It's back! Diary of an Internal Communicator: Jenni Wheller - Week 2

By Jenni Wheller, Internal Communications Manager, SSP UK 

Back by popular demand, over the next four weeks the Melcrum Blog will feature another series of diary entries by an internal communicator. Previously Rachel Allen gave us all a fascinating insight into her new role as head of communication at London Overground Rail Operations.  Read it here if you missed it.

This time our guest blogger is Jenni Wheller (pictured, right) who has recently taken on a new in-house role at SSP UK. Jenni was previously business development manager at internal communications agency theblueballroom, and prior to that, internal communication officer at Thomson Local. We look forward to hearing how she tackles the many challenges she will undoubtedly face in the coming weeks at SSP UK... here's her second week.

What a week! While the volcanic ash has left hundreds of thousands of passengers stranded outside the UK for days (and many are still there) it has also had a significant impact on our business.

The week really started on April 18th as communications went out to our employees who work in units at airports. With the mass closures we had to explain to staff what they were entitled to do in terms of holiday, unpaid leave, and so on. On Monday this was followed by communication to the entire business advising everyone what to do with employees who were stranded outside the UK and unable to attend work.

The cost to our business has been significant and when you’re fighting for budget to make a conference more engaging it couldn’t have come at a worse time – the budget has to stay the same as last year. So, flip cameras at the ready, we’re doing vox pops on the fly. The engaging workshop I had hoped for is still under negotiation and after some great meetings with a few agencies to get ideas, I’m going to do my best to get it on the agenda for the day.

This week also saw my first taste of getting behind the scenes of the operational business. I spent the day with our national retail director who looks after M&S Simply Food and Whistlestop outlets in railway stations, airports and now hospitals. From Farnborough to Birmingham New Street – stopping at Oxford and Reading on the way home I got the chance to see the environment our unit managers are working in and what pressures they face.

So what did they say:

• Some felt isolated from the business.
• Their priority is running the unit, not being on the computer.
• Things are over complicated – three email addresses are not necessary.
• Notice boards are the main communication with team members but not they’re sure how much they’re used.
• There is a split in the business between the divisions.
• They would like to bring the team together, regardless of divisions and meet other unit managers at their station.
• The Employee Forum and recognition in place in the retail division works very well.
• They do use our intranet but only to get HR information or relevant form – they bypass the latest news on the home page.

This was all great feedback and confirmed to me that online communications was not the way forward with our operational employees.

I have also spent some time in our group offices this week, working with the global communication team to understand their audience, communication goals as well as working on a project for a new corporate video for SSP to be used in job fairs, inductions and careers sites.

So what’s next? Doing a shift in a unit. Not just M&S this time, but also Burger King, Upper Crust and Millies Cookies – speaking to the managers has been great but I really want to hear what our team members think about the business.

Having set up a Survey Monkey account I can hopefully get the main survey out to the business next month. This has slipped slightly but in the interim I’m just getting out in the business where I can.

This week has been one of the busiest but it’s been great to see that the communication issues within the units are the same as head office told me they would be – they all know what’s wrong, they just haven’t been able to do anything about it.

The FOOF is in the pudding

By Nishwa Ashraf, Editorial Assistant, Melcrum

The worst of the recession might over, but that doesn’t mean communicators have to wave goodbye to cost saving exercises.

It’s worth keeping in mind that, even if your company isn’t making lay-offs, budgets are still tight and engagement is more important than ever. But how do you tie in the two?

The answer is FOOF: Focusing On Our Future.

A term coined by Aggregate Industries, FOOF saved the business more than £30 million during the height of the recession and is a highlight of today’s ‘Fresh Ideas for Internal Communicators’ Melcrum member event in London.

Facing redundancies in 2008, the construction company refused to become a casualty of the recession, setting up a campaign in conjunction with communication specialist Top Banana with an aim to save costs, prevent more job losses, boost revenues and drive cultural change. Here are just a few of the initiatives suggested by Top Banana and implemented by the Leicestershire-based business which transformed the company’s cultural future.

1.    A cross-sector of employees were selected to attend a conference fronted CEO, Bill Bolsover, where they asked him business critical questions that mattered to them. Bolsover then challenged every attendee to think of a cost saving solution under the ‘Pinch and Inch’ programme, from one pound to hundreds of thousands of pounds.

2.    The 80 delegates who attended the first meeting were then asked to encourage others to watch a video of the conference. Every colleague who viewed the event was then given a blue badge.

