Policy Schmolicy
When you write a policy, you probably do so because someone somewhere wants to manage risk and protect the people it’s aimed at. Despite this noble intent, many flinch when a new policy is announced because they think that yet another cherished freedom is under attack.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Policies can empower. They can liberate. They can enrich. And they can make you feel a whole lot better. That’s because they tend to provide clarity around what is acceptable and what isn’t. This clarity removes doubt and fear that can otherwise stifle an individual’s personal and professional development as well as cripple the organisations they work for, by blocking innovation and collaboration, and encouraging risk aversion, inertia and even withdrawal.
To be effective a policy has to make sense and land well with the intended audience. The ‘what’s in it for me’ question must be addressed right up front. “Failure to comply with this policy could lead to disciplinary action, including dismissal” just doesn’t cut the mustard.
That’s a bit like telling people they are lucky to have a job when they submit an idea to improve the conditions they work in.
With words like ‘compliance’, ‘discipline’, ‘conflict’, ‘declaration’, ‘grievance’, ‘enforcement’, ‘monitoring’ and ‘unauthorised’, the language around policies is littered with negativity.
I promise you there’s at least a glimmer of positivity in every policy and a shed load in most, so stop focussing on the doom and gloom and bring out the positives. Demonstrate how the policy will liberate you to get out there and sell more stuff, build better products, provide even better support to your customers and even maybe encourage you to evangelise about the great company you work for.
Given that most policies fly out of Legal, Finance, Internal Audit and HR it may be too much to expect the language within to ensure a smooth landing with the intended audience. This is where Internal Communications should take over the controls, ease back on the throttle, and bring the plane in safely.
The next question is do they really have to be so damned prescriptive?
Pulling in the same direction
I love working in Internal Communications. What’s not to love about trying to create a climate inside an organisation where the major factors that influence employee engagement can thrive: respect, trust, openness and recognition. For me it is the noblest of professions that has the potential to drive business performance like no other.
Marketing, Public Affairs and PR may well get all the money, resources and glory. Am I bothered? Not a jot, because I get the quiet satisfaction of knowing that what Internal Communications is doing is more challenging, more complex and every bit as important.
Internal Communications has unique challenges that external facing teams don’t have to contend with, and this fact alone makes the job such a blast.
Perhaps the biggest of these challenges is securing the enduring commitment of the senior leadership team. I say enduring because that is the key difference between external and internal communications. External communications only really needs the commitment of the senior leaders at certain points in the supply chain; budget approval, communications plan sign-off, cooperation at media training time & rehearsals, and then sticking to the script when let out in public. The rest of the time they can generally leave things in the very capable hands of the Corporate Communications team and not give a second thought to what they’re up to.
Internal Communications however needs the commitment of the senior leadership team all of the time – and I mean all of the time.
From the minute they walk in the door to the minute they clock out 13 hours later, day-in, day-out, they need to be acutely aware of the influence they have on their people. One unguarded moment; one throwaway comment on a conference call; one ill-considered line in an email; that’s all it takes to expose a potentially critical lack of alignment with company’s strategy and values, or with the rest of one’s peers on the senior leadership team.
More than anything, leaders need to live and breathe the company strategy and values through their actions,behaviours and words. Their job is to bring to bring this stuff to life internally and to empower and energise their people to follow the company’s strategic intent.
Just one loose cannon could lead to entire divisions working against each other and pulling in the wrong direction.
Internal Communications is there to facilitate and support organisational alignment – and without leadership alignment the odds are stacked against you. That’s why I believe that the single most important part of our job is to facilitate and support leadership alignment.
It’s a bit harder and infinitely more interesting than simply managing intranet content and spraying corporate messages around with the Internal Communications scattergun.
I made you a cake but then I ate it…
I can’t think of a single word in the English language that pisses me off more than the word “but”.
There’s no other word quite like it for sucking the positivity out of a room. No other word comes close to plucking defeat from the jaws of victory.
Just when you think you’ve cracked it, out pops the ‘b’ word and everything unravels. I’d love to help you but… I think it’s a cracking idea but… It’s one of the best meals I’ve ever had but…
Think about it. What does “but” actually do?
I’ll tell you what it does – it effectively puts a line through the words that immediately precede it, rendering them a pointless waste of time.
The dictionary says that “but” is a conjunction used to indicate contrast. That’s far too generous. Contrast is good – it provides clarity and makes things sharper and more visible. I think we need a new definition.
but [buht; unstressed buht]
A word used to dilute the power of the words that precede it.
Puffery
I’m a frequent flyer, and as a consequence of international aviation law and my lily-livered British tendency to comply with silly rules, I tend to browse through the in-flight magazine until the seatbelt sign goes out. I’d love to know the real reason why I am forbidden from reading my Kindle, but that’s another story.
