One of our facilities management clients with multiple service lines and dispersed teams was concerned that some employees may not feel part of the company’s journey, and may struggle to identify with the brand they work for. This company wanted its culture to be a key differentiator.
Engaging frontline staff
The business wanted to preserve a culture that had been cultivated over the years, and to drive it forward in a way that engaged colleagues and made everybody, no matter what level, feel part of the business, particularly those that work remotely and on the frontline. As the business has grown, this has become more challenging.
Facilities management companies typically have a remote and difficult-to-reach workforce. The business didn’t understand what was and what wasn’t working on the comms and culture front, or whether colleagues felt part of the business.
It wanted to implement a communications strategy that cultivated meaningful engagement and established inspiring leadership.
Account managers were the gateway to all of this. The business recognised that its account managers were a pivotal point within the company, connecting HQ with its frontline staff. It wanted to understand more about how they way work, including:
- Their relationships with their teams
- How they disseminated information
- What support or training they need
- What information was currently available to them and what they were lacking
- The best way to communicate with them
- The best way for them to share important information with their teams.
It’s good to talk
We needed employee feedback from account managers across the business to create a clearly defined internal communications strategy that supports a people and performance-based culture.
We needed to unpick what employees thought of internal communications to date. Did they get what they need? What were employees missing? What do employees want? Who receives internal communications? And who goes without? Does every colleague feel part of the brand? Do they know and share the company values?
Employee focus groups
Magenta devised a series of focus groups that were run by us, as an external company, to allow honest feedback and open communication. They allowed us to canvass the views of the people who matter the most in this focus area – account leads, account managers, business support managers, implementation and mobilisation managers, key account managers, operations managers, project and implementation leads, regional managers, senior account managers, senior project managers, support account managers.
Gathering honest opinions and feedback was the vital insight we needed to see how communications plans needed to adapt moving forward to realise a fruitful internal communications strategy.
Magenta planned two 90-minute interactive focus groups to ask the right questions that would tease out the information we needed.
A problem shared is a problem solved
The focus groups uncovered the good, the bad and the ugly of what account managers were experiencing. They shone a spotlight on where the barriers were and what needed to be done to overcome there.
Magenta produced a report with internal communications recommendations which was presented to the senior leadership team. We identified ways to help managers feel better loved and understood, as well as suggesting a ‘channels catalogue’ so employees knew whether to find certain types of information.
As a result of the audit, a forum for account managers was created for information sharing and trouble shooting. We also devised a blueprint for communications training across account manager level.
This has led to an increase in employee engagement and increased collaboration between previously siloed teams.
Internal communications expertise
We surveyed 2,000 employees and found that 53% did not describe their employer as a good communicator.
The same respondants said that poor communication negatively affects morale (80%), job satisfaction (68%), engagement (53%), loyalty (50%), commitment (49%), work ethic (39%), health & wellness (34%).
You can see all the findings in our white paper ‘Internal communications – the glue that holds everything together‘.
Contact us to discuss how we can support your business with internal communications.