3.    The ‘Pinch an Inch’ programme: Whether an employee saved a pound by carpooling or hundreds of thousands of pounds by re-negotiating a contract, every penny counted and was documented on the Aggregates Industries intranet. Individual employees logged each cost saving and others could then use these ideas to save the business more money. Employees were able to see their collective daily savings through a “Cashometer”.

4.    The Green Dot project was the final part of the savings programme. Employees were again encouraged to take part but this time place green dot-shaped stickers on things such as light switches and computer monitors as a reminder for colleagues to switch them off. A simple but extremely effective initiative.

Aggregate Industries, as a result of these cost saving actions, has now ingrained this method of working in every working practice in the business, saving a massive £30m. Chief executive Bolsover, a notoriously traditional and hard to please leader, said: “By the third quarter, people were talking about FOOF to me, not the other way around.”

It's back! Diary of an Internal Communicator: Jenni Wheller - Week 1

By Jenni Wheller, Internal Communications Manager, SSP UK 

Back by popular demand, over the next few weeks the Melcrum Blog will feature another series of diary entries by an internal communicator. Last time it was Rachel Allen who gave us a fascinating insight into her new role as head of communication at London Overground Rail Operations.  Read it here if you missed it.

This time round our guest blogger is Jenni Wheller (pictured, right) who has recently taken on a new in-house role at SSP UK. Jenni was previously business development manager at internal communications agency theblueballroom, and prior to that, internal communication officer at Thomson Local. We look forward to hearing how she tackles the many challenges she will undoubtedly face in the coming weeks at SSP UK... over to Jenni.

SSP is a company you may not have heard of but one that owns many well-known brands that I’m sure many of you will have seen or visited. It’s a global business and, until recently, had no internal communication function in the UK, hence my appointment as its internal communications manager, which began about a month ago. In the UK alone, SSP has 10,000 employees that include a mixture of operational and support function staff. 

SSP brands itself as “the food travel experts”. It owns and manages brands like Upper Crust, Caffe Ritazza and Millie's Cookies in railway stations and airports across the world as well as the franchise to operate Burger King and M&S Simply Food in these locations. And this is where the challenge lies. There are people all over the UK working for SSP but representing other brands. In total we have over 40 brands in our portfolio.

So what have the first four weeks been like? Where do you start when it’s a blank sheet of paper?

Well, it isn’t entirely blank. Pockets of the business are doing their own thing – we have weekly operational alerts in railways, action packs in airports and "Your Shout" employee forums within retail outlets. So, in my first few weeks I’ve been meeting as many people in the different support functions as I can. I’ve met with everyone on the board, various other key stakeholders in the business and attended a number of internal events.

Next up is the operational side, spending days out in individual outlets or "units" as we call them, talking to unit managers and operations managers to find out what they receive from the business and what they would like to see change. In conjunction with that, I’m also going to carry out an audit across the entire business to find out whether employees are reading the information they currently receive and what they think of it. This is no mean feat when we also have a unit manager conference to organise for November, new IT systems being rolled out and new learning and development tools to be communicated.

I'm amazed at how complicated this business is and how fast paced everything has to be. The communication is so quick and needs to be out weekly which is a challenge I cannot wait to get my teeth into!

Kevin’s rudderless employees: does the Prime Minister need a lesson in employee engagement?

By Belinda Evans, Communications Content Manager, Melcrum

It appears Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has been so busy running the country and attempting to engage voters as we enter a new election year, that he’s neglected to engage some very important people... his employees.

Rudd and his ministers have reached a whopping staff turnover rate of nearly 60% in the two and a bit years since coming to office in late 2007, with yesterday's Daily Telegraph reporting that from a total of 444 positions, 262 ministerial staff members have left their roles. Is it any wonder the front-page headline of the newspaper posed the question: Is Kevin Rudd too hard to work for?

Of course, these figures are somewhat dramatized. Staff turnover is generally measured by counting resignations during a period of just one year, and the figure of 262 includes employees who may have left to start a family or simply transferred to another ministerial office. Having said that, there are clearly some internal issues at Parliament House, and I’ll bet my vote in the next federal election that communication lies at the root of those issues.

The media is accusing the Prime Minister of being a demanding boss, one who provides little feedback to his staff. But Rudd himself admits that working in politics is no walk in the park. Talking on radio station 2UE yesterday, he likened a year working in his office to a dog year, meaning it was worth seven years in normal life. Obviously, having employees work long hours in a high pressure environment does you no favors in terms of staff turnover, but I do wonder how many of those 262 employees might have hung around had Rudd spent some time engaging them in his vision, as he would his voters?

