Download employee comms in engagement report here

If you would like to download Leapfrog's report on the role of employee communication in engagement, you'll find it in the News section on the IoIC's website. There's a downloadable version at the end of the news item.

Employee communication's role in employee engagement

In September and October, 72 employee communicators completed a Leapfrog online survey looking at employee communication's role in organisational engagement; the tools employee communicators are using to fulfil their role in engagement; what's most effective, and what would make the greatest difference to employee communicators in improving their contribution to engagement.

The headline findings from the Survey stated:

Over 40% of respondents told us their organisation still had no engagement strategy

11% of respondents stated that Employee Communications was solely responsible for engagement in their organisation while a further 72.2% said they had a defined role in their engagement strategy/process and/or activities

More than a third of respondents' organisations really didn't see a difference between communication and engagement, while a further 25% are firmly on the fence

HR is still the primary owner of 'engagement' and the most popular home for the day-to-day management and delivery of the engagement agenda

Employee communications is playing a leading role as a contributor to the development of the engagement strategy in organisations

Just over half of all respondents consider their workforces to be relatively engaged (scoring 7+); but 36% state their workforces remain largely disengaged with their employer

Electronic tools dominate the employee communicator's toolkit; with email and intranets virtually ubiquitous. Face to face communication is regarded as vital - but print appears in decline

Social media is now a planned part of the communication mix in more than 70% of respondents' organisations

The most effective employee communication tools in delivering the engagement agenda rank as:

1. Face to face meetings (four times more popular than any other suggestion)
2. Communication Champions
3. Line managers
4. Intranet
5. Annual engagement survey

The top three factors that would make the greatest beneficial difference to the role of Employee Communication in organisations' employee engagement came out as:

1. A joined-up approach across functions
2. Effective line management support
3. Active buy-in from the CEO/Top Team

Contact Leapfrog if you'd like to receive a copy of the full report

Employee communicators in engagement survey - one week to go

The survey monkey's still ticking over as more and more communicators complete the research questionnaire on the role of employee communicators in engagement. There's still a week to go if you want to add your voice which you can do here

To whet your appetite, here are a few of the trends at the half-way collection point:

• Almost half the organisations that have responded have no engagement strategy
• While the majority of organisations recognise the difference between communication and engagement, only 4% claim that recognition is total
• Almost 90% of communicators who have responded have some responsibility for their organisation's engagement agenda
• HR is the top 'owner' of engagement - drawing twice the response of 'everyone'
• HR is also the most common owner of the engagement strategy
• When it comes to tools, nine out of 10 communicators use email and the intranet
• Fewer than half still use printed newsletters/magazines
• Over 80% of respondents formally use social media in the comms mix, with blogs and internal social networks the most common uses
• Engagement varies widely among responding organisations. No organisation is fully engaged, though 30% claim a 7 out of 10 engagement score
• Asked what would make the greatest difference to engagement, the most popular response so far is a more joined up approach between functions.

That's a slice of the picture with a week still to go. Will it change? Your views could be vital.

In this only a Transatlantic issue?

Interesting: after an initial splurge of responses, the last couple of days has seen only a trickle of responses to my survey looking at the role of employee communications in engagement. In many ways, that's to be expected: those who are interested will respond immediately while others will either delete the message or put it on the 'nice to do' pile for some time never. Still, there are still 12 days left, and if I can double the current response over those 12 days I'll have something robustly statistically viable.

This is a learning experience for me, and one of the most noticeable features is the strong UK/US bias to responses. They're running fairly even; I have a few from Canada; a few from Scandinavia and ones and twos from other northern European countries. I didn't expect much from non-English speaking countries (or countries where English isn't the language of business), but hoped I'd pick up some response from Africa, Australia and New Zealand and, most of all, India. But as yet, it's radio silence.

I have a presentation to prepare this afternoon, but after that, I suspect I'll be pushing the survey out to those particular communication outposts.

Early days, early findings

Just one day into the survey mapping employee communicators' roles in engagement and there are already a gratifying number of responses from across the UK, Continental Europe and North America - it would be great to get some input from other parts of the world too.

