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 This week VMA Group hosted its Business Leaders in Communications Study launch in London. I was hoping to go but unfortunately wasn’t able to make the launch, so I’ve been reading about it and thought I’d share what I’ve learnt as it makes fascinating reading.
The study surveyed 95 Directors of Communications in leading FTSE organisations about their corporate communications function and the results provide the most comprehensive overview of the function, structure and role of corporate communications today and in the future.
Top findings from the study were:
- Nearly two in three communications professionals see reputation management as their main function, while media relations and advising the board on business strategy were both equal second. However, only three per cent of respondents saw protecting or enhancing the reputation of the CEO as their main role.
- Forty-one per cent had a seat on the board or management executive and two thirds of respondents reported into the CEO; one in ten to the HR Director and just seven per cent to the Marketing Director.
- Eighty-one per cent of respondents said that their CEO and the board thought communication to be critically important. But that figure fell to 59% when applied across the business. A significant minority (18%) said communications was not critically important in the organisation.
- More than one in three (37%) CEOs spend at least one day a week on communications activity, and one in twenty spend more than two days. The proportion of CEO time devoted to communications is particularly high in the financial services sector (22%), possibly an indication of the continued fallout from the banking crisis.
- The statistics around the ownership of the digital space raise the possibility that we may be seeing the beginning of a decline in influence for marketing departments as we currently know them.
What happened at the launch?
At the event on Tuesday night, VMA hosted Charlie Mayfield, Chairman of The John Lewis Partnership, who urged the audience of senior communicators to think about their purpose and effectiveness, saying that he believes communication is the most powerful lever to gain competitive advantage.
Alongside Charlie Mayfield were John Smythe, Founding Partner of Engage for Change, David Bickerton, Director of Communications at BP, Leslie McGibbon, Vice President Global Communications at GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare and Professor Tom Watson, Professor of Public Relations at Bournemouth University.
I was interested to see the Tweets under the hashtag #blcs2012 as it appears a lively debate took place about the role of corporate communications both now and in the future. It’s no surprise that one of the hot topics of the night was social media and its use.
Stephen Waddington of Speed Comms (@Wadds) blogged on the event and has published a Storify feed of the tweets, which you can see here.
He says: “My view, Speed’s view, is that social media is returning the public relations industry to its roots of engagement in a two-way dialogue rather than a means of broadcast via the proxy of media relations.”
Social media as a challenge?
What strikes me is that only 15 per cent of Comms Directors said social media skills were critical when recruiting to their teams. When this is contrasted against the fact that three quarters of comms professionals expect to see an increase in demand for websites, digital and social media, that’s a surprising stat. Apparently almost one in ten communicators do not see social media as a challenge.
So…. communicators expect to see a rise in demand yet won’t meet it through specific recruiting? Reports from the night show that one member of the audience asked whether this is the case “because social media is just a bubble or is it through ignorance or complacency.”
While some said it was ‘A flash in the pan’ and ‘Not used by the shop floor,’ others urged caution and said the starting point should be to question the objective of social media before acting on it. Yet, as agency bosses from Grayling, Hotwire PR and Speed Communications and senior communicators from the BBC, BP and GlaxoSmithKline responded, social media is here to stay and those who don’t embrace it fully will be left behind.
What about social media in action?
David Bickerton from BP admitted his organisation was left reeling from the social media impact of recent events and, he added, as a result the company now ensures all staff have a role to play in the reputation management of the company on social media. Even John Lewis’ Charlie Mayfield concluded that technology is changing the way people behave and businesses need to understand this and respond accordingly.
What about influence?
Results from the survey show that senior communicators expect their influence to increase over the next two years, yet they currently report only moderate influence at board level. It also reveals an expected increase in demand but decrease in budgets over the next two years. How we wish that wasn’t the case! Again, not a surprise, but I believe it’s a reflection on how the comms industry is changing and adapting to the external environment. We’d love to have huge budgets that increase year-on-year as awareness and demand for comms grows, but unfortunately the world doesn’t work like that!