It’s a shame Kevin Rudd didn’t secure himself a place at our sold out Employee Engagement conference in Melbourne next week, as it sounds like he could do with a few tips.

What are your thoughts? Do you think Kevin Rudd has is too hard on his employees?

Sometimes the best way to get started is to stop....

With rising expectations for corporate intranet functionality comes a rising tide of anxiety about losing ownership and control. Not all, but many of us fear that emerging social technologies will wipe away the policies and systems that we’ve worked so hard to establish and maintain in our organizations.

The good news is that if we’re worried, then it means we care. The bad news is that anxiety can lead to fuzzy decision-making. The business needs come second, and our fears take the driving seat.

So what should you do?

Take time to think it through, says Nielson Norman Group’s Amy Schade, featured in our latest issue of Strategic Communication Management. She talked to our team about the Group’s latest report – the widely respected Intranet Design Annual – and gave insight into what makes a standout intranet.

She said the winners carefully considered how to integrate social technologies into existing intranets – they didn’t just grab for the latest tool or widget. Even better, they introduced features for solid business reasons, not in reaction to hype or fear or pressure.

It seems simple, but great thinking is a lot tougher than it looks. It takes collaboration and dialogue. Knowing what all the options are and being able to take a step back to consider all of them. It takes conviction and strength, and perhaps most importantly, insight into what your business needs.

Attend Melcrum’s new masterclass - Intranets with Impact - and you’ll get insights into all of these core skills and competencies. You'll leave with an appreciation of your intranet as a business tool rather than "just another channel" and an actionable plan that will really make a difference to your organization.

Intranets with Impact

May 18th–19th 2010,

Orlando, Florida

www.melcrum.com/intranetswithimpact

Has email passed its sell-by date?

By Nishwa Ashraf, Editorial Assistant, Melcrum

It’s personal and can reach a wide audience, both geographically and numerically.

For the best part of 40 years since its invention, email has provided a productive solution for communication.

But if you’re often finding yourself wasting time foraying through the junk and spam clogging up your inbox, rather then dealing with business that matters, you’re one of many employees seemingly shying away from using social media as a means of communication.

Employees are spending an average of six hours or more a week reading and sending internal emails, according to research from business consulting and technology services firm Concentra.

It’s the equivalent of 41 working days, or just over eight weeks, every year.

The study, which was completed by British employees in a range of industries including healthcare and the financial services, revealed that 33 percent of employees questioned admitted they spent six hours or more drafting and reading emails, every week. A further 28 percent said they take between three and five hours a week to keep on top of internal mail.

And for 85 percent of senior managers and 88 percent of HR teams, email is still the communication channel of choice, despite the growing number of social media channels available for business use over recent years.

Conversely, 50 percent of respondents believed that less than half of the internal emails they receive are useful.

And with the abundance of communication channels available today such as social media tools linked to intranets and portals, it begs the question: Why aren’t more communicators embracing social media tools when email has so many inherent flaws?

Plenty of business communication and workflow is centered around email, but for the time-conscious, the results are hard to ignore. It’s ridiculous to think that so much time (and money) is spent tunneling through a mountain of email, that’s mostly filled with junk.

Whether it’s web- or server-based, email for communicating and managing workflow has its limitations:

• Junk/Spam: Our mailboxes are brimming with junk mail that’s ever growing. Even the most intelligent email filters can’t prevent all spam sneaking through.

• Security: Business documents sent over email are not confidential.

• Viruses: There is no certification mechanism for email senders, which is why computer viruses are most commonly delivered through email.

• Delivery: There is no guarantee your email may reach the intended person; your filter may mark important documents as spam.

• Real-time: Delays in replying prevent immediacy in conversation.

• Ubiquitous access: For businesses that use server-based emails, it can be problematic for remote users to access their emails, hence the popularity of web-based email.

• File sharing: Both parties may not see identical file and directory structures, depending on the users email platform.

• Application framework: Email is primarily a message-orientated service.

Of course, I’m not dismissing email entirely – it has its place within a business environment. Many internal communicators maintain that email is the most effective channel for companywide corporate messages, but on a micro scale where messages are orientated toward smaller teams of employees, using internal email for communicating is akin to snail mail. Line managers, for example, would be better off using an instant messenger application or internal microblogging platform like Yammer to communicate with his or her team of employees. By simply embracing and encouraging the use of social media tools, communicators can quickly prevent delays and reduce the amount of junk email sent and received throughout the organization, saving both time and money.

Could social media channels be the long-term solution for communication and workflow processes?

What are your thoughts?

