Out with the old, in with the new

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

Last night I was watching a re-run of the comedy show “Live at the Apollo”. This is essentially stand-up comedy that’s filmed in front of a live audience at London’s Hammersmith Apollo theatre (just down the road from Melcrum HQ incidentally) and shown on TV.

One of the comics was Rich Hall, an American with a very dry, funny sense of humour who started his routine by making some shrewd observations about us Brits. He said that while the rest of the world totally panicked in the face of the financial melt-down, the British just sighed, looked marginally annoyed and asked, “so, how much is all this going to cost then?”

For me, that sums up 2009. There was a lot of sighing, hand wringing and worried looks. In many serious cases there were redundancies, house repossessions and lifetime savings lost. But there was also a strong sense of, "well we can’t do much about it now, so let’s get through it and make the best of things."

In a quick poll run on the Melcrum website a couple of months back, we wanted to know how you’d sum up the last 12 months from an internal communication perspective. Almost half of people who responded (45%) said it had been a true learning experience, 28% said it had been tough but 2010 would be much better, while 8% labelled 2009 as an utter disaster.

So the majority of communicators have been able to find something positive to take from the challenges that have been thrown in their direction and will probably continue to be thrown up in the coming months.

I don’t know about you, but I do feel that the final quarter of 2009 was actually really good and that makes me hopeful that the New Year will continue in the same vein.

2010 promises to be really exciting for Melcrum. We have conferences planned for the first half of the year on topics including social media and change communication. The Internal Communication Black Belt program will no doubt continue to go from strength to strength and, as ever, we’ll be bringing you the very best in case studies, toolkits and research to support you in your work.

But for the time being, I’ll leave you with some of my favourite New Year’s Eve-related quotes that I’ve come across: one inspirational, one motivational and one just plain sensible. (I’ll let you decide which is which.)

Have a very happy and successful 2010!

“We spend January 1 walking through our lives, room by room, drawing up a list of work to be done, cracks to be patched. Maybe this year, to balance the list, we ought to walk through the rooms of our lives... not looking for flaws, but for potential." Ellen Goodman

"I do think New Year’s resolutions can’t technically be expected to begin on New Year’s Day, don’t you?  Since, because it’s an extension of New Year’s Eve, smokers are already on a smoking roll and cannot be expected to stop abruptly on the stroke of midnight with so much nicotine in the system. Also dieting on New Year’s Day isn’t a good idea as you can’t eat rationally but really need to be free to consume whatever is necessary, moment by moment, in order to ease your hangover. I think it would be much more sensible if resolutions began generally on January the second." Helen Fielding, Bridget Jones’s Diary

"For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice.
And to make an end is to make a beginning." T.S. Eliot, “Little Gidding”

Employee engagement 2009 - The highlights

By James Bennett, Managing Online Editor, Melcrum

Now I’m back in the office I can reflect on what were two great days of conference. I for one, as a relative newbie to the internal comms industry was really engaged as I left the hallowed halls on the New Connaught Rooms in Holborn, London.

Melcrum’s 5th annual employee engagement conference was, however very different to the previous four events we have run. A year ago people hadn’t heard of Twitter, now it is an internet and social media phenomenon allowing you to connect and network to whoever you want in the world and update whatever it is you are doing in a split second. Therefore I thought I’d experiment and live Tweet (the name for an individual update) for the entire two days. I ended up writing over 150 updates and for those who couldn’t make the conference or who regularly follow us at @Melcrum it proved invaluable. You guys loved it and no wonder, there was a great mix of speakers from a wide variety of nationalities, with different case studies, presenting styles, experiences and ages. The feedback, which we are just collating now was phenomenal so many thanks to everyone who gave up their valuable time to attend and to impart their knowledge and present their great work on engagement. Here are the best bits:

Definition of engagement 1: Amy Tull Atwood, head of leadership communications at National Grid: “Many people think engagement is a science. Wrong, it is an art where you can make a difference.”

Definition of engagement 2: “Engagement is much more than a business process, it's a constant process backed up by two-way dialogue.” Suzanne Millard, business strategy manager at Napp Pharmaceuticals.

What do you want from engagement? A Michelin star restaurant or a McDonalds, consistent experience or conformity?

Great stats: Gallup's John Fleming found that two out of 10 employees in the UK are actively disengaged, while four out of 10 are engaged. This means that 50% of all the good work done by the innovative and engaged employees is undone by disengaged colleagues. He adds that three out of 10 employees worldwide don’t know what their job is about.