Anyway, that’s why I came across an astonishing example of corporate puffery this evening. You know the stuff. Bland and meaningless tosh used by corporate communicators the world over to fill a bit of space when they have nothing really to say.
Here is the offending piece, which is part of the welcome page inside the front cover, written (well, signed at least) by the airline’s Managing Director:
“With the new year fast approaching, I would like to share with you the news that throughout 2012 we will be announcing a number of new initiatives. These will ensure that we continue to making flying with us the quickest, most comfortable and best-value way to travel across Europe.”
He then moves on, swiftly changing the subject, leaving me in such a state that I felt compelled to whip out my laptop and write my first ever airborne blog.
Quite how the intention to announce news of news next year can constitute news today is beyond me.
But what is worse – corporate puff or marketing bull?
Trust me, I’m a CEO
The essence of a great place to work is trust. Thirty years of experience working with the most successful organisations in the world leads the Great Places to Work Institute to conclude that the foundation of every great workplace is trust between employees and management.
In another interview with Erin Lieberman Moran of the Great Place To Work Institute, Mark Ragan recently asked about the role of social media today in Internal Communications. Erin’s response was that the best companies are using it to enhance and strengthen workplace relationships. She went on to say:
“In lousy workplaces, organisations are monitoring the blogs to make sure that there aren’t human resource violations. In high trust environments where leaders trust the people that work within the organisation, they are just letting those conversations continue because there is an understanding and an appreciation that by opening up those vehicles they have insight into what people are thinking and experiencing.”
My regular readers will not be surprised that I concur.
These conversations will still be happening. Employees with an axe to grind will still hold court in the coffee room or the corridor. It’s just that the leadership team won’t have the benefit of knowing about them nor the opportunity to engage with the issues.
Earlier this year, Giam Swiegers, CEO of Deloitte Australia gave a fascinating interview on the use of Yammer within his organisation. Among other things, it gives him the opportunity to personally engage with people out in the open, not only to challenge misconceptions but also to accept responsibility for organisational shortcomings and take speedy remedial action. It’s worth a watch if you are interested in this stuff.
It seems to me that this kind of leadership approach must make a positive contribution to the creation of a high trust environment in the workplace. I’d love to hear from any Deliotte people who could provide any insight into how much emotional credit Giam has managed to accumulate through his approach to Social Media.
Social Media is not everyone’s cup of tea and in my opinion it can only ever be part of a multi-channel approach to employee communications. In some respects the real value of encouraging staff to blog and contribute to cross functional discussions using tools like Yammer is as much symbolic as it is practical.
As long as they are trusted to do so without heavy policing and censorship.
Work must have value
I have studied employee engagement ever since I got into Internal Communications. That’s why we do it right? Never before have I been struck by the simplicity and poignancy of a single statement in all my reading on the subject:
“The engaged stay for what they can give. The disengaged stay for what they can get.”
I picked it up on Twitter via @adamparnes who had just blogged about his experience at a National Geographic forum he had attended which had been facilitated by Leadership Development consultants Blessing White. The trail led me to Blessing White’s 2011 Employee Engagement Report. Do yourself a favour – read it!
The concept of recognition is not new. Every study on employee engagement ever made will mention recognition as a key driver of positive behaviour. However, I haven’t seen many that focus on the value of work. Gallup touch on it in their 12 Elements of Great Management, where I recall the phrase “money without meaning is not enough compensation” however the context was more around working for a company that has a noble cause and a vision that inspires.
What I love about “The engaged stay for what they can give” is the focus on individual contribution. If you feel that your own endeavours add real value to the company and are contributing to its success your motivation levels will be sky high and you are likely to hang up pretty quickly next time that pesky recruiter calls.
On the contrary, no matter how much love and loyalty you feel towards your company, if the work you are being asked or allowed to do does not feel valuable, no amount of money, free lunches, great benefits, table football or sleeping pods will keep you there for too long. And if it does, that’s where the rot sets in.
Work must have meaning. It must have value. If the meaning and value disappears you begin to tread water. OK, you are still motivated by the rewards for doing that job and you still do your job. You even look busy a lot of the time. But the days drag on and your main focus becomes the clock on the wall. You tune out. Discretionary effort goes out of the window, and in no time your increasing disillusionment turns to bitterness and you begin to sap the energy of those around you.
It’s simple. The secret of driving employee engagement lies in matching the operational and strategic needs of the business with the individual skills, interests and aspirations of each employee so that everyone feels that the work they do has value.
This was beautifully illustrated in last week’s episode of Downton Abbey in the following exchange between Mrs Isobel Crawley and Lady Grantham:
“If I am not appreciated here I will seek some other place where I will make a difference. I mean it. I cannot operate where I am not valued. You must see that.”
