Greetings, comms pros! Let’s take a look at a few news stories from the past week and see what we can learn from them.

1. Target begins RTO for some employee groups, but leaves communicating it up to managers.

Retail giant Target is calling some employee groups back to its Minneapolis headquarters. According to a report from the Minnesota Star-Tribune, Target denied that its corporate remote work policy had changed, but several current employees said that they’d heard from their managers that a return to the office was imminent.

The report from the Star-Tribune also said that different employee groups will have different RTO standards and RTO start dates will also vary. It appears that both deciding on those RTO rules and communicating the policies are in the hands of individual managers.

“Team members tell us they see the benefit from the in-person connection and collaboration that’s a part of being in the office,” a company spokesperson said in a statement. “At this point, individual leaders are empowered to make decisions for their teams based on company guidance as well as what’s best for the role they play in our business.”

RTO processes are best done when they’re embedded in a company’s culture. Managers are often an employee’s closest touchpoint to the rest of the organization and can serve as both a cultural interpreter and translator of corporate edicts. For Target, tying the RTO process back to a sense of team collaboration but that ultimate RTO decision up to team leaders is a good way to individualize a message for specialized teams.

However, it’s also worth considering whether or not such a method could cause resentmeng among some teams due to differing standards across the organization. That could prove challenging for communicators to address.

Allowing managers to make decisions on RTO and share those decisions in a way they see fit can help customize the tone of a decision for a team, but this can’t be done in a vacuum. Managers need guidance and help from communicators to ensure that they’re reflecting the company’s mission and values in those decisions and communication. In these cases, communicators can provide managers with guidance documents on how, when and what needs to be shared in team-centric messaging for RTO processes.

2. Indeed CEO Chris Hyams addresses departure, leadership transition and future of company in memo

Indeed CEO Chris Hyams announced in a memo that he is resigning as CEO of the job-hunting platform. The note, which is addressed to the company’s employees and published on Hyams’ Substack, shared that former chief Hisayuki “Deko” Idekoba is retaking the reins. Hyams added that he’ll remain at the company through 2025 to aid in the transition.

Hyams chalked part of his decision up to the rise of AI.

At this moment in history, that (AI’s rise)  means devoting myself to a few urgent issues ensuring that all technology—not just Indeed—is built with humanity at its core. This includes advancing Responsible AI, countering disinformation, empowering workers, defending human rights, and bridging the gap between technology and the humanities. Many of you know my path began far from tech—a liberal arts degree, work in adolescent addiction recovery, teaching high school special education. My career in tech has been driven by the values instilled from these experiences. As technology reshapes our world, these values feel more urgent—and at risk—than ever. That’s what I want to help change.

There’s never a perfect time to leave a job that means so much. This fall, we’ll launch what I believe is the most profound innovation in Indeed’s history. Our new agentic AI platform will realize the vision of a personal talent agent for every worker in the world, and a personal talent scout for every employer. I’ve been inspired to work every day with the teams bringing this vision to life. But now is the time for the teams who will carry this work forward to lead the way.

Hyams’ note is a good example of a departure note. It clears the path for new leadership while reflecting on his own career and the values of the company. But it also looks forward beyond his own tenure and emphasizes the importance of the employees during a changing tech landscape. That’s especially pertinent when you’re the outgoing CEO of a hiring platform.

Beyond just working with incoming and departing leaders during a leadership change, comms pros should spend time with the leaders in question to pin down their voice, tone and the vision they aim to set for the company and its employees going forward. Humanizing leaders is a major first step communicators need to take during leadership changes. Showing leaders sharing their own perspectives through writing and even creating videos to show them to the employee base during the change can create familiarity that goes a long way toward coalescing positivity.

3. Study shows more employees are working on vacation, emphasizing the need for work-life comms

A report from Dayforce stated that the number of people using their vacation time to disconnect from work fully is on the decline, with just 37% of workers reporting the ability to unplug from their jobs. That’s down from 47% two years ago.

The study of 2,500 workers from the United States and Canada also reported that 15% of employees secretly work on their vacations, while 11% have faked an illness on vacation to get work done.

This data is a stark reminder that internal communicators have a major role to play when it comes to talking about PTO usage. Comms pros should reinforce the importance of unplugging away from work by not only creating messaging reminders of how PTO can help rejuvenate an employee mentally and physically, but also how it’s directly tied to company culture. Better yet, PTO comms can be even more impactful if leaders model the behavior and speak openly about time away.

Everybody needs time off. Comms pros should be proactive in talking about how important it is for everyone to take that time.

4. How about some good news?

• Data shows that global smoking rates are falling.
• The first-ever electric ferry crossing from Europe to Africa took place.
• A startup in Rhode Island is turning seafood shell waste into furniture.
• Ragan Training is great for communications pros to find inspiration and resources.
• You should be rewarded for your work. Find out how to earn an award here!

Have a great weekend comms all-stars!

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and trivia.

The post Target leaves RTO decisions, comms up to managers; Indeed CEO sends mixternal resignation memo appeared first on Ragan Communications.

At Ragan’s AI Horizons Conference earlier this year, Noelle Russell, CEO of the AI Leadership Institute, shared her perspectives on the need for responsible use of AI platforms amid the technological explosion.

To emphasize her point, Russell’s presentation began with an AI-deepfake introduction of herself. She told the crowd that AI’s widened accessibility is also creating more points of vulnerability that organizations and communicators need to be aware of.

“It didn’t just deepfake my face, it also deepfaked my voice,” she said. “All I had to do was talk for two minutes into my phone.”

Russell likened the rise of AI technology and its adoption by the masses to a furry animal at the zoo. It might seem fun, but if you’re not careful with it there’s a chance you’ll pay dearly later on down the line.

“When companies adopt AI, it starts in baby tiger mode — it’s cute, fluffy, exciting,” she said. “But no one’s asking how big it will get, what it will eat or what happens when it grows.”

“Big tigers kill you,” she added emphatically.

Russell also said that human beings play a major role in the future of AI. Because AI platforms (LLMs in particular) are influenced by their input, comms pros should carefully consider their brand and tone when they’re using AI to help in comms-related tasks.

“Don’t ever use a model off the shelf unless you’ve checked its behavior,” she said. “These models amplify stereotypes. Unless you check them, they will carry all that garbage into your product and your brand voice.”

She also said that a clear mind and knowledge of where you want AI to point you can help when you’re working with platforms in a comms capacity.

“Everyone has to learn how to build AI systems,” Russell said. “But the only skill you need is clarity of thought.”

Check out more from Russell’s talk below.

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No internal communicator wants to be the bearer of bad news. But getting layoff communications right is important for preserving both the dignity of those affected by the move and the employer’s reputation. When you’re able to share the news in a fashion that preserves the humanity of employees on the receiving end of the process and reflects the company’s tone and culture, you’re on the right track. However, failure to do so can erode even well-established company cultures.