Anyway, the number of responses is statistically interesting, but perhaps not get a truly viable sample - still there's a fortnight yet to go.

Some early findings - which may well change as the number of responses rises suggest:

• Almost half of all respondents have a role that includes employee communication - but has responsibility for other stakeholders as well.
• Almost half of all respondents state that their organisation has no employee engagement strategy.
• A third of respondents' organisations really don't differentiate between employee communication and engagement.
• Virtually all employee communicators are involved in engagement strategy or implementation, with a third of respondents stating their team 'owns' engagement in the organisation - though HR is the most common 'owner'.
• The intranet is the most widely used communication channel from our early respondents, closely followed by emails - with face-to-face channels very popular, but restricted by time and capacity, especially of leadership.
• More than three quarters of respondents to date use social media in their organisations, with blogs and internal social networks leading the way - though one respondent is also using virtual worlds.
• Engagement levels vary widely, and the 'must haves' to help employee communicators vary from a social media strategy to effective line management support and a joined-up approach across functions.

However, this is just a broad-brush round up 24 hours into the survey. It still has two weeks to run. If you haven't taken part yet, why not do so here?

The role of Employee Communications in Employee Engagement

While the debate continues around the correct terminology for employee engagement, there's an equal lack of understanding of the role the employee communication function plays in engagement within organisations.

I'm currently working on a report covering exactly this area, and would very much like to get a snap-shot of where exactly employee communication practitioners operate today within the engagement agenda.

It strikes me that too few organisations today differentiate properly between employee communication and employee engagement - but I'd like to apply some evidence to that hypothesis.

So, if you have a role in employee communication and perhaps play some part in engagement in your organisation, pleas complete this survey and help build a picture of what role the employee communication team plays in engagement - and how you're fulfilling that role.

The survey will be open until September 24th - and I'll post details of the final report once it's published.

Several steps away from the board; working for HR or Corporate Comms....but the budgets are getting bigger

CiB are running a survey to gauge where in house communicators sit in terms of seniority, budgetary control and to look at the kind of work they're involved in. The survey's also looking at the relationship between CEOs and IC.

I've had a look at the early results, and while it's too early to draw too many conclusions, the function still seems largely split between Corp Comms and HR control; no-one so far is operating at board level, and there are a fair few loan IC-ers out there.

What's encouraging is that there seems to be more budget for IC than a few years ago and, most encouragingly, more budget as a proportional spend when compared with external comms.

The survey's set to run for a wee while yet, so if you haven't had a chance to complete it, why not give it a five minute whirl now?

In-house in IC - make your views known

The CiB IC Index survey is now live. If you're an IC practitioner, working in-house, make sure you complete it so that we can establish the latest trends in terms of earnings, budget and responsibilities for the current crop of IC professionals.

The survey's also looking for your views on your boss as a communicator - and on how the rest of your organisation views you.

So, grab a coffee and your mouse and get clicking here.

Do you do, or do you manage?

I've been developing some survey material for CiB this month looking at trends in internal comms - and particularly who's currently involved in-house.

One of the questions fascinating me is around whether today's in-house communicators are actually doing the communicating or managing others to do it for them.

The trend across the board in organisations is to slim down and focus on core business. That means organisations employing fewer, more skilled people directly who are involved in the heart of the business, and outsourcing non core services to specialist suppliers.

I'm beginning to see this more and more in IC where the traditional in-house agency is being slimmed to one or two professionals. They haven't the time to plan, craft, disseminate and measure the impact of the corporate message day to day, so are becoming more and more reliant on 3rd party support to make IC happen. It's great for people like me - but does it mean that in-house communicators will merely become managers of the word, unskilled in actually bringing it to life?

Call me old-school, but I believe great craft communication skills should be the start point for any corporate communication manager. It's not enough to be able to sweat suppliers and bring comms in on budget each year. That way, blandness, dumbing down and poor communication lies.

Anyway, it'll be interesting to see if this particular perceived trend is borne out in the survey findings.