Embracing Digital Transformation? Focus On Internal Comms!
When we talk about the digital transformation of the workplace, we often focus on the business or technical aspects: supply chains, artificial intelligence, data management have all become part of our everyday life as professionals, and these new technologies have enabled us to deliver better products and services to our clients. A full translation to digital transformation can be tricky though, and companies need to take care about not forgetting employee experience: when this is not part of the digital transformation journey, the entire initiative is at risk.
Three Reasons Why Internal Communications Is At The Core
1. Stronger as a whole
With any company initiative, its success depends on whether employees are able – and motivated – to meet business goals and drive success. If a majority of employees feel disconnected from the business and don’t understand why decisions are being made, the organization’s project of keeping everybody aligned with its long-term goals is likely to fail.
Which is why communications and reaching every employee are essential. If employees aren’t getting relevant information, they may not understand or even know about company-wide business goals. Ultimately, good internal communications support employee engagement that drives desired business outcomes.
And a more connected workforce is a catalyst for improved business results.
2. Data-Driven Decisions
Strong internal communications drive and sustain change and organizations need an effective internal communications strategy for bringing people together which can reinforce and energize employees at all levels of daily operations.
Perhaps not surprisingly, 83% of respondents to a recent ATD poll said communication is the most critical success factor for managers, and another study by Gallup shows that employees are usually up to 3 times more engaged when managers hold regular meetings with their teams.
A strong internal communications strategy starts from understanding where you currently stand with the one you have in place and what exactly you want to achieve with your new one over the next few years, to get to know how long it would take to achieve success and who do you need to involve in the journey.
Once all of this is clear, identifying some key metrics to measure the outcomes of what you want to put in place as a strategy is vital: How many employees are using the intranet? Are users thoroughly engaged with the available resources on an intranet? Are internal comms team happy with the existing strategy and tools? Companies should set targets and aim to get to the highest score as answers to these questions.
If you’re still not convinced, we came with receipts: according to a Towers Watson study, companies with highly effective communications practices see 47% higher returns to their shareholders. Sounds like a challenge that is worth your time, right?
3. Making new technology your ally
HR and communicators need to reach employees on their terms and involve them in the company story, and with the help of new technologies, this can be achieved way faster.
Employee communication platforms span across the entire workforce and can connect many tools. They not only integrate with other systems (combining the best from each individual resource) but are better for communicating to hard-to-reach employees, such as frontline or desk-less workers, who are finally getting the attention they were lacking.
Take it from someone who’s been there
Mike, a friend of ours here at Beem, talked to us about the mindset of “How do I create proper communications?” and spoke on the importance of a brand story that comes from a company’s own history: the “goodness” of what it has done in the past. If you can put employees in the company story, they become actors in that story, so that you create a groundswell where employees are stakeholders in the success of the digital transformation initiative.
Organisations that use integrations and can offer a single point of publishing tool to multiple channels, along with a strong communications strategy, will truly reach every employee, wherever they are, to drive the desired transformation!
If your company is thinking about moving it’s old processes into the digital age, here at Beem we can help you plan and deliver on making Employee Engagement a core part of it. It’s the employees that need to transform, not just your tools.