Recent research shows that there’s a pattern of impersonal layoff communication taking shape. According to a report by Zety, 30% of workers were informed of a layoff through a large company meeting. Furthermore, 29% of impacted employees got the news of their layoff got the news through an email and 28% were called by their manager or an HR representative. And while it’s not a large number, 2% of surveyed employees discovering their jobs were gone after their access to email or messaging platforms was abruptly disconnected is noteworthy. These statistics show that impersonal approaches to layoff communications are becoming more prominent.

https://infogram.com/layoff-comms-1hxj48mnlkzl52v

There are several factors that can be ascribed to the rise of impersonalized layoff comms. Part of it can be chalked up to more dispersed organizations in which management finds it easier to cut employees in different locations all at once rather than taking the time to individualize conversations. Another factor is the rise in digital-first communication through messaging platforms and email, which has taken some of the humanity out of communication in some organizations.

Regardless of the situation surrounding the layoff, empathy needs to be readily apparent in everything an internal communicator does. People are what make up a company’s culture, and that needs to shine through in layoff comms. Even when the affected team members depart after the job cuts, the remaining employees will see how leaders and communicators handled the move.

In a piece for Ragan last summer, Dr. Kerry O’Grady touched on how poorly-executed layoff comms can impact both the overall business and prospects of those announcing the move. People will remember how a layoff was done just as much as they’ll remember the layoff itself.

“Handling the people who do the work in careless ways and assuming everyone is replaceable will cause irreversible damage to not only the bottom line, but the long-term career success of those mishandling the circumstances,” she said.

Medium matters

The way a layoff is communicated is important, extending beyond the words spoken when the news breaks. It’s also critically important to consider every part of the equation, including how affected employees find out.

In communications, valuable lessons can come from examples of what not to do in addition to following good precedent. For instance, comms pros should look to Google’s layoffs in early 2023 as an example to avoid. Rather than individualizing and humanizing the issue at hand, the tech giant sent out emails to employees in the middle of the night, which a lot of staff naturally missed as they got ready for work. When employees showed up to the office, some workers found out they no longer had a job when their key cards didn’t work. Needless to say, both impacted employees and their colleagues who remained were less than happy with how the message of job losses was shared.

While a big company like Google will naturally face more complex layoff communications (especially if the job cuts impact people in offices in different locations), offering clarity and a human-centric response is necessary. If you don’t nail it, it’s going to show you in a not-so-rosy light as an employer.

Internal communicators should always know that the way the message is shared is often just as important as the message itself. That’s especially true during a time of major change like a layoff, when a company’s commitment to culture via comms will be put to the test. As impersonalized layoff comms methods continue, internal comms should remember the ties between how a message is packaged and how it’s received.

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

The post The importance of layoff comms methods appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Mary Olson-Menzel is the founder and CEO of MVP Executive Development and co-founder of Spark Insight Coaching. Michelle Powers is a fractional chief of staff.

You are the voice of your company, your leaders, and your employees. You are leading the charge and articulating so many situations with grace and poise. Yet, every once in a while, your own voice creeps into your consciousness when you least expect it. There it is again, pulling at your attention and whispering in your ear. That nagging sense of restlessness about where you are, what you are doing, and especially about what the future holds.

You’ve done all the “right” things — you built a great career, climbed the corporate ladder, AND you’re not sure you want to keep doing this. Whether “this” is your current function, your role in the same company, or your career track entirely, that restless little voice has been warning you that something is potentially off.

Does this sound familiar? I hope not, but it can happen to the best of us at certain points in our careers!

That voice is not something to ignore. This voice is a signal, like a lighthouse in a storm; your passion is trying to get your attention. It is the kind of passion that energizes you in the middle of a crisis call, sustains you through countless changes, and reminds you why you chose this work in the first place.

If you’re wondering how to connect with and listen to your restless internal voice in a more meaningful way, start by asking better questions. Questions that you are so adept at asking others. Questions that help you realign with what drives you at your core and tap into your light.

Here are four questions we challenge even the most seasoned communications leaders to ask themselves:

1. When do I feel most alive and “lit up” — so immersed in what I’m doing that time disappears?

In an industry that thrives on deadlines, deliverables and external validation, it’s easy to lose touch with what genuinely lights you up.

Was it the time you guided a CEO through a media crisis and felt fully in your element? When you led a successful company rebrand? When you mentored a rising comms star and saw their confidence grow?

In those moments of feeling alive, what skills were you using? What values were you honoring? What impact were you making?

2. What am I doing when people say, “you’re an expert at that,” or “you’re a genius at this”?

We may overlook our core genius because it feels natural and effortless. You may assume everyone thinks strategically and systematically under pressure or crafts the perfect narrative in real time. But they don’t! That’s *your* superpower. Pay attention to it!

What are the talents you bring to the table that your team, peers or clients constantly thank you for? Crisis clarity? Storytelling vision? Executive presence?

Ask your trusted circle of colleagues, mentors and collaborators: “When have you seen me at my best?” Keep track of their answers. You’ll likely begin to hear larger themes that reflect what you do well, as well as what you’re meant to do more of.

3. If I could get paid to solve one big problem in the world, what would it be?

The intersection of purpose and passion can be a significant signal in reigniting your passion.

Maybe you’re driven to help organizations tell the truth more boldly. Maybe it’s about combatting misinformation, elevating marginalized voices, humanizing leadership or building organizational cultures of trust.

You don’t need to solve every problem. By anchoring your work in a problem you care deeply about, it makes long hours and internal politics more than just part of the job — it makes them part of the mission.

Look for that intersection that is called ikigai — the intersection of what you are good at, what you love, what the world needs and what you can get paid to do. Are you in your ikigai?

4. What fear is keeping me from fully pursuing this — and am I ready to release it?

Most of us don’t drift from our passion because we’re unclear of the path ahead. We drift because the next step feels risky, uncertain or even impractical. Over time, we also run the risk of losing connection altogether to the connection between doing what we love and what we get paid for.

Physiologically, your fear is designed to mitigate risk and protect you. However, when fear takes over, it may prevent you from taking the risks necessary to tap into your passion. As experts in communications, you are used to managing uncertainty for others. The real challenge is to manage it for yourselves as well!

Ask yourself: What is the root of this fear? Fear of being irrelevant, stepping outside the pathway you’ve followed for 20+ years or starting something you might not finish?

Then ask yourself: What is my fear costing me? Freedom? Joy at work? Or the opportunity to tap more fully into my passion?

If you’re not willing to let that fear keep running the show, you’re already on your way to figuring out your next right steps.

Final thoughts

Reconnecting with your passion as a communications leader doesn’t require a dramatic career pivot or a pithy resignation letter. It means making smarter, more intentional choices that better align your day-to-day work with your deeper sense of purpose, passion and joy!

• Start with curiosity.
• Track the moments of aliveness.
• What moments in your day are you finding the most joy?
• Listen to what others reflect about your strengths and superpowers.
• Focus on the problem you most want to solve and being of service to others.
• And above all, don’t let fear shape your narrative and make sure you are following what lights you up.

May the intersection of your passion and purpose reignite your spark to light you (and everyone around you) up!

The post Reignite passion in your career: 4 questions communications leaders should ask themselves appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Customer data can be a great way to demonstrate the impact of marketing campaigns to internal stakeholders. However, it won’t be an effective tool if that data is not easily understood. Being able to translate complex data into actionable items and simple proof points is key to earning stakeholder buy-in. Marketers must be able to provide a guiding hand in navigating the results of a campaign. They have to bridge the gap between data and decisions.

