Sanitary check – the antidote to financial gloom?

By Mandy Thatcher, Head of Content, Melcrum

In these worrying times of financial crisis and economic downturn, it’s pleasantly diverting to have a communication conundrum of slightly less epic proportions to worry about. So I think the Melcrum crew were probably secretly pleased (or maybe that was just me?) to receive a posting on our email discussion forum entitled “Sensitive sanitary issues”. Here goes:

“I’ve been approached by our Office Services team to address the state of our gents loo's (after a number of complaints from others have been received). I'm aware this is a sensitive issue and wondered if anyone had any advice they could offer in terms of how to best address this? Apart from the obvious 'polite' notices on the back of each cubicle door and such like, we've not been able to agree on what would be considered an appropriate manner of dealing with this. Has anyone come across this type of communication challenge?”

Earth shattering? Perhaps not. But a dilemma nonetheless. It’s easy to smirk, but I think this definitely qualifies as a “difficult message” driven by a real need for behaviour change. Measurable behaviour change at that.

Fellow networkers were undaunted by the challenge and just in case you’re ever tasked with a similar communication initiative, the general consensus is “use humour” – e.g. humurous posters and messages. One networker suggested linking to culture and values: “Our company core values are an accepted part of life here; respect is one of our values and how you leave the toilet for your colleagues is a matter of respect, so we would have a clear way of making the point.”

At a more practical level, another piece of advice was to make sure employees had access to whatever “basic materials” they needed to keep the toilets in a more pristine condition.

On a more serious note, there was some concern that a communication professional was being asked to deal with this kind of thing in the first place: “Please forgive me for seeing an opportunity to use this as a great example about the need for business (communication) people to establish firm priorities about what they will and won't do based on the value added to the business.”

What’s your view? Do you think it’s inappropriate that communicators have “projects” like this dumped on them? What’s the most embarrassing message you’ve ever had to communicate?

Comments

[Annie Waite]

I particularly liked the suggestion one Comms' Network member posted in response to this query –

In one organisation, some of the gents had "accuracy" issues. The solution was to make a series of posters that went above the urinals with a picture of a big bullseye and the phrase "We aim to please, you aim too please".

Simple, but clever. I hope it worked!

[Vandana]

One request I have received is to encourage people to use the straircase more often rather than using the building lift. The idea behind this is cost cutting, maybe taking the trend to the extreme but nevertheless the intention's good. Any suggestions on how humour can be used here?