There are many areas of life where timing is all important. Communication is one of them. This is something that anyone who has ever had to talk to their boss about a difficult project knows very well. Or if you’ve had to persuade a 2-year-old to put their socks on! Cycles of work Working in academic environments has particularly taught …
Guest blog: What to do when leaders don’t listen
This month, internal communications consultant, Martin Flegg, shares his advice for getting your voice heard by the leaders in your organisation. If you like what he has to say, you might also like to join him and many other internal communicators at the ‘Changing the Conversation’ conference – details at the end of his piece. You’re an internal communications genius, …
An exercise in audience understanding
Effective communication is based on audience understanding. To build connections, communicate messages and listen to others, you need to understand them. What are they interested in? What motivates them? What have their experiences been? With this knowledge you can plan communications that are meaningful and move towards achieving your organisation’s objectives. Put yourself in their shoes When I run my …
How effective communication solves problems #1
I believe that effective communication solves problems by motivating people to take actions. But which problems? And which actions? To help my readers understand where communication can support them and their organisation, I have written a series of blog posts covering different problems you can solve by communicating well. This week I am looking at the issue of getting people …
Communicating through web pages
A while back I wrote website text for a client who was setting up a new business. At the same time, I was also writing internal web pages for a professional services department at another client. The sites were very different in terms of their ultimate objective and audience groups, so the tone, feel and content was different. But the …