The cost of poor data communication

Poor communication of customer data, or the lack of it, can cripple a company’s goals. When a marketing team fails to simplify and contextualize data properly, it has a ripple effect. KPIs are misunderstood, which leads to delayed or disjointed decision-making while planning a campaign. As a result, the allocated budget and other resources are wasted, ultimately impacting the campaign’s outcome.

Clear and effective data translation avoids this scenario altogether. Communications teams just have to keep three key principles in mind.

The three pillars of effective data translation

No. 1: Clarity in visuals

To properly translate data, it is essential to first have clear visuals. Charts and graphs are valuable when they have a clear message. It’s important to avoid cluttering the visuals with too much information. Instead, focus on the “so what” of the data. You have the data, so what does it mean? Make that clear in the visualization of the data.

There are many different ways to present a data set: bar graph, pie chart, heatmap, and so on. Choosing the right format for the data you are presenting is key for your audience to easily understand and utilize it. Bar graphs are great for comparing different categories and tracking changes over time, such as indicating trends in a data set. Pie charts are better for demonstrating how multiple factors contribute to a whole, precisely demonstrating the role each factor played in achieving the result.

Regardless of how you decide to present your data, it’s a good idea to establish standard practices across your team. Keep things consistent visually throughout reports, being sure to use the company brand guide if you have one. It’s important to avoid any potential confusion, and using clear visuals to communicate data is one of the best ways to do that.

No. 2: Narrative framing

Data is compelling because it tells a story about a customer’s journey. You can begin using data to build your customer’s narrative by identifying the problem you’re solving or the question you’re trying to answer first. From there, determine what the data tells you about your customer, connect it with the campaign strategy that was used, and highlight the results accordingly.

For example, in one campaign, you use an A/B testing strategy on LinkedIn to see what content would best resonate with your audience. Using the results, you can determine what content performed best and build your future content marketing strategy based on that. The information from your campaign will inform you of what sort of customer was drawn to your content, who clicked through to your target site, and who ultimately became a lead.

No. 3: Actionability

You started by presenting the “so what” of the data and getting your internal audience to understand it. Now it’s time to translate that information into the “what now” step. Internal and executive stakeholders need to see and understand results to be able to effectively make decisions. A marketer’s job is to connect data points to insights that help drive decisions on budget shifts, channel strategy and creative pivots.

To use our prior example, if content B performed better on LinkedIn, what does that mean for your social media marketing strategy? It can mean expanding on content B to determine what exactly resonates with your audience or what spurs your audience to action. Take what you learn from your data and its story to create action items and next steps.

The future belongs to data translators

Internal stakeholders rely on marketers to interpret campaign performance. Your role is not just to report on the data but to take the data and assist with product decision-making. A marketing team that can effectively translate and connect data directly to executive business goals is a team that is prepared for the future and poised for growth.

The post Turning data into actionable insights that drive growth appeared first on Ragan Communications.

When used correctly, an employee intranet should be a vibrant source of employee-centric information and a platform that reflects an organization’s culture. However, far too often, intranets serve as little more than a repository for employee holiday calendars.

But according to Kristin Komar, senior manager of global communications at Uber, it doesn’t need to be this way.

“We realized that an intranet shouldn’t be just a document storage tool,” she said. “It should be a daily touchpoint that shapes how employees experience the workplace or find what they are looking for.”

Komar will present a case study of her experience reworking the intranet platform at Uber during this year’s Ragan Employee Experience Conference, August 5-7 at Disneyland in Anaheim, California. To learn more and register for the conference, click here.

Identifying and solving problems

Komar told Ragan that her team conducted an audit of the intranet to determine what needed to change to enhance engagement and ease of use.

“One of the biggest pain points we identified was our search function,” she said. “After consolidating content from multiple legacy platforms into UberHub, employees still struggled to find what they needed unless they knew the exact category or location of the resource.”

Komar and her team enlisted the help of AI.

“We integrated an AI-powered keyword search, which replaced the category-based navigation,” Komar shared. “This allowed employees to search for what they needed more naturally. They got more accurate, relevant results — just like they were Googling something.”

Komar said that the success of the revamp was simple — people need to know where your content for them lives.

“Findability is part of the communication strategy,” she said. “If people can’t find what you publish, the message gets lost. AI doesn’t just make content more accessible, but it makes communication more effective.”

Intranet and the employee journey

If a company wants an impactful intranet, it needs to be more than just a series of pages with rote information. An effective intranet should serve as a map that helps guide people to where they need to go in the most frictionless way possible.

Komar said that during Uber’s intranet redesign, her team tried to place themselves in the minds of their colleagues by trying to figure out what they’d look for on the platform.

“From a real estate perspective, our focus was to map out the employee journey and understand what they may be searching for,” she said. ”This led us to create Building User Guides as the single source of truth for each Uber office no matter where they’re physically located.”

Komar added that a major line of thinking in the redesign centered on optimizing the platform for self-service. “To achieve that, communicators need to anticipate the big questions and build systems that empower employees to solve them independently,” she said.

Komar shared a few details from the platform rebuild that other comms pros can apply to their own intranet redesigns, including:

• Use plain language and make navigation intuitive. “This was especially important for the Places section of the platform,” Komar said. “Previously, our Building User Guides were attachments that didn’t show up in search. We had to pull key terms out of those documents and build searchable knowledge pages within UberHub so the content could be found.”
• Bring fragmented resources together. Ease of access helps reduce confusion and can lead to increased usage. “Work to create a single source of truth on your platform,” Komar said.
• Bring ticketing systems under one umbrella. “Instead of sending employees to multiple systems, UberHub became an employee’s central access point,” Komar said. “The result was less back-and-forth, consolidated feedback and a more streamlined employee experience. That’s a big benefit for comms.”

Komar also provided a word of advice for communicators looking to overhaul their intranets.

“Engage your cross-functional partners early,” she said. “You’ll design something more holistic, more effective and more lasting.”

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

The post Tips for reinventing the intranet from Uber appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Yury Molodtsov is the COO and a partner at MA Family, a communications partner for tech startups, where he helps tell their stories and scale their impact. He’s led PR for breakout names like JetBrains, Flipper Zero, Miro and Gett. Before diving into agency life, Molodtsov was an investor at Day One Ventures in San Francisco, backing startups like Superhuman, Truebill, and Remote, while guiding their comms strategies from the inside out. 

What was your first job in comms and how has it shaped your career?

My first job was in marketing at a tech company called Coub. It was a video sharing app — a mix of Vine and the early stages of what became TikTok — very popular among internet users in Eastern Europe. Our main goal at the time was to enter the US market. We did everything from partnerships to seeding content and encouraging mainstream media to use our content for their own stories, like pasting a looped clip from the upcoming movie.

This experience heavily shaped my career as I now help founders and tech startups enter international markets. Many of them are immigrants who moved to Europe, the UK or the United States to launch and scale their company. We want to put them on the same footing as Stanford graduates going through Y Combinator in ecosystems like Silicon Valley.

Shortly after, my boss launched her full-scale agency, and I jumped ships to become its first employee. 

You’ve worked with startups at all stages. How do you build a comms strategy when the company is still figuring out who it is?

