How to Get Your Internal Communications from Dystopia to Utopia

Jun. 18

Picture this: a business where every voice is heard, every idea is valued, and every team member is empowered to reach their full potential. Employees who love their jobs are more productive, present, and engaged. This might sound like a dream in a post-COVID-19 world with back-to-office mandates and hybrid work environments. But it's not—it's the power of a strong internal communications strategy. ✨

Since it’s not external facing, many organizations may be tempted to overlook or undervalue their internal communications, but employees are not just cogs in a machine: they’re potential brand advocates, company champions, or if they become disenchanted, your Achilles heel.

You might wonder how we get to this magical utopia when our internal comms is currently giving Hunger Games. You won’t be shocked to hear the answer is hard work and careful planning, but if you need somewhere to start, Formidable’s crew of strategic communications professionals have the magic recipe to utopic internal comms:

Two-way communication
Follow through
Analytics
Engagement

Two-Way Communication

Ready to say goodbye to dystopic factions and welcome a new age of collaboration and engagement? It all starts with two-way communication, i.e. both listening and responding to feedback—and the processes that formalize it.

Most companies have an annual or semi-annual performance review process for managers to provide feedback to employees and help them evaluate their performance. While good in theory, communicating with employees once or twice yearly might not be enough. Performance reviews can be viewed as meaningless time sucks and a token effort, especially when there’s little in the way of follow-up once that half-hour meeting is in the rear-view mirror. Instead, employee feedback loops collect real-time data in a systematic way, becoming part of the company process and culture.

It’s important for organizations to provide many opportunities for employees to give their honest opinions. Feedback loops should be a continuous process involving asking for and utilizing employee input to enhance products, services, and operational processes and policies to ensure employees' fulfillment.

A feedback loop can be as simple as a comment box in your staff newsletter or as involved as group-style focus meetings to gather opinions on new processes or policies. Topic-specific or general pulse surveys can help gauge regular employee satisfaction. If your organization has an intranet, use it to house and send surveys and other feedback tools.

Follow Through

Once you’ve collected feedback, it isn’t enough to store it in a cloud somewhere like a post-apocalyptic tyrant boggarting water à la Mad Max.

The key to internal communication is to make employees feel heard so they can rest assured, knowing their voices aren’t overlooked or brushed aside. Formalize a process to review, assess, and action all feedback. This may involve the communications team providing recommendations or assisting in crafting responses from Leadership.

Here are some high-level tips to action employee feedback:

Make sure you understand and discuss feedback as a team
Prioritize actionable items from feedback
Make a plan to address feedback and involve employees in crafting solutions

Utilizing Analytics

Once you’ve gone through the trouble of planning for feedback, gathering it, and responding to it, it’s time to reflect on your efforts. How many employees engaged with your feedback loops? How did they interact with your forms and survey tools? Ensure that, for whatever feedback method you’ve chosen, you’ve also built in analytics — ways to gather information on that communication’s effectiveness.

If your feedback loop is an in-person touch point or focus group, analytics might be a post-event survey. If the feedback loop is the survey, use a platform that will report on things like open rates and click-throughs.

Why? Because data is your best friend in the world of internal communications. It's what tells you if your messages are hitting the mark if your employees are engaged, and if your efforts are making a real impact.

Engaging with Employees

Achieving the dream of happy and productive employees and a strong internal culture isn’t all just back and forth and analysis. When done correctly, your internal communications strategy will also make time for other kinds of engagement. Like fun!

Getting to know your employees and encouraging them to get to know each other and feel like part of the team isn’t just about icebreakers and “Any plans for the weekend?”. Fostering meaningful connections with employees, whether through team-building activities, recognition programs, or collaborative projects, encourages loyalty, boosts productivity, and cultivates a culture of belonging.

Don’t be afraid to get creative! From themed dress-up days to virtual coffee breaks for remote employees, there are plenty of ways to engage with your team. Remember that a little effort goes a long way in crafting strong, lasting relationships. And don’t forget to check in afterward to ensure you achieved your goal.

A great opportunity for practicing those feedback loops. 👀