My phrase of the conference: The definition of the very bottom of employee engagement: Not finding a dead worker in the office until five days later.

Classification of engaged employees: 1) Fully engaged (Loyal and very valuable and represent a 23% premium compared to actively disengaged workers) 2) Engaged 3) Not engaged 4) Actively disengaged.

The Co-Op challenge: Its mission was to change views by changing employee experience. It needed consistency and alignment but has multiple businesses in multiple sectors, its brand and brand perceptions as well as employee perceptions of the brand were very weak and only 19% of employees responded to a survey in 2002.

Co-Op’s triumph over adversity: The internal comms team made success and employee engagement their number one priority, stopped the company’s tug of war agenda between social performance versus commercial success, and said: “From now on create an environment where every employee can feel safe enough to bring their true selves to work everyday. This went down very well with the delegates and was re-tweeted, or mentioned, again and again on Twitter and within the conference itself.

Consider the generations in your business: Think about how many generations work in your company, whether they are remote workers or not, what level they are at and therefore chose carefully how you communicate with them: Face-to-face, SMS, Twitter, Yammer, instant messaging. Consider your audience.

Question to think about: When you go to a party, when was the last time you talked about and were proud to talk about your company?

Three questions every manager should ask employees: What's important to you, how are you doing, what would make your experience better? Simple advice but how often do leaders ask any these questions?

The six steps to achieving better results with lower budgets, according to Paul McKinlay at Triffid:

1. Align and mobilise your leaders - there is a real opportunity to achieve more with less.
2. Change channels - channel plans should have the agility to change and move forward in times like these. For example, a high street bank saved £1m just from cutting paper out of its communications, while a retailer added millions to its P&L from cutting 10 minutes from meetings. An effective channel review: Choose what to stop, what to start, what to continue doing well, an what to improve.
3. Look at the usual communications model and do something about it. Change the fact that money goes to those most engaged, and instead allocate it to the least engaged.
4. Save time and money.
5. Re-use whatever ideas, graphics, written material and props you can - get external sources to review existing ideas.
6. Innovation: Film, TV, politics, literature, newspapers and magazines - we enjoy all of these things but never use them effectively. Use them more.

Social media begins to grab internal comms attention: BlueBallroom’s white paper on social media launched at the event: http://www.theblueballroom.com/downloads.php

The power of TV: Vodafone’s very emotional employee engagement film aimed at 1500 line managers and its CEO. In Annette Ware, Vodafone’s comms manager’s own words: “By targeting line managers we were just one person away from anyone in the organisation. They hold the key to engagement to anyone within Vodafone.” She said that after seeing the film, her previously unemotional CEO said, with a quivering lip: “That’s why I come to work everyday.”

Virgin philosophy: A happy, well-motivated workforce means you're much more likely to have happy customers and happy shareholders.

Virgin Media’s takeover of NTL: It found hanging wires and broken chairs and a culture where no one wanted to work there. Break out rooms were a disgrace. An internal memo even stated that NTL staff were only allowed to watch one TV channel, SkyNews, but weren’t allowed to change the volume. Virgin changed this completely by launching a six-month teaser campaign called ‘Starting the revolution’. Discreet messages placed under people's mugs, and even toilet seats informing employees it was okay to challenge others and turn up the volume on TVs.

Virgin Media’s employee engagement tools: Open House: A two way debate, and discussion with executives where PowerPoint is banned. Staff also have two-way on their mobiles, voicemail and are able to rank responses. Focus magazine: Goes out to people in the field. Littered with two-way feedback opportunities. The Grill: Leaders are put forward for a one-hour grilling. Employees can submit questions to leaders and watch them answer via a webcam. Its intranet is completely open, staff are in an ongoing debate and leaders get involved. Virgin instils themes such as openness and honesty, safe to challenge, open platform for staff to take part in dialogue. It is also experimenting with its own secure internal Twitter feed, Wikis, and has even set up living rooms where call centre staff can see what it feels like to be on the other end of the phone.

Golden piece of advice from the panel: Geoff Walker, CEO of Sandwell Community Caring Trust: “If you can’t come to work and make people feel better about themselves don't come at all!