Focus on today’s core message. Startups are constantly evolving and updating their thinking. You should have a positive vision for your company’s role in the future, but the focus should be on what you’re offering right now.

Take Airbnb as an example. It started as a way to rent out a spare bedroom during big events. Then it became a network of professional hosts. Now, it’s expanding into experiences like personal chef services and photographers. Whether or not that was always part of the vision, they focused their messaging on what they offered at each stage. Anything else would be dilutive to the brand that had to educate people about this brand-new concept. 

Strategy can shift over time, but it starts with clarity in the present. You can always change your positioning when the time comes, but it’d be great to get there with a big business already. 

What’s your approach to helping founders become stronger storytellers, especially if they’re not natural communicators?

It’s not just talent; it’s a lot of work. When you read an interview with someone like Satya Nadella, you can see a lot of media training and memorized talking points that went into this, alongside his own immense experience. 

We work with founders to prepare in advance, develop key messaging frameworks (who we are, what we do, what makes us different), and create talking points for specific announcements or interviews. We conduct media prep to make these talking points feel natural. For example, when launching a product, we focus on why it’s important and why people should care, not iterating on the technical specs. 

Anybody who prepares as much can become a good communicator. In some cases, we invite third-party coaches and executive trainers who have supported CEOs of public companies to prepare for their next keynote or board meeting. 

When a company is growing fast or getting acquired, what are some tips on how comms teams should adapt their messaging and priorities?

With acquisitions, the acquirer’s comms team usually takes over. Your role is to provide context and materials.

With rapid growth, the priority shifts from the quantity of coverage to the quality. Early on, startups need to break through the ice. You need more content, news pieces, articles, podcasts — anything that gets you on the people’s radar. 

As companies grow, your focus should be on the impact and messaging of the coverage. Apple doesn’t care how many stories are written about its new iPhone, but it very much wants to ensure what exactly is said about it. 

This transition involves focusing on top-tier media and building long-standing relationships with reporters, not just between you and them but also between them and the company. They need to know who your executives are, what they do and what they believe in. 

Finally, you must identify key industry experts whose opinions can significantly influence the perception of your company among the stakeholders. Let’s say you’re a company in the AI coding space — being featured by someone like Ben Thompson can introduce you to multiple decision makers and reporters covering this space. 

What’s one underrated skill someone new to comms should have in their toolkit?

Understanding how to create news. Many people outside this space believe that having a good company is enough to guarantee coverage, but news needs a hook. The art lies in the ability to create news almost out of thin air. 

When a company doesn’t have obvious news, you can find competitors who can act as benchmarks and see what gets them coverage. Beyond that, you should identify gaps in the media landscape. For example, we had a Web3 cybersecurity client that operated in the space known for multi-million-dollar hacks. I noticed a lack of comprehensive statistics on stolen funds, with the only figures from two anonymous blogs differing by 100%. So we worked together to collect and analyze the publicly available data and produced the first proper regular report on crypto losses that has become a standard in the industry and the foundation of this company’s PR. In a couple of years, all of their competitors started doing this, but we already had the best relationships with the likes of CNBC and Bloomberg, who often came to us for comments.

 What’s one tool you can’t live without?

Superhuman is a powerful email client marketed for founders and sales but underrated for PR. I communicate extensively via email with internal team members, clients, and reporters and Superhuman is invaluable for this. It excels over any PR industry software, from scheduling emails to be sent in different time zones to templates and reminders. And there are small things. For instance, everyone writes the foundations of their pitches in a separate doc, but when you paste it, Superhuman ensures consistent formatting across devices, so that it will look perfect — try this with Gmail. 

Isis Simpson-Mersha is a conference producer/ reporter for Ragan. Follow her on LinkedIn.

The post Building a comms strategy for tech startups appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Ragan Communications is proud to announce the winners of its 2025 Workplace Wellness Awards, honoring organizations that have made employee wellbeing a strategic priority through groundbreaking initiatives in mental health, DEI, benefits, engagement and beyond. This year’s honorees represent a diverse mix of companies that are building healthier, more connected and resilient workplaces.

The winners range from household names to smaller organizations making big impacts, and their programs offer models for supporting employees at every stage of life and work. Take a look at three standout examples from this year’s class of champions and then read the full list of this year’s winners.

United Federal Credit Union: Building culture through inclusion and growth

United Federal Credit Union (UFCU) stood out for its multi-pronged approach to fostering inclusion, professional development and wellbeing. The organization reduced overall turnover by 22.3% in one year and cut leadership turnover by more than 50%. Nearly every employee participated in voluntary training, with engagement in learning programs rising fivefold. The DEI Council, internal promotion pipeline and robust wellness benefits — including paid volunteer time and generous 401(k) contributions — reflect a culture that invests in people at every level. These efforts have made UFCU a model for inclusive, values-driven workplaces.

Exos: Redefining productivity with a four-day workweek

Exos won in the Work-Life Balance category for its innovative Readiness Culture Code, which reshaped the company’s workweek around intentional recovery. A four-day workweek pilot was launched for more than 1,000 employees, supported by initiatives like “You Do You Days” and shortened meetings to reduce burnout and enhance focus. A data-backed study conducted with the Wharton School revealed significant increases in engagement and measurable drops in stress. The framework’s success has already influenced 60 client organizations. By aligning workplace structure with performance science, Exos showed how flexibility can elevate both wellbeing and productivity.

ADP Retirement Services: Empowering employees through financial literacy

The winner in the Financial Wellness category, ADP Retirement Services, launched its Financial Wellbeing Roadmap Series to deliver practical financial education tailored to every career stage. The initiative combined interactive webinars, guides and workshops on topics like budgeting, and retirement planning, with targeted sessions for participants over 50 and 65. Engaging elements such as live polls and real-life case studies helped turn information into action. The series achieved a 160% increase in registrations over benchmarks and saw significant gains in engagement, particularly among employees under 55. ADP’s approach ensures that employees are better equipped to build lasting financial wellbeing.

Congratulations to this year’s winners and honorees! Don’t forget to read all the profiles of this year’s class of winners.

People of the Year

 CEO of the Year

Dr. Erling Renown: Renown Health

CHRO of the Year

Kelly Jones: Cisco

Culture Officer of the Year

Robyn Jordan: DriveTime

Total Rewards Leader

Toni-Ann Sforza: Municipal Credit Union

HR Team of the Year

Vistatec, HR Team

Top Places to Work for Employee Wellbeing

Large Organization (more than 1,000 employees)

Verisk: Verisk Invests in and Fosters Wellness and Well-being

Mid-Size Organizations (between 100-999 employees)

LAIKA: LAIKA Total Rewards

Small Organization (less than 100 employees)

Breaktime Media: Breaktime Media

Outstanding Total Rewards Programs

Large Organization (more than 1,000 employees)

Athena

Mid-Size Organization (between 100-999 employees)

Unanet, Inc

Wellness Initiatives/Programs

DEI (Diversity, Equity & Inclusion)

United Federal Credit Union: United Federal Credit Union

 Employee Benefits

T-Mobile: Employee Benefits

Employee Engagement

EPAM Systems, Inc.: Employee Engagement is a Corporate Imperative

 Employee Experience

LAIKA: LAIKA Total Rewards

Financial Wellness

ADP Retirement Services: Financial Well-Being Roadmap Series

 HR and Communications Collaboration

MSU Federal Credit Union: 2025 Open Enrollment

Learning & Development

Sapling Financial Consultants: Sapling Financial Consultants

 Mental Health Initiatives

Mitsubishi Corporation (Americas): Mitsubishi Corporation (Americas)

 Physical Wellness

ePlus: ePlus Well & Good

 Work-Life Balance

Exos: Readiness Culture Code

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Clear and consistent communication from executives and senior leaders is fundamental to building trust, ensuring alignment and driving sustained engagement across an organization. Their words shape company culture, clarify strategic priorities and inspire employees to take an active role in achieving business goals.