Julia Meighan, Executive Chairman of VMA Group who commissioned the research says: “The debate arising from the launch of the BLCS this week demonstrates what a truly significant and timely piece of research this is. The study will play a critical role in helping communicators and CEOs underpin their investment in corporate communications, and better demonstrate the link between reputation and profitability that Charlie Mayfield speaks of. Some of the world’s leading organisations have responded to this research and so its influence and relevance is far-reaching. I urge communications professionals to study the report and use it in their businesses.”
Where can you get the research and what happens next?
The Business Leaders in Communications Study 2012 is available to buy from the BLCS web page. VMA Group is hosting a series of breakfast events in February / March for those people who have purchased the study and wish to discuss and debate the findings in greater detail. For more information and to register your interest, contact: marketing@ vmagroup.com
Post author: Rachel Miller
 Today marks the fourth birthday of the Employee Engagement Network, which now has 4530 members.
The network was founded and is hosted by Canadian David Zinger. He is an author, educator and speaker who has written over 1400 blog posts and authored two books on work - Zengage: How to Get More Into Your Work to Get More Out of Your Work and Assorted Zingers: Poems and Cartoons to Take a Bite Out of Work.
I joined the network in 2009 and there is a wealth of information available at your fingertips including 50 word case studies and numerous free PDF books on employee engagement, which are a fantastic resource.
Happy birthday to the network, and if you’ve never checked it out before, do take a look.
Post author: Rachel Miller
 Like many internal communications professionals, I’ve often been asked over the years to help combat the complexity of company strategies and communicate them in an engaging way.
This week I came across a fantastic example of how to do exactly that thanks to Melcrum’s Strategic Communication Management magazine and their article on the power of images to communicate complex information.
You can read the full article here, but in a nutshell it features two visual thinking maps for Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) and global engineering group GKN that were developed by a Brand Engagement agency from Bristol, UK, called Home.
 Simon Hardaker, Director, Group employee communications at GKN is quoted in Strategic Communication Management magazine saying their need for visual thinking methods came from the implementation of the company strategy, which needed to be shared globally with employees.
He says: “From the outset, I felt we needed people to visalise what the strategy was. In some ways, our strategy is simple, but in other ways our employees couldn’t see how different pieces and processes in the organisation joined together. We felt a visual thinking method would help employees retain the message because we planned for it not only to describe the strategy but for it also to be possible – just by loking at it – to link the various component parts.”
How do you know if visual thinking is right for your company?
These top 10 tips were highlighted in the Strategic Communication Management article and I thought I’d share them here:
10 steps to using visual thinking
1. Decide if visual thinking is appropriate for the message
2. Sit down with stakeholders and talk about what’s important for them
3. Collate the relevant information
4. Edit and decide what parts must be kept in with help from team
5. Decide what visual thinking method you’d like to use
6. Create the graphic
7. Test it on a focus group
8. Use results to refine
9. Create a user guide with talking notes for managers
10.Consider enlisting the help of an external agency for additional expertise.
Did it work?
GKN used the process to communicate strategy across the organisation with impressive results as 92% of employees surveyed said that they now understood the big picture strategy.
Can I see it?
An interactive, animated version of the RBS strategy map is available in the public domain and you can view it here or by clicking the top image on this page.
You can read the whole story in SCM here. Have you come across something that you think would be good to share with other comms professionals or would you like to write a guest post for my blog? I’m always on the look out for fresh ideas and content, so do get in touch with your suggestions: rach@rachmiller.com. Thanks as ever for stopping by.
Post author: Rachel Miller
Judging panels are all the rage at the moment on TV and you can’t move for people wanting to meet the judges and spending column inches debating their thoughts and outfits.
The comms industry is no different and this year the Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) is calling for entries for the CIPR Excellence Awards 2012 – with a slightly different twist. If you’re thinking of entering the awards, help is at hand as the CIPR is running two free ‘Meet the Judges’ events in London on 1 and 7 February at 5pm.
They aren’t promising Simon Cowell or Tulisa, but the judges will be offering guidance on making a submission and outlining common entry pitfalls that you can avoid. You will also hear from a previous winner with their top tips for success. Places are being offered on a first come, first served basis.
So if you’re thinking about entering and would like some help, book now to save your space. The location is 52-53 Russell Square, London, WC1 4HP.