To hear more about how communicators are using social media in a way that makes a real difference to their business, look out for Melcrum's forthcoming Social Media for Internal Communications conference, in Belgium. See Melcrum.com for more details.

Employee engagement: What's the ultimate definition?

By Sona Hathi, Editor, Melcrum

Definitions. Oh how we love them. They give us clarity, meaning and comfort and communication professionals in particular seem to love nothing more than a debate on some of our function's most thrown-around terms. While these debates are always interesting and entertaining, it is important for us to be able to define terms such as "engagement", "employer brand" and even "internal communication". Because while within our professional community, these terms need no explaining. But try and define "employee engagement" at a dinner party and the chances are you'll fumble around with words like "loyalty" "passion" "going above and beyond expectations" "happy" and "satisfied", only to receive a cynical and disengaged reaction from your friends.

Definitions, by nature, are always going to be open to debate, they'll evolve as time goes on and organizations and workforces change. This has been evident in the changing definition of employee engagement. Once upon a time, to be an engaged employee meant that you were satisfied, happy and loyal. A few years later, an engaged employee was one would who proudly recommended their employer to others, and a few years after that, an engaged employee was an involved employee. But now, after a global recession that has left many employees feeling insecure and disillusioned, but simultaneously more knowledgeable about business and economic issues, I'd safely bet that the status quo on the definition of engagement has changed once again. In last week's Melcrum Poll, we offered 5 definitions of employee engagement and  asked you to choose which one you most agree with. Over 100 people responded and here are the results:

• "Employees who think and act as business people" - 9%  
• "Getting employees' hearts and minds orientated to the business" -  33%
• "Employees who say, stay and strive" - 13%
• "Intellectual understanding and emotional commitment" -  34%
• "Employees who create a lasting difference to the customer" - 8%
• Other 3%

These results show that today, engagement is less about making a difference to external customers, neither is it simply about being able to speak business language. It's more about an alignment of an emotional and intellectual connection with the business. Employees need to understand the business and the role they play in it, feel challenged and supported in carrying out this role, as well as find enjoyment in the overall experience of doing so. In order to feel this way, they also need to feel respected and recognized as individuals who lead rich and busy lives outside the workplace. 

Now, enough about the theory, I urge you to come and meet people who live and breathe this topic at our employee engagement conference in London next month, (Australia's all sold out!) where we'll be looking at how you can put communication at the forefront of employee engagement. In the meantime, have your thoughts around engagement changed in recent years? Is there something new we should be considering now, in addition to what's mentioned above? I'd love to hear your thoughts.

One and a half staff needed to look after social media channels

By James Bennett, Head of Content, Melcrum

“Spend less money on social media tools within an organization and there is less reason to prove ROI”, said Richard Dennison, senior manager, social media at telecoms company BT, during a webinar yesterday afternoon. According to Dennison and many other practitioners there is little evidence of social media initiatives within organizations proving a return on investment. But surely they should, particularly if recent research on the amount of time it takes to maintain social media channels is true.

A study by CloudSpark, a US communications strategy company, has discovered that it takes a minimum of 65 hours a week to maintain four social media channels for one brand. Many social media channels maybe considered “free”, but if this is accurate (and not an April Fool), the time you need to create, develop, and maintain those channels is far from free and would take 1.5 full time staff to complete.

CloudSpark surveyed 40 “social media practitioners” from the external and internal spheres, and questioned them on the hours they invest in social media for their brands or the brands of their clients. In the survey it defined the following: creation – setting up the page with initial content (this doesn’t include creative design team hours); development – attracting followers, initial promotion/launch; and maintenance – listening, responding, posting, messaging, inviting.

I’d love to know just how long it takes internal communicators to maintain their social media channels. Please leave a comment on the blog or drop me an email at james.bennett@melcrum.com.

Here are a few stats from the surveyed practitioners and the time they spend on social media for a single brand:

Planning
Social Media Research: Eight to 25 hours
Social Media Planning: 10 to 20 hours

Blog
Creation: 10-15 hours
Development: 40 hours
Maintenance: Five hours/week

LinkedIn
Creation: One hour
Development: Five to 15 hours
Maintenance: Three to 10 hours/week

Facebook (Fan or Group Page)
Creation: Three to 12 hours
Development: 10 to 50 hours
Maintenance: Seven to 15 hours/week

Twitter
Creation: One hour
Development: 15-40 hours
Maintenance: Three to seven hours/week

YouTube (branded channel)
Creation: Three hours
Development: Five to 20 hours
Maintenance: Two to seven hours/week