However, according to data from Ragan’s 2025 Communications Benchmark Report, a signature research project conducted for members of Ragan’s Communications Leadership Council, many communicators report difficulties in gaining direct access to the C-suite, a significant barrier to more effective leadership communication.

The full Communications Benchmark Report is available to members of Ragan’s Communications Leadership Council. Non-members can download the executive summary.

Obstacles to more effective C-suite communications

Time is the biggest obstacle. Simply getting dedicated time on busy calendars is the primary barrier, according to just over half (51%) of respondents. A smaller group of respondents do not feel their executives grasp the value of communications (27%), or they don’t have access to executives (26%) or their principals are hesitant to use social media (19%).

Assuming they get time on a busy executive’s calendar and have established enough credibility to have their ear, communicators must then figure out the best way to deliver leadership’s messages to employees.

Leadership communications

Email has continued to grow as the most effective way, in part driven by the ability to reach nearly everyone in the enterprise via one medium as well as the ability to personalize messages for different employee segments. Other established tools like town halls, newsletters and the intranet rounded out the top four tools, aligning with broader trends around effective channels for internal communication.

Interestingly, video and virtual content saw a 10-percentage point decline, part of a three-year trend that is likely indicative of the move toward more in-person work in the office. Small group meetings, one-on-ones and walk-abouts all decreased further this year, continuing their three-year decline in favor of mass communication tools.

As AI and other commtech tools allow communicators to further segment and personalize communications to targeted audiences, expect tried-and-tested traditional tools like email and newsletters to remain near the top as leadership communication tools.

Manager communications

A similar storyline plays out when communicating with frontline supervisors and managers.

After a brief dip in last year’s rankings, email once again claimed the top spot for communicating with people managers. The suite of AI-enabled writing products being developed and deployed will give communicators a powerful set of tools to customize content and target busy managers with information they need to know at the time they need to know it.

Personal communication methods and development resources also remain effective channels for reaching people managers. Nearly three-quarters of respondents (72%) find team meetings with managers to be effective, followed by dedicated resources for team managers such as briefing sheets or templated content (45%) and one-on-one meetings (42%).

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Whether you’re just getting started or looking to level up your internal email management game, this guide covers how to create an internal email editorial calendar to help your team stay organized and your people engaged.

What is an email editorial calendar?
An internal email editorial or content calendar is a shared calendar that outlines what internal emails are being sent, to whom, when and why. As a single source of truth, it can help you plan and prioritize email content, alert you of competing sends, optimize timing and help you track your performance, all while making it easier to collaborate within your team (and across departments). It can also help prevent email overload — so your team doesn’t accidentally send five emails to the same group of employees in one week (unless it’s benefits season, or something exciting is happening).

Why do you need an email calendar?
Depending on your organization’s size, you may have a lot of cooks in the internal comms kitchen: HR, IT, operations and leadership may all have messages to share. Employees can only handle so much email, and repetitive messages from multiple senders are a primary cause for feeling email overload. Without a shared calendar, emails can quickly become repetitive, poorly timed and unmanageable. An editorial calendar can make it easier for your team to boost visibility of your internal comms efforts, collaborate with other departments, space out communications and ultimately, create a better employee experience.

What is email and calendar management?
Internal email and calendar management can keep your messaging clear, consistent and optimized when done well. When you do it right, you send the right amount of information to the right people at the right time. This strategy involves prioritizing messaging, scheduling, spacing sends and tracking deadlines. The goal is to organize your internal comms so your team can work efficiently and avoid overwhelm. Managing internal comms with a visual calendar system can help simplify your workflow. Remember to include senders who are not part of your internal comms team — HR and IT tend to send a lot of broadcast emails.

How to create an internal email editorial calendar

1. Pick your format. When selecting an internal email editorial calendar, the best approach is to choose a format that aligns with your team’s existing tools and workflow while meeting the specific needs of your internal communications strategy. PoliteMail’s Calendar View, for example, offers valuable features like color-coded events and visual clarity of scheduled sends, making it an excellent choice for teams seeking streamlined and organized email management. However, alternatives such as shared Outlook calendars, Excel spreadsheets or project management tools can also be effective depending on your team’s preferences and familiarity with these platforms. Consider factors like content planning capabilities, collaboration functions and visual limitations when evaluating options. The right calendar should simplify your workflow, foster collaboration across departments and support clear, consistent messaging that engages your audience without overwhelming them.
2. Define email categories. Next, you’ll want to assess your email content and create typical buckets like announcements, culture, events, HR/benefits, IT and leadership comms. These standardized buckets can help you categorize and prioritize your messaging, quickly identify any imbalances in the types of messaging you’re sending and assess the effectiveness of each category.
3. Map your audience. You’ll want to divide your all-employee email list into smaller target audiences based on specific criteria or characteristics. Data from PoliteMail, which includes four billion emails sent to 12 million global employees, shows that attention and readership decrease as the distribution list size increases. Organizations commonly segment lists based on hierarchy (staff, management and leadership), units (divisions, departments and brands), geographic location (region, country and city), and categorically, such as benefits enrollment (declined, not enrolled, enrolled or experiencing a qualifying life event).
4. Determine send frequency. Next, you’ll want to identify recurring sends. What do you send weekly? Monthly? Quarterly? You can slot these recurring messages into your email calendar and plan other messages around them. Prioritize this consistency while leaving room for flexibility. By leaving space between scheduled sends, you can minimize the risk of overlapping messages if leadership needs to send a time-sensitive, yet unexpected message.
5. Build in time for editing—and communicate expectations. As internal comms professionals, you’re already familiar with the time it takes to craft and edit a message. But when you share your editorial email calendar with other teams, like IT or leadership, it can be helpful to make that timeline visible to them. Communicate your draft deadlines, when feedback is due and final scheduling. Or consider noting minimum lead times. For example, content must be submitted to your team for review at least seven days in advance. These timelines can allow space for thoughtful, well-reviewed messages.
6. Measure and adjust. When you create an internal email editorial calendar, you want to maximize your impact and minimize overload by using your time and resources efficiently. Evaluate your approach, benchmark your performance, and refine your email management strategy to improve overall effectiveness. Review read and engagement rates, and analyze employee feedback. Your calendar should evolve with your team.

Simplifying internal comms with an email editorial calendar
A thoughtful and visual internal email editorial calendar isn’t just about logistics; it can help your team produce more intentional, strategic messages. When you plan, it’s easier to loop in other departments, engage your people and keep those all-staff emails from disappearing into the digital void. An email unread is a message unsaid.