The Excellence Awards closing date is 27 February, with late entries accepted until 5 March. There are 28 Excellence award categories in total, grouped into four distinct areas: campaign, special, team and individual. See the CIPR website for more information and a video showing last year’s top tips. Best of luck if you enter the awards.
Post author: Rachel Miller
 Are you ready for Google+? Do you want to see how you can engage with your audiences through Google’s new social media offering? Want to work out how to integrate all your social media channels? Need to effectively evaluate your G+ efforts? Now you can do all this and more thanks to a series of morning conferences that have just been unveiled by Communicate magazine.
I spotted a link to the conferences on Communicate magazine’s website and thought I would share the info here. They are taking place from 5 – 14 March: in Bristol on 5 March, Manchester 8 March, Glasgow 9 March and London on 14 March and cost £95. The first 10 bookings for each seminar will receive a free subscription to Communicate magazine.
What can you expect?
The publication says these seminars are ‘vital’ and will look at the context of Google+, focus on integration with your existing online presence, identify the lessons from the pilot brands, and, most importantly, explore the practical aspects of how your company can use Google+ to communicate with your audiences more effectively.
What does Google+ let you do?
You can separate users or followers into different categories, view sophisticated video chat capabilities and powerful analytic tools and it’s integrated with existing Google.
But how can businesses and brands create a Google+ presence? And once they’re in, how can they make the most of the opportunity? Facebook’s business pages grew organically, allowing brands to learn from the mistakes of others, but the speed of digital turnover means that there is an immediate need for communications professionals to get Google+ right, here and now.
Who is speaking?
The speakers for each seminar will differ across the dates, but they include: Adam Vincenzini, Giles Palmer and Branislava Milosevic. Find out who else is speaking. The programme has been published and you can view it here.
Communicate magazine, the speakers and the sponsors will all be tweeting about the conference both before and during the event using the hashtag #Gplusbrands. Feel free to join in the conversation. If you want to find out more check out the information on their website here and you can register here. You can follow Communicate magazine on Twitter @communicatemag
Have you come across any interesting looking conferences or seminars lately that you think other comms professionals would be interested to know about? If so, let me know via rach@rachmiller.com
Do you use Google+? You can view my profile here and view a previous blog post I wrote about the site here.
Post author: Rachel Miller
 The Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) has published its series of live training webinars for 2012. They cover a variety of topics including social media, blogs, Google analytics, communicating with hard to reach audiences, creating dedicated online communities and social marketing.
I recommend seeing what is coming up and signing up to take part as I think they are a great way to have a taster of various topics and will only cost an hour of your time. If you’re a CIPR member the webinars are free, and if not, they are £30+VAT each.
I logged on to one of their webinars in November that was on the topic of ‘Print vs Online’ and hosted by Social Media expert Euan Semple and former editor of Ariel, the BBC’s internal publication, Andrew Harvey. I found it a good use of an hour and it sparked an interesting discussion among the participants.
Sessions are fully interactive as you can submit questions to the trainers, who you can see and hear via video link. If the timing doesn’t suit your diary, you can view them on demand at a convenient time. They are usually 10.30-11.30am GMT.
You can see full details of what is coming up here, and the next few months include:
24 January – doing more with less resources
10 February – developing a social media strategy
14 February – the importance of good grammar
21 February – evaluation best practice
Have you come across a training course or event that you think other Internal Comms professionals would be interested in reading about? Do let me know, you can contact me: rach@rachmiller.com
Post author: Rachel
 You can’t move in the UK at the moment without seeing something related to the Olympics and the Institute of Internal Communication (IoIC) is offering Internal Comms pros the chance to hear from a winning speaker.
Double gold medal-winning Olympian, Steve Williams, is due to speak at the Institute’s annual conference in May. The rower, who took gold as part of the coxless fours teams in Athens in 2004 and Beijing in 2008, now works as an inspirational speaker and runs team development workshops.
The Olympics will be taking place in London just a few weeks after the IoIC event. The theme for this year’s conference is ‘Preparing for Peak Performance’. The IoIC says that as well as reflecting the Olympic theme in this special year, its conference will provide Internal Communication practitioners with valuable insights, tips and case studies to get them in the best professional shape to take advantage of the up wave when the business cycle turns again. That can’t be a bad thing!
