's definitely something in this...

Free McJob webcast - Fairhurst battles on

HR people don't always impress me, but one who does is David Fairhurst, vice president of people at McDonalds.  I saw him speak at the Simply Communicate conference earlier this year, where he made a powerful case for fast food chain's approach to engaging its 67,000 employees. I also enjoy his monthly articles in HR Magazine. So I was really pleased to stumble upon this interesting little webcast. It focuses on the 'McJob' tag, something David has been crusading against over the last few years. David is joined by show host Murray Norton, The Mirror business editor Clinton Manning and HR Magazine's editor, Sian Harrington. It's an fascinating and very balanced debate - well worth watching if you're interested in this sort of thing. David is a savvy operator and his battle is certainly helping improve McDonald's reputation and employer brand, as well as helping lift the lid on what HR (and comms) people get up to. It's easy to take a pop at McDonalds, but I'd argue that we can all learn a thing or two from Ronald and co, and from Fairhurst.

Fighting the engagement epidemic

In her usual cut-through-the-bullshit way, Sue Dewhurst's latest blog post on engagement captures a view shared by many internal communicators,myself included. 

She basically assets that the 'e' word is over-used and abused - that it has become a handy catchphrase or business buzzword people pop into conversations to show that they're 'with it'.

I couldn't agree more.

I've been in a number of meetings/discussions recently where the 'e' word has quietly crept in, gradually multiplied and slowly taken over the minds of participants. It's spreading like a virus. As Sue points out, it's one of those 'wibbly' words that is oh so easy to use and, for the most part, succeeds in making us sound clever and current.

But once you actually start to actually think about it, you realise that hardly anyone is talking about it in the same way. Some use it to describe a process, others a philosophy. For some it's synonymous with involvement, for others it's an annual survey. For some it's hearts and minds, for others it's discretionary effort. The list goes on. Like 'empowerment' before it, it's a term that's rapidly becoming an irritant.

I'm lucky enough to have picked up an early copy of John Smythe's new book, 'CEO - the Chief Engagement Officer'. It's a great read (no, it's a must read) for internal communicators. John's book is all about engagement. It is both extremely thoughtful and incredibly accessible, containing lots of practical and usable ideas. Enough of the plug (I'm not on commission hon!)

John's stance on engagement is clear and compelling - he views it first and foremost as a management philosophy based on the idea of including the right people in the right decisions at the right time in the right way.  That works for me. He defines employee engagement narrowly as an integral part of decision making, arguing that it's largely an outcome of the routine practices of bosses at every level in the organisation. The book builds on this view, demonstrating what effective leaders and managers actually do to engage employees. That really appeals to a practically-minded communicator like me.

If you, like me, are getting irritated by the 'e' word, then I recommend John's book as an antidote. It'll convince you that engagement - as a management philosophy - is a no-brainer and that many of our current approaches to internal communication remain essentially about coercion, command and control. It's thought provoking stuff....

Time for panda sex?

I’ve been catching up on a lot of reading this week (my pile of unread periodicals was getting way too big – I think I’ve been spending far too much time online!!)

I discovered an article about employee engagement in April’s Management Today. You may have seen it.  It’s a solid, though largely unsurprising, overview of the subject. It covers the usual territory – Sears’ employee-customer-profit chain, the Towers Perrin data, the Best Companies research, etc (most of which I’ve previously discussed on this blog). There are a few interesting case studies in there too – on Honda and Arup.

A couple of things jumped out at me though…

First, there’s a nice little graphic ‘the virtuous circle of employee engagement’ which illustrates three aspects of engagement – the conditions, the employee and the company. I’m a bit simple, so I like things like that. Under the conditions of engagement they list the following:

• knows its values and communicates them
• knows who fits the company and how to attract them
• behaves as its employees would expect
• engenders autonomy and trust
• strong and authentic leadership and management
• provides challenging work and personal development
• values, respects and involves each employee
• invokes a sense of community

I like that list. I think it’s pretty accurate. And I like the fact that all of those conditions can be delivered and/or influenced by savvy line managers, leaders and internal communicators.

When I speak I sometimes use a quote – “communication creates the climate in which engagement takes place.” I can’t remember who said it, but it makes sense doesn’t it?  I’ve found that a useful way of approaching the subject.

My second selection just underlines the first – a really nice metaphor for the challenge we all face. I’ll paraphrase the article’s author Emma du Vita:

“Creating the right climate is like getting a pair of giant pandas to breed in captivity- it’s about putting the right conditions in place to ensure the love-in actually happens.”

I’m not convinced it’s quite THAT hard to do, but I nevertheless like it. 

Now, where's that bamboo....