Episodes

  • End of Series 1 | S1 E30

    End of Series 1 | S1 E30
    Dec 29 2020
    The Engaging Internal Comms Podcast – it’s a wrap on Series 1!

    So, we’ve come to the end of Series 1 of the Engaging Internal Comms Podcast, and what a first season it’s been. We started the podcast in April, during lockdown, with the aim of using our time positively and productively. Most importantly, we wanted to create something that would prove useful for others. We haven’t been disappointed.

    We reached out to potential interviewees, and they have undoubtedly proved to be the stars of the shows that we hoped they would be. We’ve enjoyed some amazing discussions with amazing people. The experiences and insight they have shared are second to none and have generated quite a response from a rapidly growing audience.

    While we would encourage you to dip in and out of the episodes as you wish – and there are details of how to do so at the end of this message – the highlights include:

    • Our first episode, in which Craig discussed using internal brand to develop extreme employee engagement with Arafa Heneghan, Head of Brand at ao.com
    • Meeting Sarah Carr, Global Communications Insights Lead for Aviva, and learning of her insight as she explained her 7 myths of internal communications
    • Chatting with the amazing Tracey Brower, and learning of her thoughts about the future of the workplace – one of the most listened-to episodes in Series 1
    • Speaking with Hilary U, Executive Internal Communications Leader for the Salesforce security team, and learning about the strategies she uses to overcome the challenges of communicating from the C-suite
    • Hearing Head of Internal Comms at XE Chris Coburn’s thoughts about the role of a line manager in episode 22, and how organisations can develop the role of the line manager as a conduit for communications

    We must emphasise that while these are a few of the highlights, it’s impossible to mention everyone that we’ve been fortunate enough to speak with throughout the series. We must, however, thank all our interviewees. Every single episode has helped to develop the conversation and engage a growing audience.

    As 2020 draws to a close, we can only reflect on what a very strange year it has been. We don’t think anyone is under any illusion that 2021 will be anything other than another tough year. However, let’s take what we have learned through the challenges we’ve all faced over the last few months and approach the new year stronger and more resilient as individuals and internal communicators, and with optimism for the future.

    2021 will be the year to ensure that you get your people behind your purpose and values, and ensure they return to work with renewed enthusiasm. Let’s build back better than we had before, both personally and at the organisational level.

    Before we sign off this first season, we’d just like to repeat our thanks to all our interviewees for their incredible contributions, and to our listeners for their gracious and continued support.

    We’ve got some fantastic episodes lined up for 2021, kicking off with Linda McCormack from Anglian Water, who discusses employee advocacy and the great work that Anglian Water have been doing during the pandemic as...
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    6 mins
  • The future of internal communications | S1 E29

    The future of internal communications | S1 E29
    Dec 22 2020
    The Future of Internal Communications

    In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Jennifer Sproul, Chief Executive of the Institute of Internal Communications since 2016, and currently leading the institute through the most uncertain and difficult times in the profession.

    She is also the co-presenter for IoIC’s podcast, for which you can find a link at the end of these show notes.

    The IoIC celebrated its 70th year last year and is the only independent professional body that is solely dedicated to promoting a deeper understanding of internal communication. It has 1,800 members, who work mostly in corporate organisations and the public sector.

    Prior to her role as Chief Exec for the IoIC, Jennifer worked in the Market Research Society and a variety of senior marketing and comms roles.

    The importance of internal communication

    For some time, internal communications has been used as a broadcasting function, acting as an executive megaphone to transmit messages.

    Today, internal communication means much more. It provides essential access to engagement within an organisation and empowers learning and organisational development. Internal comms is now a key mechanism in successful and forward-moving organisations.

    Through communicating internally, organisations can learn:

    • How people share information, through feedback and dialogue
    • How line managers can communicate effectively amongst teams
    • What’s important to the organisation
    • How people perceive their role and how engagement creates empowerment, purposefulness and inclusion, resulting in employee loyalty

    In 2020, communication became more important than ever before. “In this pandemic, if we’ve learned nothing else, we’ve learned the power of communication,” says Jennifer. “It’s our tool in the fight against what we’re dealing with right now in the world.”

    The changing role of internal comms people

    Currently, internal comms people have a clearly defined role in facilitating greater communications. However, the future of internal communication as a profession will lead beyond message distribution. Internal comms will assist the learning and development of middle and line managers to act as communication conduits directly with their teams.