Over the next few months the programme will be published and it promises to be packed with “informed and engaging presenters delivering highly relevant sessions and all the benefits of networking with your internal communication peers”.
It’s happening at the Marriott, Forest of Arden, near Birmingham, from Wednesday May 23 – Friday May 25. If you would like to make a booking, or need further details of the event, please contact Brenda@ioic.org.uk
Post author: Rachel
 Happy New Year to readers of Diary of an Internal Communicator, I hope you had a good Christmas break and are raring to go for 2012.
If you received a new diary and are looking for ideas of what is around this year to help you develop your Internal Communications (IC) skills or network. I’ve come across a seminar which may just fit the bill and be perfect to add to those fresh new pages.
It’s Vive l’Evolution: The emerging role of Internal Communication and is the annual seminar of the central region of the Institute of Internal Comms (IoIC). It’s taking place on Friday 24 February in Birmingham, UK.
Information from the IoIC says: Internal communicators our time has come! No longer seen as the town crier or the post box of the organisation, our strategic role is starting to be recognised. We have even more challenging and exciting content to communicate, more sophisticated and demanding audiences, new and exciting channels to reach them with and increased organisational and employee expectations of our skills and capabilities.
Rise to the challenges
Find out how to rise to these challenges and grasp these opportunities at IoIC Central’s fifth annual seminar being held at the fabulous new Radisson Blu Hotel at East Midlands Airport on Friday 24 February from 9.30am to 5pm. The seminar will be covering communication content, channels and capabilities in a full day event with some of the country’s leading communication experts and practitioners.
The money bit
More information is going to be released by IoIC soon but the prices have been published. There is an early bird fee (on or before 24 January) of £110 for IoIC members / £150 for non members. The standard fee (on or after 25 January) is £190 for IoIC members / £230 for non members. To find out more information and to book, you can contact Brenda@ioic.org.uk.
What other IC events have you come across that you think IC pros would be interested in? Contact me via rach@rachmiller.com or comment below to share the information with others.
Post author: Rachel
 ‘Tis the season of giving. But do you have that hard-to-buy-for employee communicator in your life and are struggling with what to get them for Christmas?
If so, help is at hand thanks to Chuck Gose. Chuck contacted me via Twitter a few weeks ago and I contributed to an article he wrote to discover what employee communicators would like to find under their trees this Christmas.
You can read the whole article here.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to all my readers.
Today I spotted that Melcrum is offering a brand new course in Internal Communications (IC). If you have a fresh comms budget to spend next year, it could be a good way to start 2012, but for many people I expect it will be too expensive at £545 for members and £595 for non-members for one day. However, I know that lots of students and people who are new to the world of comms read my blog, so thought it worth sharing.
What is the course?
Internal Communications 101 bills itself as an introduction to internal comms. So it should provide a good overview if you have new team members or people who are new into the world of IC and want to know where to start! It’s taking place on 24 January and 29 February 2012 and promises to provide invaluable knowledge and insight in one day.
Internal Communications 101 covers:
- The role of IC in different organisational settings
- Tips and checklists to implement in your role on a day-to-day basis
- Key questions to ask to get to the heart of a communication challenge
- Interactive case studies that bring the role to life
- Three key trends that all internal communicators must manage
- Three core ideas of IC, and how to implement them and get results
- The value of effective internal communication
It’s being led by Melcrum’s research and content director, Rebecca Richmond, who heads up the Strategic Communication Research Forum and who I saw speak at a Melcrum event earlier this year.
This is taken from Melcrum’s description of the course: Great internal communication enables performance, increases engagement, and delivers value to organisations. But if you’re new to the internal communication function, if involvement in internal communication activities within your company or business unit has recently become part of your role, or if you are tasked with local internal communication responsibilities in addition to your “day job” – where do you start?
This workshop introduces the key concepts of internal communication, describes the fundamental skills and creates a “week in the life” of an internal communicator to provide the tactics and tools to equip new practitioners to be successful in their field.
I love the idea of a “week in the life” – would be interested to see what that looks like as not sure that’s an easy task!
To find out more about the course, check out the link here.
Post author: Rachel Miller
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