Geoff Walker’s top CEO tips:

• Work out opportunities to regularly meet employees. “I'm always there on training days making tea,” he says.
• “I always leave the last Friday of every month open in my diary. I'm always available to anyone on that day.
• As a CEO you should always lead by example. People have to know what you, and what we as a company, believe in.
• If you don't live it as a CEO, you don't and can't communicate it to everyone else.
• Don't let your CEO lose sight of communicating with your employees.

CEO tip No.2: Engage Group's John Smythe: “In times like these your CEO needs to go from God to guide.

Create an an emotional contract with employees: Experian's gift to the community programme presented by Colin Archer, head of people and communication and community, is where the company gives its employees three days off to volunteer anywhere in the country. His top tips:

• Create an emotional contract that is more than just intellectually 'getting it'.
• Find out what your people care about.
• Show you care enough about these things to support them.
• Develop a community program to do that.
• Give a sense of pride.
• Celebrate non financial achievement.

Engagement will see the cash flashed in 2009

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

A recent YouGov report from stakeholder engagement consultancy Engage Group reveals that having an engaged workforce is critical to the success of an organization. The survey questioned nearly 23,600 directors and employees with nine out of ten board members saying they planned to maintain or increase the amount of money spent on engagement in 2009. But will employees feel the benefit of this cash injection? Only a third of employees surveyed believe their organization engages them to perform well.

Asked to comment on this particular statistic for the news story on the Internal Comms Hub, Darren Briggs of Flametree Communication says this may be down to the tendency to refer  to “engagement ‘programs’”. This implies there’s a beginning, a middle and an end and will lead to almost certain failure he says. A further interesting point that Briggs makes is to question whether “engagement” is a term that belongs in the past: “I wonder if ‘engagement’ may have had its day? Is the philosophy of an engagement ‘program’ viable?”

What are your thoughts on this? Do you have a culture of engagement or is the term "program" more commonly used? Would you be happy to receive an increase in budget for engagement or are there other more worthy areas in your opinion?

If you need a boost in the right direction, our COUNTDOWN TO CHRISTMAS giveaway for today is an article from Strategic Communication Management that takes a look at the thinking behind successful employee engagement at National Grid USA.

Strengthening employee relationships at National Grid USA brings you advice from the company’s former head of communications on how internal comms practitioners can work with senior leaders to build loyal and engaged teams.

Corporate comms experts gather in Barcelona (but alas no Barack Obama)

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

The night before the start of Melcrum’s Corporate Communication Summit last week in Barcelona, Spain, I didn’t sleep well. I dreamt that Barack Obama turned up out of the blue to give a speech on leadership. Secret service agents were everywhere and I was worried about providing an intro worthy of the President Elect of the world’s most powerful country.

Everything turned out fine though. Not surprisingly, President Obama didn’t arrive and expect to address the Melcrum delegates (maybe I'll put him on my "wish list" of future presenters) and those speakers we were lucky enough to welcome seemed perfectly satisfied with the way in which I introduced them.

Following on from comments made by Melcrum CEO Victoria Mellor at the SCM Summit in London last month about employee engagement not being a luxury item that can be dismissed when times get tough, it seems the sentiment is similar across Europe; especially now that the continent’s largest economy, Germany, has gone into recession.

Engaging employees in challenging times was the theme of the first two presentations and was a recurring topic throughout the two days. Along with the need to keep communications simple (this was explicitly discussed in the presentation from Eva Jarlsdotter of AstraZeneca on day two when she endorsed the benefits of the lean communication process – particularly useful, she said, if large numbers of communicators have been made redundant, as is the case within her organization.)

Derrick Fennell, head of internal communication at Société Générale corporate and investment delivered the keynote speech on day one. He talked about how he’d walked into the office one day to be met with the news that the company had been defrauded to the tune of 4.9 billion Euros. Days don’t get much worse than that. As a result, he was tasked with changing the company’s culture to get a higher level of employee buy-in and engagement.

The second presentation came from Andreas Parchmann, global head of internal communication at Royal Philips Electronics. He explained the need for communication to be clear and easy to understand, which led to the Sense and Simplicity campaign and a simplicity day. Engagement levels were also boosted by a huge online event that kick-started internal debate.

The Edge Picture Company’s Phil Blundell spoke together with Andrew Coker of Syngenta to explain how film had been used to inspire Syngenta employees regardless of their location around the globe or the language they speak.

The global theme once again came to the fore in Michael Redford’s presentation. Talking about his communication strategy during a global merger at SAP, the organization’s head of employee communication said that it takes more than just efficient internal communication to bring about employee engagement; it requires buy-in from senior management and a strong partnership with HR and other departments.

