Talking Internal Communication...

Is bad language ever a good communication tactic?

There have been at least two studies published this year that have touched upon the thorny issue of swearing in the workplace. 

In the spring the Aziz Corporation conducted research which found that 36% of UK senior managers and directors accepted swearing as part of workplace culture. And this week a study by Norwich's University of East Anglia (UEA) into leadership styles found that use of "taboo language" boosted team spirit.

At Gatehouse we're often advising clients to inject more emotion into their communications. We regularly find that organizations have the rational/logical content of their messages nailed, but that they are lacking in warmth and, dare I say, humanity. The result is communication that speaks to the head and not the heart - which can only ever get you so far when it comes to engaging people.

There are, of course, many ways to build more emotion into your communications - using music and video, paying attention to your non-verbal communication, employing actors, selecting the right delivery mechanism (it's easier to convey emotion face-to-face than on the intranet) and, importantly, choosing the right words. 

Using sparingly, swearing can be a very effective way to convey emotion, to emphasize key points and to grab the audience's attention. Fact.

But can it ever really be justified as an internal communication tactic? 

Swearing is endemic in some working environments, so you could argue that if the leaders use that same language they are demonstrating that they are 'in tune' with their people, on the same wavelength. I'm not convinced.

Don't get me wrong, I'm no saint and I do make use of colorful language, particularly when I'm with my friends and close colleagues. I'm not an anti-swearing do-gooder. But I just don't think that frequent use of swearing is a healthy thing inside most diverse workplaces. It can be disrespectful, offensive and downright annoying. It's also a legal minefield - abusive language is a form of bullying.

Thankfully it's still far from the norm - most organization's codes of conduct advise against swearing and most employees I've come across use it sparingly. It serves a useful purpose - used rarely it is a very powerful way to show your feelings (which is no bad thing), but it certainly shouldn't be encouraged. 

I have no doubt swearing does, as UEA discovered, help create bonds between people at work. Violence creates bonds between gang members, but that doesn't make it right. 

Messaging myopia

Why is so little written about messaging in internal comms?

I don't mean instant messaging, text messaging or any other technology, but the core process of creating, crafting, developing, testing and refining the messages we want to share internally.

I'm working on a toolkit for one of my clients and I've been researching the messaging section. Given that communication is essentially about the transfer of meaning and that meaning is usually contained in messages, I expected to find numerous references and lots of words of wisdom from the gurus of our profession. What I found was a gaping void.

I'm not the first to spot this. My good friends Sue Dewhurst and Liam Fitzpatrick, the team behind Melcrum's Black Belt course, were so frustrated they created their own tool. It's called the 'Message Builder' and is a robust, four-step process for constructing messages that really work. In addition to this, I expect I'll find some useful material in the richer PR and communication literature.

It's knowledge gaps like this that underline just how immature our profession is. Whilst we're making great strides in education, training, development and professional excellence, I can't help thinking there's still a long, long way to go before we come of age.