The post How to create an internal email editorial calendar for your comms team appeared first on Ragan Communications.

The communicator’s lament: overworked, understaffed and pigeonholed as an “order taker.” For many comms pros, it’s a daily struggle to stay afloat with each new ask seemingly coming out of the blue.

For the three-person comms team in the Technology department at FINRA (Financial Industry Regulatory Authority), the answer was thinking like a software developer. The results? Increased productivity, higher internal client satisfaction and more than 50% reduction in ad hoc asks besieging the department.

From reactive to proactive mindset

Lauren Modisette, FINRA’s director of communications and operations, technology, started her career as a project manager and business analyst (including at IBM) where she was introduced to the software development cycle and Agile workflow.

“I have found communications to be a very reactive practice–we’re waiting for requests and work to come to us and we’re fielding it in real time,” said Modisette. “There will always be reactivity because you can’t predict everything, but you should predict what you can.”

That starts with building relationships with customers and stakeholders to anticipate the work that’s coming down the pipeline, she said

While the FINRA comms team had set up an intake portal for comms requests, there was no real method or framework for managing workload when Modisette arrived. “I would hear internal customers say, ‘We think your team is so great, we can come to them any time and we know they will help us.’ And I’m like, ‘OK, I’m so grateful to hear that and my team is here to support you, but that’s not an effective way for us to work.’”

Step 1: Building relationships

Modisette and the team first spent time observing the requests coming in, as well as talking to their internal counterparts to better understand their needs and timelines.

“Let’s connect,” said Modisette. “And let’s keep connecting because I want to understand what your needs are and the sooner that you can communicate what your needs are to me, I can look ahead on our calendar and commit to those things up front.”

Step 2: Prioritizing workflow with Scrum and Kanban

Next, Modisette started applying Agile project management frameworks to prioritize workflow based on business value and complexity.

“When business leaders hear the word ‘agile’ they typically hear ‘flexible,” said Modisette. “We want to be flexible, but we want to make sure that we’re being flexible for the right reasons and that comes down to business value at the end of the day.”

Modisette and her team utilize two project management frameworks: Kanban and Scrum. Kanban is a project management framework designed to visualize and track a backlog of work, limit work-in-progress and maximize efficiency. FINRA uses it for ad hoc tasks and Modisette likens it to a “help desk” that provides an intake of requests, typically on a first come, first serve basis.

“That helps us have one source of truth for our ad hoc work, so we’re not digging through our email for what we need,” she said.

The Scrum framework is for managing planned work, such as newsletters, town halls and fireside chats. Within Scrum, projects are typically managed in time boxes called Sprints.

“The standard Sprint in Scrum is two weeks,” said Modisette. “That helps you understand not just how much volume of work your team can deliver in a time box, but how much complexity your team can deliver in a select time period.”

By funneling ad hoc requests through Kanban and planned assignments through Scrum, Modisette and team have a better sense of the complexity of each project and how long they will take to complete.

“With Kanban, we’re collecting data on our customers and starting to better understand what their future needs are going to be,” said Modisette. “Then I can use the Scrum framework to start building that out against timelines and complexity.”

Step 3: Assigning value to projects

The complexity of each project is measured with the Fibonacci sequence, and the numeric is called a “story point,” giving the task a weight based on what it will take to complete it. The story point is an estimation; if we worked on this task, and only this task, how difficult is it to complete? How long would it take?

A simple, low complexity task, such as an email communication or an event invite with a known process and timeline, may be worth one point.

A more complex task, such as a designer creating a new logo for marketing collateral, requires more time, more review and more unknown factors, which could generate a 3 or 5 rating.

“As you start to lay these tasks out in these time boxes and you start to add a weight to them in terms of their complexity, these data points all add up,” said Modisette. “When your two-week time box is ending, you now have a data point behind it.”

The FINRA comms team is delivering about 13 points of complexity per Sprint, according to Modisette. “When I look ahead and I’m seeing Sprints that have 30 points committed, I’m like, ‘OK, this is a problem we need to figure out.’ We need to manage the expectations of our stakeholders to help them meet their timelines. And then it becomes more like a conversation than a negotiation.”

Thirteen points is a good velocity for the FINRA team now, but that represents the volume of committed work the team can take on at any given time. “If we have an influx of ad hoc work, and my team is constantly committed to 13 points Sprint-to-Sprint, then we no longer have capacity to handle unplanned, high priority work,” says Modisette.

Modisette said the team may only commit to 10 points upfront to leave capacity for ad hoc work. If there’s no ad hoc work, they can pull something in from the backlog or an upcoming sprint.

Since much of the team’s scope is now predictable, Modisette can now plan for Sprints months and quarters in advance. “During our busy times, I need to make sure we have capacity reserved to handle those unplanned high-priority tasks,” she said. “When I can predict the slower times, that’s when I feel confident we can commit to strategic work.”

Ad hoc requests down, customer satisfaction up

The number of ad hoc requests Modisette and her team have received in the first four months of 2025 is down more than 50% compared to the same period last year.

But it’s not just about taking the load off the comms team, it’s about prioritizing work that enhances business value.

The FINRA comms team is beginning to measure its customer satisfaction score with quarterly surveys to its customers, stakeholders and business partners, utilizing a Radical Candor framework. Instead of a five-point scale ranging from poor to exceptional, the team has a four-point scale including “not OK,” “OK for now,” “good” and “great.”

The comms team score is 3.3 out of 4, Modisette said, with a goal of moving to 3.5.  “It’s up to us now to empathize with our customers, stakeholders and business partners and brainstorm how we can elevate our level of service and quality,” she said.

Getting started
Despite implementing the frameworks last spring, Modisette considers her team “green” rather than “mature” in their usage and has assigned courses on Agile workflows and product ownership to help them get up to speed.

Still, there are other less complicated project management tools with which teams can start. Even a simple calendar is a starting point, allowing you to plot out commitments and deadlines in response to requests. “Finding a tool to use as your single source of truth for the work that your team is doing is the first big step,” said Modisette.

While the learning curve is steep and continuous, Modisette’s team are believers now. “It can feel a little micromanage-y at first,” she said. “But once we’re able to start containing some of the chaos and communicate to our stakeholders how much work we can really accommodate at any given time without impacting quality, that’s when they start to see the value in it.”

Members of Ragan’s Communications Leadership Council have access to additional reporting and can view a sample Kanban board and Scrum workflow. Learn more about the benefits of Council membership today.

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Digital deception tactics like deepfakes and impersonation require new approaches to detection.

“Today, it’s less about how do you identify and determine if information is fake or real, but really particularly for us comms folks, how is your company and how are you responding?” asked Nick Loui, co-founder and CEO of PeakMetrics, at Ragan’s AI Horizons conference.

Here’s how to spot real from fake:

Limits of detection

The increase in AI-generated content makes it increasingly difficult to distinguish deceptive content using traditional cues.

“We’re seeing how the volume of content that we need to monitor and track as folks that work in this space has increased, while the quality of content has significantly decreased,” said Loui.