    As we emerge through a game-changing pandemic, Jennifer identifies this current climate as a pivotal opportunity to develop managers’ skills to communicate more effectively with their teams. This includes helping them to:

    • Digest and understand the context of an organisation’s message
    • Understand employees’ reactive feelings and behaviours as feedback

    Internal comms people are now helping managers upskill to become better communicators, an advantage felt even more acutely in remote teams.

    “It’s about redefining what good management is,” says Jennifer. “As we move to more distributed working, where the line managers are going to play more of a pivotal role, now is the time to really be thinking about making that seismic shift and helping to embed that good facilitation skill throughout the organisation.”

    Another development in internal comms is that secondment to positions to which they are communicating is now more common. This helps internal comms people to understand the issues that people are experiencing, thus deepening their knowledge of the organisation from the ground floor up.

    What has 2020 done for the profession of internal comms?

    2020 has been a historic year. It forced individuals and businesses of all sizes to adjust rapidly to survive. There has also been immeasurable trauma – mentally and physically to individuals, and logistically and financial...
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    48 mins
  • Employee alignment: Unlocking the engagement puzzle | S1 E28

    Employee alignment: Unlocking the engagement puzzle | S1 E28
    Dec 15 2020
    Employee Alignment: Unlocking the Engagement Puzzle

    In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Lindsay Uittenbogaard. Lindsay is Director at Mirror Mirror, which is an employee engagement consultancy based in the Netherlands.

    Mirror Mirror has built around 120 practitioners in 17 different countries. It is a tool that identifies and measures alignment gaps, by capturing the way that people perceive their context at work and comparing them in other team levels, to identify common ground and differences. It helps organisations and employees create clarity and engagement, enabling teams and organisations to develop more effectively.

    Prior to Mirror Mirror, Lindsay held senior internal communication roles at Shell, T-Systems, VEON, and FEMS (Federation of European Microbiological Societies). Lindsay also has experience in micro-businesses.

    Employee alignment is different to employee engagement

    Employee alignment is often viewed as a consequence of employee engagement. In reality, alignment is a precursor to engagement. Alignment is crucial to employee engagement.

    Lindsay explains this in three levels of alignment in an organisation:

    1. The alignment of the enterprise to the strategic intent

    This provides a strategic frame in which employees can operate, ensuring an organisation’s systems and processes are all pointing in the same direction.

    2. The alignment of people to the organisation’s strategy

    How the context can be shared with employees to enable them to align with the strategy.

    3. Aligning employees with each other

    With the strategy and communication in place, this level ensures employees can collaborate and interact to fill the gaps.

    Lindsay explains that without alignment and a clear view of the strategy on how to collaborate and implement it, employees will not be engaged. However, she also puts forward that employees may be aligned yet not engaged.

    When employees understand the vision, the strategy, their team’s purpose, and how they can implement it, engagement is achieved to advance the organisation’s mission through their role.

    Creating employee alignment in a diversified world

    Thankfully, world culture and organisational culture now encourage diversity and the embracing of differences. However, it may appear contradictory to combine this with alignment, with all employees expected to sit on the same page.

    Lindsay is quick to clarify that alignment must not be confused with the idea of everybody thinking the same thing. “We don’t want you to just kind of memorise a message, because that’s not really going to have them internalise it,” she explains. “People have to make sense of things in their own ways.”

    Alignment is not a uniformed and rigid message. It’s about cognitive and behavioural compatibility.

    Organisations must both deliver a strategy and allow employees to express their interpretations and views within it.

    Employees and teams must take time to discuss their interpretations, healthily challenging each other without confrontation or conflict, with respect for differences in opinions. Doing so will pave the way for alignment as employees adapt to each other’s views and decisions and come to agreement on how to move forward together.

    Therefore, communication must focus on engaging people in conversation to surface misalignments and resolve them as a team.

    Miscommunicating communication

    Communication through conversation is widely accepted as the best method to engage people in organisations. But how one person hears a message can be very different to how others hear it. The result could be engaged teams that are misaligned.

