Nick, article, beyod the opinion survey

Beyond the opinion survey

Just as ‘think global, act local’ became a mantra in marketing, so ‘devolution’ and ‘empowerment’ acquired the status of dogma inside organisations during the last decade. And then came the much reported breakdown of trust. Now and in the future, managers must still have the entrepreneurial freedom to develop their businesses, always within the boundaries of corporate values and objectives. But motivating them to maximum performance within these boundaries, in the new circumstances, will require more than ever consistent and effective communications.

There is no clear map of the future. But of one thing we can be sure: the balance of power between employers and scarce talent is rapidly shifting in favour of the scarce talent, and is unlikely to shift back soon. As we plot the course of the future of work, we can and must see it through the eyes of the people we need to hire, engage and retain. If we are to understand and manage talent effectively we cannot do it by considering our own views alone.

Communication will involve new ways of looking and listening. To achieve that we will need more than simple opinion surveys. Here’s an idea that you may want to consider as a prelude to any communication plan or initiative.

Communication : the nine-point test

Most of us, hopefully, know that the minimum requirement is that your messages be:

1.      sent
2.      received
3.      understood
4.      believed / trusted
5.      believed to be important to the company

But, and this is where some of us need to play catch-up, they must also be:

6.      felt (more than just believed) to be relevant to the manager personally
7.      kept in mind and acted on continuously (corporate values and goals)
8.      ‘stored’, then retrieved and acted on when necessary (operational information)
9.      communicated onward, throughout the organization and among external stakeholders.

You can easily check that your messages are being sent. But do you really know that they are completing the course? And if you do know that they are still in the race after hurdle 5 (most messages run out of the race here), what can you do to ensure that they clear hurdles 6-9?

If they are not making it, you will find that:

·        key managers attend the global briefings, cascade meetings, etc., learn and absorb, then go home and carry on as before
·        junior managers and employees complain that they do not know enough about corporate values, goals or strategies to do their jobs well
·        state-of-the-art communication channels, are admired -   then left unused
·        printed communications are read, believed, thought to be useful - then forgotten
·        messages that are not ‘relevant now’ are lost for ever
·        you are surprised and frustrated at the time it takes to get any response to your initiatives.

The challenges of being big and successful

Efficient, effective and believable communication is an increasing problem for large and especially global businesses. This is partly because the rapidly changing business environment demands ever faster responses; and partly because of organisational change. While delayering and devolution of power have removed many of the barriers to fast communication, they have at the same time weakened formal channels of communication, and even motivated managers not to share information which they see as a potential source of competitive advantage.

It is particularly challenging when different national cultures are involved: even more challenging in the wake of mergers and acquisitions. And not unchallenging if you have been successfully doing the same things for 100 years, and are still successful, but see far-reaching changes in the business environment coming round the corner. How do you persuade managers to change a winning play?

These challenges need a combination of motivational and behavioural research, hands-on communications skills, and a real understanding of global and local management issues. It will cost you. But the benefits of reaching your key people and influencing their behaviours fast, comprehensively and effectively will go straight to the bottom line.

Are you getting through?

Check how well you are communicating with your key managers, against your communication objectives. This means clearing hurdle 5: getting to the point where your managers buy in, rationally, to your messages. The method is typically a combination of qualitative and quantitative research, and observation, leading to:

1)   an analysis of how well aligned managers’ values and personal goals are with those of the company
2)      identification of barriers to effective communication: are they not receiving messages? or not understanding them? or not believing them? or not accepting them as relevant / important?
3)   diagnosis of what causes barriers to develop and persist, e.g.:
a)            structural or organisational inhibitors
b)   cultural resistance to change, involving team-sanctioned rejection of new ways
c)            psychological resistance at the individual level
d)            problems with the content or channels of communication, in the linguistic and cultural context of the country, business unit / division or profession.

It is essential to know these things, but it is still not enough. Communications are only working effectively when they influence behaviour.

Are your strategic communications working?

At this point it may be helpful to consider strategic communication as separate from communication of operational information, even though many communications combine the two. The reason for separating them is that you want managers to act on the first sort all the time. Corporate values should influence their behaviour in everything they do. In contrast, operational information is needed ad hoc; the key is to make sure that people know where to find it when they do need it.

Incidentally, remembering the mission statement and values in the sense of being able to recite them or tick the box in a survey is not enough. They must be embedded in hearts as well as minds, so they will influence behaviour when there is no time or inclination for rational assessment. There is even evidence from the world of neuroscience that conscious message-recall can sometimes block the effect of communication on behaviour. We should be careful about what we measure.

Your strategic messages can clear hurdle 5, i.e. get as far as understanding and belief, and still have no effect whatsoever on how managers behave. The main reason is that up to this point we are dealing with rational beliefs, not with emotions. Opinion surveys tell you whether people understand and believe, and whether they think it is relevant to the company and to themselves personally; but not whether the message has moved on from their minds to their hearts.

The surest way to find out whether the strategic messages have reached managers’ hearts is to observe how they behave with each other and in the market. This is probably part of your appraisal system, particularly if a 3600 system is in place. But research, especially qualitative methods, can also give reliable indications of whether managers’ beliefs are influencing behaviour. Employees, customers and other stakeholders can tell you whether they think your managers are on message, living the values, and also whether your corporate values are a good fit with their own. If you do not already co-ordinate your internal and external research programmes to monitor these interactions, now may be the time to start.

Are your operational communications achieving all they might?

Managers do not need to know everything all the time. What matters is that, when making a decision, they know:

1.      what relevant information is available
2.      where to get it.

Because each manager needs different information at different times, it is not generally possible to use standardised survey instruments to measure the effectiveness of this kind of communication. But the problem does lend itself to one-on-one interviews, in which managers are asked to recall recent decisions, and probed about their awareness and use of the relevant information. And even the most strictly operational information conveys other meanings, intended or not, which can be explored in this way.

Do everyday, operational communications in your organisation reinforce the strategic messages? Or are they lost opportunities? Or are they even in conflict with the strategic messages? Everyday communications with and among managers provide the best opportunities to change behaviour, keeping it aligned with organisational values, goals and strategies. It should be examined, understood, and managed.

Understanding is more than measuring

Here are three things to remember:

1.      Only a tiny fraction of all the communications in organisations, internal and external, is under the direct control of communications professionals.

2.      There are as many unintended as intended meanings; in global communications, ambiguity and misunderstanding are the norm unless they are identified and dealt with.

3.      Message recall at the rational level does not always indicate behaviour change.

Opinion surveys are helpful, but not enough to ensure that you stay on top of the situation. Researchers can and should be asked to probe deeper. And yet the current emphasis on performance measurement, KPIs, scorecards, and accountability in general, is leading us back into the world of simple, easily repeatable opinion surveys. We should take care not to confuse measurement with understanding.

Nick Winkfield : Stakeholder Studies : January 2005

Nick is Managing Partner of Stakeholder Studies Ltd, a research and consulting firm working in stakeholder relationship management and communications. He has a background in marketing and corporate communications, and moved full-time into research in the late ‘70s. His main focus is on cross-cultural issues and the communication challenges facing multinationals, especially those resulting from mergers and acquisitions. He is a regular contributor to seminars and workshops, and writes occasional papers, on issue- and risk-evaluation, CSR, communication ethics, and the methods and applications of research for employee and external stakeholder communications.

Website: http://www.stakeholderstudies.com/
Contact: winkfield@stakeholderstudies.com

Nick Winkfield

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