Clues like unusual posting patterns or visual errors are harder to spot and text-based AI content is also far more coherent and persuasive than before.

Agentic AI

Loui said that as these tools grow in sophistication, so must communicators’ strategies for identifying and mitigating deception. Communicators can leverage AI agents to combat deceptive media.

For example, when a user submits a request to an agent such as: “combat deceptive media around my organization,” the following interactions between agents occur:

1. Orchestration agent: Acts as the central coordinator by breaking down the initial request and assigning tasks to the appropriate AI agents.
2. Research agent: Discovers relevant content by scanning news sites, social media, blogs, forums and fringe platforms for company-related narratives.
3. Context agent: Analyzes patterns by clustering similar narratives and assessing their rate and scale of spread.
4. Deception detector agent: Verifies content integrity by flagging manipulated images, deepfakes, AI-generated text and bot-driven activity.
5. Threat scoring agent: Evaluates risk by ranking each narrative based on its potential to cause reputational or operational damage.
6. Verific agent: Ensures accuracy by double-checking flagged content and confirming the validity of identified threats.
7. Response agent: Executes crisis mitigation by alerting Nike’s crisis team and deploying countermeasures such as talking points, takedown notices, and community notes.

“When we’re thinking about this world of synthetic media overlapping with the concept of agentic AI that is now getting deployed into businesses every day, it creates a much more complex environment to be operating in,” said Loui.

The AI threat defense ecosystem

Loui said there are a lot of organizations that are thinking about what the future of combating these different types of threats looks like.

Loui categorizes the defense ecosystem into several domains:

• Threat intelligence firms tackling the problem from a cybersecurity lens
• Narrative intelligence companies that analyze information spread and sentiment
• Deepfake and bot detection specialists
• Trust and safety organizations focused on maintaining secure online environments

Watch the full presentation in the video below:

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Managers aren’t just team leaders — they’re also key parts of any organization’s communications structure. Comms pros can lean on managers to help spread internal news and updates and relate them in a way that meshes with an individual team. But what happens when a new manager joins an existing team?

Newly placed managers and communicators can work together to learn, adjust and apply communications processes. This collaboration can help keep the company’s values at the forefront of messaging while also tailoring communication to each new manager and their reports in a way that leverages their skills and personalities.

Debra Helwig, internal communications and event director at Pinion, told Ragan that the first thing communicators and managers should do at the outset of a new managerial assignment is to observe how the existing team communicates. She shared that this happened in her own department, when a senior associate on her team was promoted to a manager position.

“You have to go in not trying to change a lot, but really listening and observing,” Helwig said. “Ask them questions about how the team works and what the pitfalls are.”

Daviera Powell, director of strategic internal communications at The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, recommended that new managers start out by working with the comms team to learn about what channels the team uses to communicate. After that, she suggested setting up a meeting with the new team to discuss preferences. Doing so will help embed the new manager into the team and also provide valuable feedback for the comms department.

“In addition to providing an avenue for the team members to share their thoughts on team communication, it’s also an opportunity for the new manager to share their communication preferences,” Powell said. “The comms team should also help the manager create a Q&A document for the new manager to help answer questions about how they’ll manage and interact with their reports.”

Communicators as facilitators

With work taking up a major part of most people’s waking hours, it’s only natural that they get used to the people and processes that govern their teams. A new manager can throw that into flux if they’re not onboarded properly. Internal communicators can serve as valuable conduits to forming the perception of the new manager.

“It’s our responsibility as the internal comms team to shape the narrative when a new manager comes aboard,” Helwig said.

Helwig suggested running a messaging campaign aimed at both reports to the new manager and adjacent employees that informs and humanizes the manager. This can include blogs that explore the new manager’s personal interests, Q&As about their background before ascending to the role or a video introduction posted on the intranet.

“The team often wants to know who their manager is as a human being in addition to who they are as a colleague,” she said. “It’s our job to answer any questions about why this is the right person for the job at this point in time.”

Engaging skeptics and the importance of tone 

A new manager can pose a major change for employees — and they’re not all going to be sold on the adjustment right away. Internal communicators can help smooth out that process.

Helwig proposed having new managers work with comms pros to pin down the wording and presentation of how they plan to run their teams. By going into the transition with a collaborative mindset, new managers are more likely to get their teams to open up, clearing paths for better communication.

“There’s a difference between agreement and alignment, and we need alignment,” she said. “Bring the team into the transition process by clearly inviting their opinions and support.”

Powell said that tone matters a great deal when a new manager arrives on an existing team. The comms team should ensure that they work with the new manager on emphasizing positivity in their team communications, and all introductory calls and announcements should reflect this as well.

“New managers and the comms team should work in lockstep to craft a positive tone upon their arrival,” Powell said. “It goes a long way toward making a team click.”

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

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Executives talk a lot about trust. The real part is all about earning it!

It is not about the ever-so-long speech or the polished intranet update that defines what employees believe. It is the recurring messages they see in motion, the way managers share updates, the peer voices spotlighted in Teams and even the line beneath someone’s email. These aren’t broadcast moments, they’re embedded signals. It is where culture is truly reinforced, or quietly undone.

The companies getting internal comms right in 2025 aren’t the ones speaking the loudest. They’re the ones designing systems that let employees speak clearly, consistently, and credibly, often through channels leadership may have forgotten to notice.

What the stats say:

Employees are not lacking information. They are lacking alignment.

In an environment saturated with updates, memos, and check-ins, trust does not come from more content, it comes from more meaningful signals.

Embedded signals are the new Internal comms frontier

Engagement alone is no longer the benchmark, alignment is. Since aligned employees do not just feel involved, they act in sync with company goals. They interpret change more effectively. They make decisions faster, driving optimal growth, which reinforces culture from the inside out.

That level of alignment is not driven by volume. It is driven by signal quality, the degree to which communication is clear, contextual, and consistent at every touchpoint.

If trust is the outcome, internal channels must become more than delivery tools.

They should become cultural infrastructure, intentionally designed, easy to scale and built for the way people actually work.

Why employee-led communication makes the difference

As traditional top-down approaches lose traction, internal communication is evolving to amplify employee-driven voices. These voices are often more trusted, more direct and better positioned to drive real engagement while cutting through information overload.

The most impactful internal comms strategies don’t overshadow employees, they support them. That means communicating in the channels people already use, and reinforcing meaning without adding noise.

To do that, organizations are leaning into new formats that reflect how employees actually connect:

• Building influence through Employee Resource Groups (ERGs).
• Delivering key messages through internal podcasts.
• Enabling peer-led communications at scale.
• Showcasing employee-generated content to build credibility.
• Making employee advocacy a core communications strategy.
• Standardizing and maximizing email signatures as high-impact touchpoints.

These aren’t side projects. They’re authentic, culture-driving channels that reflect how people feel about their work, and how they want to engage.

Elevating the everyday touchpoint

When internal communication is designed for alignment, even the most routine touchpoints become tools of consistency. Take the email signature: standard across roles, visible across teams and sent out by employees thousands of times each week.

That is not just repetition, it is reach. Every email becomes an opportunity to reinforce brand, culture and clarity at scale. Far from being just administrative real estate, the signature can become a subtle but strategic asset, a reflection of identity, trust and intent.