    Organisations must take car...
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    1 hr and 3 mins
  • Measuring organisational culture | S1 E27

    Measuring organisational culture | S1 E27
    Dec 8 2020
    Measuring organisational culture In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Victoria Bond about measuring organisational culture. Victoria is Director at Space HR Ltd. – a new HR consultancy that helps organisations to maximise the value of their teams, their people, and their culture. Victoria’s extensive career includes several senior HR roles in organisations, including Manchester Airport and The Access Group. She is passionate about helping organisations to better measure and understand what their employees are thinking and feeling, thus finding ways to help their leaders to respond to that feedback in real time. The difference culture can make in Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A) Victoria points out how management often focuses too heavily on profits and sales, when it’s the engagement of its people that can truly make the difference, especially when merging or introducing potential investors, or acquisitioning. “They are overlooking the value that having a really great team is adding to their business,” Victoria says. “A lot of conversations I have with clients are around really maximising the value and the performance in their business through really turning up the volume of employee engagement.” Victoria talks about how investors or potential buyers are looking for healthy culture and the feel of a successful business that runs on the fuel of engaged and innovative employees. “If somebody is coming in to value your business, and they’ve had a terrible experience from the people who work there, while you’re going to take points off, you’re going to take pounds off the value of that business.” The added value of engaged employees is a value that is not only identified by potential investors and buyers, it is also a value that allows management to present the company in a confident pitch. Victoria explains the difference it made to her in her experience, when she was HR director presenting her well-cultured company. “It helped that I was able to passionately and articulately talk about our talent, and the thing we were doing,” she says. “We could talk about the levels of engagement in our business; we could talk about the length of service and loyalty that we had from our team. And that was backed up by the owners and the other operational leaders in the room.” When focus is not solely placed on sales and profits, and instead attentive of people engagement, the culture that cascades throughout the organisation strengthens the spine of the company. This adds exponential value to a company’s investors and potential buyers. How can organisational culture be measured? Whether organisations have identified that they need to improve engagement amongst their people, or they already have a strong and healthy culture, they must be able to measure their successes and failures. This is critical to preventing failures in engagement from being identified in the early stages, and in identifying where a company may be struggling in order to improve people engagement. Victoria outlines a couple of physical indicators that demonstrate a company has a good employee engagement strategy:
    • Incentive schemes – appropriately managed and working effectively
    • Rewarding and supportive employee contracts
    • Succession planning, with personal development programmes for key players
    However, a lot of monitoring of employee engagement can be based on the general feeling within an organisation, and it’s crucial that this has regular pulse checks. Victoria gives a few pointers:
    • Are the leaders and managers inspirational and good at leading change, with the ability to lead their teams through big change transitions?
    • Are employees connecting and...
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    48 mins
  • Using humour in internal comms | S1 E26

    Using humour in internal comms | S1 E26
    Dec 1 2020
    Using Humour in Internal Comms In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Costanza Tobino about using humour in internal comms. Costanza’s work experience ranges from marketing to internal communications and employee engagement. She has previously worked for companies such as Pearson and Gap, and currently she is the Global Internal Communications Manager at Stats Perform, a leading technology company in sports data. Stats Perform’s mission is to provide better sports predictions and insights by using data and artificial intelligence, bringing the deepest breadth of data, sports research, sports news, and video content. Headquartered in Chicago and London, Stats Perform has offices around the world. As Global Internal Comms Manager, it’s Costanza’s job to unite everybody, and ensure all employees are collaborating, connected, and integrated. Costanza has led numerous communication projects involving change integration, mergers, acquisitions, executive leadership, product launches, corporate social responsibility, learning and development, and community engagement. Her biggest interests are in powerful communications, video, new technologies, and humour, which is what Craig will be discussing with Costanza in this podcast. The power of humour as a communication tool While humour is defined as the quality of being amusing or comical, Costanza explains that humour in the context of communication within an organisation is very different. Humour is a powerful tool that can ignite an emotional connection with an audience, which is crucial when a message is to be conveyed. Engaging communications produce positive emotions and essentially positive behaviours from individual employees, teams, and organisations as an entirety. Describing humour in internal communications, Costanza says, “It’s a form of emotional intelligence, and if used appropriately, you can contribute to employee wellbeing, human flourishing, and also the creation of meaningful connections, and better employee engagement.” Breaking down internal communication barriers Craig and Costanza discuss how humour can break down the barriers of communication that are often barricaded with corporate-style rigid communication methods. With messages encrypted within a humorous and engaging presentation, the importance of the root message is carefully disguised as fun. Perhaps most importantly, this engrains the message within the audience for the long term. When something is made fun and memorable, an individual will recall it throughout their profession. This is very powerful within an organisation’s communications. Ensuring sensitivity before humour Humour, of course, must always be handled with care and sensitivity. There are many factors internal comms people must consider when using humour to communicate, such as:
    • Religion
    • Culture
    • Politics
    • Social issues
    • Health issues
    If humour is not adjusted accordingly, it can have a very detrimental and unnecessarily negative effect on an organisation’s people. “Humour is a form of emotional intelligence, which can be broken down into self-awareness, self-regulation, empathy, and social skills,” says Costanza. “As leaders and communicators, we need to rely on all these skills and fully exploit our emotional intelligence to identify situations and circumstances where you would be perceived as, for example, disrespectful or insensitive.” Internal comms people must directly use emotional intelligence and be highly self-aware of potential negative reactions to humour. Why humour is an essential ingredient in communicati...
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    52 mins
  • Motivational Intelligence | S1 E25