Blimey – I never thought I’d end up quoting a popular period drama to make an intellectual point about employee engagement…
Freedom of the press
Freedom of the press normally applies to the freedom of the press and media to operate and report without unreasonable state interference. It’s important all right, but not for me today. My mind is weighing heavily on a different interpretation of this much used phrase.
I’m looking at the freedom of the press to ride roughshod over the principles, ethics and standards of journalism. Principles like objectivity, impartiality, fairness and accountability. Principles that every journalist should swear by, but sometimes seem to stick two fingers up at instead.
Yesterday, The Telegraph’s Business Editor Alistair Osborne posted a news story bearing the headline “Betfair a ‘shambles’ says punter who lost £16,000”. With a headline like that it was soon all over Twitter like a rash.
Before I go any further I should declare an interest here. I worked for Betfair for two and a half years up until January 2011. I left the company by choice. I am not a shareholder. Regular readers of my blog will know that I am a long standing Betfair customer and fan of the company. My experience working for Betfair served to reinforce what I have always believed. It is a great business, run my passionate and capable people, as well as a great place to work.
After reading the piece I was left with an uneasy feeling that the author has a bit of an axe to grind. Since when has a customer service issue become bona fide business news in a quality UK broadsheet? At best it’s the kind of story that given time may possibly develop into something Anne Robinson may take up on Watchdog – but even that is unlikely as there is no question of skulduggery or deceit.
I then noticed that the author’s last two pieces on Betfair were equally critical in content and tone. I had even tweeted about one of them at the time just a few days ago, as I was disappointed to learn that Betfair had physically prevented journalists (including Alistair Osborne evidently) from entering their AGM. My feeling at the time was that adopting a bunker mentality was not sensible for a public company with nothing to hide.
Anyway, after reading the comments under Mr Osborne’s latest piece I was quite shocked at how many people were taking the opportunity to indulge in a spot of Betfair bashing. So I tried to redress the balance and point out that in my opinion the author had an axe to grind and the story was a ‘shameful’ piece of journalism.
Well the moderator was having none of it and after a short delay my comment was removed. Luckily I kept a copy. This is what I posted:
“Shameful journalism. This is not business news. This is the kind of tosh I’d expect from Anne Robinson on Watchdog, not from a business editor on the Telegraph. The author clearly has a personal agenda here. Just look at his recent pieces on Betfair. Take a long hard look at yourself in the mirror Mr Osborne. Is this how they taught you to behave in journo school?”
At the last count the article has 91 comments. Many are littered with strongly worded abuse towards the company, the industry and even the ‘victim’. Some accuse Betfair of being rigged. Others of theft. One even makes reference to the CEO’s ethnicity and jokes about his access to triad gangs to enforce gambling debts.
One wag using the name “the_judge” wrote “Jon Weedon get back in your plantpot. Betfair is a scam outfit. It took me months to get my deposits back from these crooks. I hope they go bust and your shares go down the toilet.”
My point is that my comment was not half as rude or threatening as many posts that still reside in the thread. I can only conclude that it was removed because it did not comply with the sentiment of the anti-Betfair brigade who dominate the thread and it dared to question the author’s journalistic integrity. It looks like the expedient route of censorship prevailed over freedom of speech.
It feels very much to me like double standards are at play here. How can a member of the press corp being excluded from an AGM be an outrage, when a member of the public being excluded from commenting on a poor piece of journalism is fine?
Hurrumph…
How do you make people laugh?
I’m a really funny guy. I’m not joking – I’m truly hilarious.
I have developed very successful strategies for making people laugh. I fully understand the dynamics of the chortle. When I tell a joke I deliver the key elements perfectly every time. Without fail.
I lay the foundations and set the scene so perfectly that when I deliver the punch line it has everyone laughing their heads off. And if I don’t deploy the element of surprise, I’m a master at dropping in a spot of exaggeration or a beautifully observed piece of irony. Believe me, I really am very funny.
Convinced? No, of course you’re not. You think I’m a bit of a twat who thinks he is funny and is clearly anything but.
The moral of my story? If you want to make people laugh, don’t keep telling them how funny you are, start telling jokes.
OK, let’s change the question a little. How do you make people feel engaged?
Can you see where I’m going with this?
If you want to make people feel engaged, don’t keep telling them what a great employer you are, start engaging them.
Precisely how you do that will differ from person to person, office to office, city to city, and country to country. You probably don’t want to start telling Jewish jokes in downtown Tel Aviv or Irish jokes in deepest Dublin.
However, there are some universal truths in employee engagement, like respect, trust, openness and recognition. So don’t keep telling people you are going to trust them, or treat them with respect. Just do it.
Q: When is the worst time to have a heart attack?
A: When it’s your go in a game of charades.
How I see IC (15)
Focus on your objectives – never lose sight of the purpose of your communication.
Photo by Henrietta Weedon