Supporting leaders to become better communicators was the subject of Barbara Massury’s presentation. The former head of group internal communication at Credit Suisse reinforced the fact that anything a leader does is a message – not just want he or she says. She also urged communicators to use their leaders more, believing them to be the most influential but underused communication resource.

The final presentation of day one came from Karen Cooperman, head of internal communication at Allianz Global Investors. Karen spoke about the challenges she faces in getting messages out to a decentralized global organization.

On day two (after a much better night’s sleep with no interruptions from any Heads of State), the Fifth Business’ Luisa Sorrentino and Enda Logan demonstrated how communication techniques have altered over the generations and how they now use some very hi-tech programs to keep their dispersed workforce in touch.

One of the conference highlights was Bill Quirke who spoke about turning strategy into action using communication. One of his key points was how communicators are obsessed with the journey, whereas leaders prefer to focus solely on the destination. This sparked many interesting discussions over the remaining course of the conference.

Helena Norrman, VP internal communication at Ericsson, looked at strategy in more detail offering many examples of how she’s worked with her team to become an integral driving force behind strategy implementation.

Delegates then heard from Camilla Herrmann, Aviva Plc., and Ann-Leena Mikiver, TeliaSonera, both on the subject of transforming their company’s intranet and improving employee interaction.

The final presentation came from Christine Vanormelingen and Valérie Perruchot Garcia, both from AXA. Their focus was on repositioning and strengthening the brand message. With Christine approaching it from a local perspective and Valérie from the group level, delegates gained much valuable insight and conversations continued as delegates left to enjoy the sights and sounds of Barcelona.

 
 

What does the future hold for manager communication?

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

Who'd have thought that the BBC series "The Apprentice" would have revealed so much about the state of communication among young managers? I thought it was just a showcase for "Siralan" to point and shout at young entrepreneurs who proudly (and misguidedly) proclaim themselves the "best salesperson in Europe", before falling miserably (but hilariously) at the first task, which is to sell fish in a fish market?

What we've learnt beyond this is that young managers are struggling to communicate effectively. This is according to a survey of learning and development experts carried out by the World of Learning 2008, the UK's conference for business learning.

When asked "Which skills do you believe The Apprentice highlighted that young managers need to improve", some 71% of respondents said it was communication skills.

Interestingly, improving the communication skills of managers was a recurring theme of Melcrum's SCM London summit a couple of weeks ago. Both Mary-Lynn Carver of pharmaceutical giant AstraZeneca and Nicola Bowles of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office said that managers in their organization are now assessed on their ability to communicate and the results are taken into consideration when promotion is on the cards.

One of the questions posed to the manager and leader communication expert on Melcrum's Internal Comms Hub, Andy Szpekman, asked what to do when leaders wrongly believe themselves to be great communicators. Andy says in this member-only article, the majority of leaders like to think their communication skills are flawless, mainly because they're surrounded by people laughing at their jokes, listening to their thoughts, or agreeing with their suggestions. When they're getting this sort of positive response why would they stop to entertain the possibility that they're failing to communicate effectively? And in all honesty who'd be brave enough to tap their manager on the shoulder and say "actually gov' that last speech was delivered with all the eloquence, charisma and charm of a pig in mud."

Andy suggests you approach the problem quietly to start with, perhaps asking a couple of trusted colleagues for their opinions. If they agree, maybe you're on to something.

Another point to consider is are you helping your leader play to his or her strengths? For example, if a senior leader is a brilliant communicator when speaking to small groups of people, but reluctant and uninspiring when it comes to addressing crowds, the month-long series of road shows you have planned is probably not the best path to take.

Every now and again, a piece of research crops up in the media to do with the future of our children. The fear seems to be that the development of their communication skills is being hindered year on year by the amount of tv they watch/the hours spent in front of a computer/the deterioration of the traditional family unit. With this in mind, organizations need to start appreciating the importance of teaching good communication skills before future generations reach positions of managerial responsibility, as the situation looks set to worsen rather than improve.

Hands up all those who want to work for Google?!

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

Wow, have you seen Google’s offices? Funky just isn’t the word. After having worked in the past for a company where we were only allowed to make hot drinks twice a day, this working environment looks like heaven. A decompression (stress) capsule that’s impermeable to sound and light? It’s like something out of an episode of Star Trek. Free food and drink, rest rooms with massage chairs, professional masseurs and masseuses, private cabin areas where you can sort out your personal affairs, pool tables and video areas… why would you ever want to leave work? Wait a minute! I see what’s going on here! Now call me cynical, but there must be a reason why Google wants its employees to feel so loved, cared for and pampered. The aim must be to keep them at work continually.