    Motivational Intelligence | S1 E25
    Nov 24 2020
    Motivational Intelligence In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to David Naylor. David is Executive Vice President at 2Logical, a leading global consultancy helping organisations navigate through various challenges and transitions, most recently being the pandemic. Clients include organisations such as General Motors, Bank of America, American Express, L’Oréal, Tate & Lyle, and many more. David is based in New York, where 2Logical has its headquarters. The company also has offices in the Middle East and Australia, and operates across 90 countries and six different continents. David is also an author and Forbes contributor, as well as a LinkedIn advisor, and his team run The Motivational Intelligence podcast, which you can find in the link at the end of these show notes. What is motivational intelligence? The original concept of intelligence was quantified in the form of an IQ back in the 1600s. This is still used to measure mental ability. Additionally to IQ, David explains how emotional intelligence (EQ) is essentially the human being’s understanding of emotions and how these emotions influence behaviour. Further to this, David explains how psychological researcher Dr Carol Dweck discovered a third type of intelligence, motivational intelligence, which consists of two types of mindset: 1. Fixed mindset Those with a fixed mindset have a more limited belief system about themselves and their capabilities, and even their perspective on the world. They believe their qualities are unchangeable and fixed traits, and do not strive to develop or improve them. They believe that success requires talent alone, and not effort. 2. Growth mindset Those with a growth mindset believe that learning, effort, and persistence improves their abilities and intelligence. They strive for improvement in themselves and have broader capabilities, and embrace change and development. “Motivational intelligence is the driver on whether an individual is operating under a fixed mindset, or growth mindset,” David concludes. “It is an individual’s awareness and their ability to manage negative thoughts and self-limiting beliefs.” Thus, how an individual behaves can have damaging ripple effects within an organisation, with their mindset most often the root cause of issues within a business. Identifying motivational intelligence in the workplace It is crucial for an organisation to identify motivational problems within its people, as negative effects can hinder the performance and progression of an individual, a team, and the business itself. David notes five important characteristics that will highlight the mindset types of an organisations’ employees. An employee’s reactive behaviours depend on whether they have a fixed mindset or growth mindset. These characteristics are:
    1. Accountability – a fixed mindset will play the victim, while a growth mindset will take ownership of accomplishments, failures and solutions
    2. Adaptability – a fixed mindset is risk-averse and contests feedback, while a growth mindset is open-minded and seeks feedback
    3. Resilience – those with high motivational intelligence bounce back from setbacks more easily
    4. Initiative – the ability to problem solve and lead is more apparent in people with high motivational intelligence
    5. Courage – motivational intelligence drives people to act without fear and self-doubt
    Being aware of these five characteristics will help identify those who, most importantly, are struggling with motivational intelligence, so that action and support can be provided accordingly. Developing motivational intelligence in those who need it most...
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    46 mins
  • Building a career in Internal Comms | S1 E24

