FUTURE COMMS: A comms plan to help people sleep at night

Well, it’s had a great innings but can we now finally bury the idea that using social media ad hoc in an organisation is going to change the world?

But what great days we had.

We had a mantra of JFDI in local government – just flipping do it – and we did things under the rader without permission.We could chuck up a Facebook page knowing that IT didn’t know what it was so couldn’t block it.

We could tweet election results without too much interference, snigger behind our hands and we could push the envelope.

But those days are over. We learned lots but we didn’t take over the world. Today, many public sector teams have been cut back too far to have space to innovate. Even more worryingly, teams haven’t found a way to tackle the big issues that really matter with the resources to make a difference.

Sure, the trojan mouse idea of testing out four or five ideas to see where it’ll take you is one I enthusiastically believe in to help you experiment and see what works. But to really make a difference bright communications people need to take what works and find out what is keeping senior people awake at night. Then go hell for leather to tackle pretty much that, that and only that. But make sure the senior people know exactly what you are doing by reporting back using every means neccesary. Infographics are particularly good. Make yourself a sandwich board if you have to but just flipping do it.

Here’s an idea to help you.

Are you helping senior people sleep at night?

Here’s an exercise I came across during the LGComms Future Leaders programme at a session at Leeds Metropolitan University with Anne Gregory and Paul Willis. It was the best piece of training I had in the eight years I spent in local government and I suggest you do this quick exercie.

1. Get a piece of paper and draw a blob in the middle.
2. Think of six people you do most of your work for in your organisation and write their names on the paper, the more important they are the closer to the blob you can write their name.
3. Write down some things – let’s say six things – that keep those six people awake at night.
4. Ask yourself, are you really spending time with the key people?
5. Ask yourself, are you really doing things to help them sleep at night?

My own conclusion to this was that I wasn’t really tackling the issues that matter with the people that matter and I’ll bet you a slice of Victoria sponge that you aren’t either. The goal of the bright communications team is not vague ‘reputation’ or ‘awareness’. It is to prove in pounds, shillings and pence if needs be the value of the team before it is too late. It’s why I’ve long been convinced that channel shift and customer service are things that comms teams need to be closely involved with.

So how can we help tackle the issues that keep senior people awake?

If I had a pound for every time someone told me the words: ‘What we need is a comms plan,’ I’d have been rich. What they meant was they wanted to tick a box. What they really wanted was to outsource the responsibility to you when we all know it should be a joint thing.

What you really need is a comms plan agreed jointly with the senior people around a table. They can take many forms but they need to have:

1. Where they are now.
2. Where they want to go.
3. Something measurable and tangiable to show when they’ve got there.
4. Who they want to talk to and how they can do it.
5. Some ideas of resources.
6. Some idea of evaluation.

Some of what’s in your plan will be traditional comms and some will be digital. You’ll have a mix of both and you’ll be working to make a difference to your organisation for the people who are going to be making big budget decisions in the not too distant future.

Your bosses’ boss will sleep at night.

And you won’t be sleepwalking towards a cliff.

By the way, I’m now available to help you with all of this and would love to do so. I’m [email protected] and @danslee on Twitter.

Creative commons credits

3:33 http://www.flickr.com/photos/7774088@N08/4131391566/

We will awake https://www.flickr.com/photos/25028863@N00/5612074901/