A friend of mine worked for a short while at Google in Silicon Valley in the US. He had free food and drink, free transport to the office and back (in buses with wireless to connect him to his office PC throughout the journey), even his laundry was taken care of. He just needed to pop his dirty stuff in a named bag and drop it into a shoot next to his desk where it was whisked away to be cleaned, pressed and delivered back to him in pristine condition a day or two later. And there’s no need to rush back home at 5 in the evening to exercise Fido, he can be walked by a designated dog carer.

So is this a way of showing employees how much the company values them or is it a ploy to make it more convenient for them to work around the clock? Cynical thoughts aside, they may simply have a really good understanding of how to get the best from their people and to retain the top talent in a creative and stimulating environment.

Personally, I know if I worked there, my productivity levels would be low to non-existent, for the first few weeks at least. I’d be far too distracted watching the fish in the aquariums as I relaxed in my self-controlled massage chair, working out which masseur offered the best shoulder rub, piling on the pounds in the free canteen and trying not to worry about my rising cholesterol levels in the decompression stress capsule. Actually, no, scrap that last one. I think my stress levels would rise just lying there worrying about how to get out… (see the picture below).

After the initial excitement of working in a giant playground, I’m sure the novelty would wear off and I’d find it all quite tedious. But there’s no denying that employees’ needs are very well catered for and this is precisely why so many people want to work for Google and why it was ranked second in the Financial Times' list of best places to work in Europe and first in the UK.  

An animated guide to what internal comms isn't

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

A recent question posted on Melcrum’s Communicators’ Network asked for a definition or a summary of the scope of internal communication. Whilst a pithy explanation of what internal communication is may be tricky to craft, this animation illustrates perfectly all that internal communication isn’t.   

Watch and giggle quietly to yourself as the clueless marketing manager reveals his understanding of internal communication to be “emails, chats in the kitchen and drinks in the pub after work”. And yes, of course, powerpoint gets a mention (internal comms can’t exist without it, right?) But I won’t spoil it …you need to watch and see for yourself.

The cartoon's originators, ABT Brand Experience Agency, have created a comic scenario that’ll probably resonate with many internal communicators who have grown weary of trying to prove their value. How many companies can you think of where no expense is spared to keep senior level staff content and no expense spent on creating a happy working environment for those in the lower ranks? How about companies that hold the function in poor regard/see it as the “fluffy” department/as the people who just send out newsletters? In the worst-case scenario, there must be organizations where employees aren’t even aware of the function's existence.

Have a look, see what you think and forward it on to your colleagues. I guarantee it’ll put a smile on your face for the rest of the day.

Think of "granny" for better business writing

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

Melcrum’s skills training courses got off to a flying start last week with a very popular advanced writing and editing course. Practitioners from a variety of locations and organizations including Virgin Atlantic, NYSE, and ABN AMRO developed their skills in a bid to ensure corporate messages get noticed and understood.

The two-day course was run by Sue Heal, (pictured below) an experienced media trainer and journalist whose recent clients include BT, the Ministry of Defence and Sony Europe.

Sue stressed the importance of making a personal or individual link between the corporate message and the reader, "When writing, ask yourself: 'What does this mean to Mr X in the finance department? Why should he care?'" Sue’s advice is to include stories about specific employees as much as possible, to give the message a human interest angle which appeals to everyone, even high-level execs.

Another top tip from Sue was to bin the jargon. This was seen as controversial by some of the participants who felt leaders expect corporate speak to be used. Why? Because otherwise messages that are supposed to have come "from the top" would appear unprofessional. Some also commented that leaders like to hide behind the jargon, "It gives them an escape route from being honest with employees and telling them like it is," said one delegate. And what about organization-specific language that would be perfectly clear to an employee in a certain industry even if it would make no sense to an outsider? Should this be avoided to? “Merely understanding something is quite different to consciously wanting to read about it,” answered Sue. “The language used has to make an employee actually want to pick up the material and read it through to the end.” Sue believes this is why so much of what is produced by internal communication departments goes unread.