    Building a career in Internal Comms | S1 E24
    Nov 17 2020
    Building a Career in Internal Comms In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Dureen Anwer, who is the senior Corporate Communications Manager at NHS organisation NEL, a role that involves both employee engagement and external corporate communications. NEL is a commissioning support unit consisting of 1,500 people, which provides expert support and advice to clinical commissioners, and an extensive range of services such as contracting, analytics, finance, IT design, and digital communications. Dureen has followed a phenomenally successful career path. After moving to the UK from Pakistan, she moved up from the role of communications officer to a senior IC role within five years. Dureen has worked in several organisations including the NHS and Herefordshire Council. To achieve your career goals, it may be necessary to first step down the career ladder When starting a career in internal comms (or other roles, for that matter), the traditional career ladder isn’t always the best way to view your path. Sometimes it is necessary to take a step sideways, or even a step down, to move ahead. This is how Dureen made her move into internal communications, by first stepping down from a senior management position. “I was moving from a PR agency to a multinational. I needed more stability, and I wanted to work on the client side instead of being on the agency side, where you don’t have enough room for creativity. I had to step down the ladder,” says Dureen. Dureen describes how important it is to consider what you want from your role. If there is an opportunity that accommodates these factors, then stepping down the ladder will allow you to expand your experience and eventually allow you to climb higher in your career. This does mean that in the early stages of building your career in internal comms, there may be episodes where you may feel overqualified, or your experience isn’t reflected in your authority, responsibilities, or salary. Dureen emphasises how this is all a part of steering your career into something bigger in the future. “I believe it’s always getting your foot in the door which is the most difficult bit. Then all I needed to do was to be proactive and prove my worth,” she says. Whilst building your career in internal comms, you must play the long game, and concentrate on opening up the opportunities that allow personal development and growth. This will evolve into organic career growth in internal comms. You must be resilient to build a career in internal comms For many, moving back to move forward in your career is a difficult concept to grasp. It goes against the grain. Resilience is necessary. “Starting from the bottom again meant that I was looking up to a lot of other people who might not have had similar experiences, or had less experience compared to me,” explains Dureen. She says it is important not to allow a sense of being undermined become a barrier to your own future success. “I didn’t let that get to me because I looked at it from a different perspective that these people, they know the market,” says Dureen. “I reminded myself that I know my goal. It might not happen today, it might not happen tomorrow, it might not happen in the next five years. But ultimately, there’s no reason that I can’t achieve it. So that was my personal motivation.” As they are building their career in internal comms, comms people must utilise their key skills to learn and create new opportunities to advance their long-term career goals – they must invest in themselves. Business acumen and key skills are critical in internal comms To be successful in internal comms you must have a good understanding of the business before you attempt to act as a communication channel amongst its people. “You...
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    32 mins
  • Communicating from the C-Suite | S1 E23

    Communicating from the C-Suite | S1 E23
    Nov 10 2020
    Communicating from the C-Suite In this episode of Engaging Internal Comms, The Big Picture People’s Craig Smith talks to Hillary U, who is Executive Internal Communications Leader for the Salesforce security team. Hillary is currently based in Washington, Seattle. Salesforce is the world's number one customer relationship management platform, with a focus on bringing customers and companies together. Salesforce has almost 50,000 employees around the world, with an ever-expanding global footprint. Prior to this role, Hillary was involved in a senior internal comms role at Amazon Web Services, and before that held posts at Deloitte Digital Alaska Group, PACCAR Inc., and the University of Washington. Time is the ultimate challenge of communicating from the C-Suite Good internal communication is imperative within a company to ensure that changes, messages, and transformations are effectively and accurately communicated throughout an organisation. The source of the communication begins in the C-Suite. However, with the C-suite housing a corporation’s most senior executives, there’s a risk to overall trust and clarity if this level within the organisation does not communicate effectively. With decision making and technical issues requiring prioritisation, communication beyond the C-Suite can often become jarred, preventing the seamless flow of communication that is required throughout the organisation. Hillary explains that while many leaders want to communicate their message, time is the ultimate challenge to communicating effectively. Communication blocks are commonly found at the following points:
    • Finding time for the change or message to be thoroughly understood by management and internal comms executives
    • Finding time to distribute and communicate that message throughout the organisation
    With time constraints, Hillary also explains how the C-Suite can often simply assume that communication has occurred, with no time to manage how the message has been portrayed and received. “I think it’s easy for leaders to think that employees understand either their goals, their vision, their values, because as senior leaders, they’re getting that every day from their own manager, whether that be the board or stakeholders,” Hillary explains. “But for the everyday employee, that message tends to get watered down as it makes its way through the organisation.” Two-way channels give communication real power The C-Suite may not necessarily be equipped with natural communication skills. It’s important to find a way for every leader to ensure change and message are transparent and understood, and that employees feel like they are a part of their organisation’s decisions and future. Hillary explains that while many leaders are good at pitching – to stakeholders, board members and other C-Suite officers – employees require a very different tone. “Employees don’t want business speak. They want to hear something authentic. They want to see vulnerability. They want to feel like it’s a real person they’re speaking to, and they really want a two-way channel,” says Hillary. To prevent a decision being made by C-Suite and simply ‘paper-aeroplaned’ to employees, communicating change management must allow two-way communications. This enables employees to better understand the information and be able to ask how it may impact their role within the organisation. This can be accomplished in various ways, such as:
    • On a small-scale level: small groups, or lunch-and-learn gatherings for a more casual environment
    • On a large-scale level: a large meeting, but crucially where not only the leader is talking
    However executed, Q&A time must be accommodated to provide a clear two-way channel for discussion. W...
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    44 mins