Do you remember being at school, practicing the school play and the teacher telling you to project your voice as if speaking to Granny at the back of the room? In the world of internal comms, Granny should be able to understand corporate terminology (like ‘strategy’, ‘initiative’ or ‘core values’) if it were explained to her over a cup of tea. Keeping jargon to a minimum shows respect for your audience. Employees are intelligent people and a good writer should always respect this quality in their audience. Practitioners should remember that employees can usually tell when a sensitive corporate issue is being padded out or covered up by jargon. “Be as straight forward with them as possible,” says Sue.

What does winning internal communication look like in your organization? Is it a case of hitting the right note with the right language or have you needed to go further to get yourself heard? I’d love to hear from those of you who have developed innovative ways of getting employees to sit up and take notice of what you and your colleagues have to say.

Sinickas shines at comms’ network meet-up

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

Angela Sinickas was the star of Melcrum’s communicators’ network London group meeting held earlier this week. The research and measurement guru gave an informal talk on the subject of calculating ROI from communications during her brief European visit.

Angela had approached the group’s organizer, Matt O’Neill, asking if she could come along whilst in town and was told “yes, but only if you facilitate the meeting!” Over 30 members gathered to hear Angela’s wisdom on the subject.

It seems that the need to prove the ROI that communication brings has never been so pressing. One participant revealed to the group that a sales colleague had come to her internal comms department asking that they send out a parcel for him. When asked why he felt the internal comms department should be responsible for this, he replied “That’s what you do isn’t it? Send stuff out?” Oh dear. I can imagine where his parcel ended up…

As well as running through the maths behind calculating ROI, Angela made it clear that sometimes specifics aren’t necessary. “It doesn’t have to be ROI, just having the right attitude will help”. This was illustrated with an example of an internal comms practitioner known to Angela, who, by asking the correct questions in a survey, had been able to ascertain that 94% of sales people within her organization believed that reading the employee magazine helped increase their knowledge of the organization, which in turn helped when speaking to clients. This was a direct connection to profit and upon hearing this, senior managers immediately decided not to cut the magazine’s budget.

Angela also had advice for those in the public sector wanting to calculate their comms ROI, which she admitted could be trickier than for the private sector: “To make it work in the public sector, be more creative and be prepared to think broadly – the ROI may not be seen in your specific area, but it will be seen.”

The London group's next meeting will be in April, but the location has yet to be decided. For more information on joining this group, or one of the many others, please click here. 

A passion for change

By Kelly Dyer, Editor of Strategic Communication Management, Melcrum

One thing that came across very obviously to all those present at Melcrum’s Change Communication conference last week was how passionate many of the speakers were about their organizations and their level of involvement within them.

From a program of excellent presenters, I’m thinking in particular of the keynote speaker Carol Kinsey Goman, president of Kinsey Consulting Services in the US, and Terry McKenzie senior director, global employee communications and communities at Sun Microsystems.

Both struck up an overwhelming rapport with the 130+ delegates and spoke animatedly and honestly about their experiences of change. In fact, they were so honest that they both referred to past family episodes that had affected their professional opinions and views on change in the workplace.

Kinsey Goman, for example, shared with the audience an anecdote from her childhood about witnessing first hand how companies at that time dealt with making staff redundant. Her father lost his job after a considerable number of years with the same employer, yet this seemed to count for little when he received the news of his imminent departure written on a slip of paper in the same envelope as his wage slip. The subsequent events that impacted her family life resulted in Kinsey Goman growing up with the philosophy that “no matter how massive the change that is inflicted on a person, one thing you can never alter is the power of the human spirit.”

This provided a marked contrast with the communication plans that were put in place for employees of London's Heathrow airport in the run up to the opening of Terminal 5. Tom Everett, T5 live communication consultant at BAA, spoke with great enthusiasm on the various methods used to keep employees up to date and involved with its progress. These included having T5 live t-shirts printed, creating a Facebook group and training team leaders to make films that were shown to their teams during a special T5 induction day day. “There’s a palpable feeling of community at T5 which I’ve never experienced elsewhere,” said Everett. So impressive were the schemes and programs available to the employees that Mackenzie later commented that she found herself “drooling in envy” at the budget that Everett had!

This seemed to strongly indicate that society has progressed a long way since the days experienced by Kinsey-Goman and her father. Never again would an employee have to learn such big news through such humiliating methods, I thought. But I was wrong. A couple of days ago I heard about a British company which laid off a number of its employees in France. How did they inform their staff of the news? By text message. It seems some organizations still have a way to go after all.