With a centralized platform like Letsignit, organizations can design signatures that do more than display contact info. They deliver messages that move with the employee — persistent, visible and quietly powerful. It’s about making alignment effortless.

What does that look like in practice?

• Internal comms teams can roll out targeted messages visible only to employees — like a training launch, a mentorship program or a quick pulse survey for the next offsite.
• Marketing teams can drive product awareness, promotions or event teasers — embedded directly in outbound emails.

• Customer success teams can easily share integrated satisfaction surveys — reaching customers in a familiar, low-friction channel.
• Banners and messaging can be adapted by role, region or language — evolving in real time with your strategy.

This is what designing for trust and relevance looks like. The message travels with the people who send it — embedded, not imposed. When comms leaders build around how people actually communicate, trust stops being a goal.

It becomes a built-in feature of how the organization thinks, moves and grows.

The post Hidden channels, trusted voices: Why employee-led communication is the future of culture appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Greetings, comms pros! Let’s take a look at a few news stories from the last week and see what we can learn from them.

1. Royal Bank of Canada orders employees back to their desks four days per week

Royal Bank of Canada is the latest institution to move closer to a full-time return to work. According to a report in The Globe and Mail, the bank will transition from a three-day-a-week in-person schedule to four days later this year.

The report cited a memo from the bank emphasizing the importance of employee relationships.

“RBC is a relationship-driven bank and in person, human connection is core to our winning culture,” RBC spokesperson Gillian McArdle said in an e-mail statement. “We set the expectation in 2023 that we’d come together in the office for the majority of the time, with the flexibility to work remotely one to two days a week.”

The decision for more in-office days at RBC aligns with statements CEO Dave McKay has made in the past relating remote work to a drop in productivity and innovation.

Return-to-office memos are nothing new at this point, especially in the financial space. Royal Bank of Canada’s communication of the RTO process pins the motivation for the move on a tie-back to the company’s culture. If you’re going to do an RTO process, that’s the way to talk about it. Focus on how it aligns with the established organizational culture, feature people prominently in messaging about the move and root it all back in what makes the company unique.

2. Business Insider is laying off 21% of staff, CEO says 

Business Insider CEO Barbara Peng announced that the publication is cutting 21% of it its roles. In an internal memo obtained by Axios and published on X, Peng said that affected employees would receive an email with next steps within 15 minutes of the memo’s release and would be walked through next steps individually.

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“While today’s changes are what we must do to build the most enduring Business Insider, it doesn’t make them any easier,” the memo read. “We are fortunate to have built a company with thoughtful, kind and creative people around the world, and we are are deeply appreciative of the positive impact they have made within the company and on our readers, clients and partners.”

The memo ascribed the job cuts to a rethink in strategy that’s placing more emphasis on events and AI.

When layoffs announcements do come down, they’re best done when they’re thorough and affected employees hear from leadership. Peng’s message is thorough, provides reasoning for the layoffs and acknowledges the affected employees with a sense of gratitude. Empathy and compassion should lead any layoff notification. In addition, employees shouldn’t be left twisting in the wind; giving them a swift breakdown of the process and having structures in place to answer questions is a must.

Layoff comms aren’t easy and no communicator wants to create messaging for them. But when you do them the right way, you can more easily preserve goodwill and employer reputation.

3. Report: Workers are keeping on-the-job AI use a secret

A report by security software company Ivanti revealed that 42% of workers are using generative AI tools at work — but a third of them are keeping it a secret from their colleagues. The top reasons for doing so included that employees liked having a secret advantage (36%), fear of job cuts (30%) and the fact that their employers had no AI usage policies in place (30%).

This report emphasizes the need for open and honest conversations about AI in the workplace. That’s a role internal communicators should be spearheading. If your company has AI policy in place, comms should be sure to create robust messaging so it’s readily apparent to all employees. If there isn’t one, communicators can work with leadership to draft guidelines.

The best workplace cultures are ones that thrive on transparency. AI usage is here to stay — but if we are more open and honest about it as employees and communicators, we can create policies that help both spur innovation and strengthen workplace cultures.

4. How about some good news?

• Japan is set to begin trials on artificial human blood later this year.
• Archaeologists in Egypt discovered a set of three tombs that date back nearly 3,000 years.
• The world’s tallest 3D-printed building is taking shape in Switzerland.
• Ragan Training is great for communications pros to find inspiration and resources.
• You should be rewarded for your work. Find out how to earn an award here!

Have a great weekend comms all-stars!

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and trivia.

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Kristin McHugh originally set out to be a journalist, but a college professor introduced her to the world of communications—and she never looked back. Now at PwC as the chief marketing and communications officer, McHugh recently led the firm’s first brand refresh in 14 years, blending its heritage with a bold, modern identity. The global update included a refreshed logo, a standout orange palette, and a new campaign centered on helping clients move forward. It’s all about showcasing how PwC empowers its clients through innovation, tech, and strategic momentum, the comms pro said.

When she isn’t working, you can find McHugh at the beach with her family at the Jersey Shore or getting inspired by a good book.

You stepped into this role just seven months ago — what’s one unexpected thing you’ve learned about PwC since joining? 

 What I’m so excited about is the people. When I think about the team, the talent within the communications team, within the marketing team, the focus, the agility, the ability to learn and to continue to grow matches what’s happening within PwC as the brand. And it’s been extraordinary to see the capabilities of the team. It’s been exciting to think about the trajectory of the team and where we can go together. And that has been really rewarding and exciting and certainly culminating in the brand refresh that we launched recently. So that has been a focus of the team and really a way that the team has come together across marketing comms and CX to deliver an incredible new brand refresh for PwC.

Coming from Verizon, a very consumer-facing brand, what shifts, if any, did you have to make in your approach now that you’re in this realm?

There’s a lot that’s different. There is a lot that stays the same. When we think about the focus of communications and marketing, the process we go through and how we focus on the customer, those remain the same. Focused on insights, focused on delivering outcomes that drive the business and build the brand, that remains consistent. And that is what I have built throughout my career, from when I worked on the agency side on behalf of clients, then at Verizon and certainly now at PwC. Taking all that, I’ve learned to bring that to this role that connects communications and marketing to deliver on behalf of the PwC brand and to drive the business forward.

You’re overseeing everything from brand to sales — what part of the marketing-comms toolkit are you having the most fun sharpening right now?

 It is all really fun and it’s incredible. My favorite thing as we think about marketing and comms is when the team comes together. So the integration between marketing and comms to understand the insights that our customers need and where we can deliver and how we can use the tools within our toolbox to deliver the most effective marketing and the most effective, both internal and external communications to drive our business goals, to drive our brand goals. And what has been really exciting and rewarding is that integration and having the team come together on behalf of the business and certainly on behalf of the brand, as evidenced with the brand refresh two weeks ago and which continues in market today.

Your path has taken you through some big brands—how did each stop along the way shape the kind of leader you are now?

 When I started in undergrad and went to Villanova University as a communications major, I wanted to become a journalist and my junior year took a public relations and communications course and I was hooked from I did an internship in Philadelphia for the Brownstein Group and focused on PR and communications. And when I had any spare time, I would go downstairs and work with the advertising team. And then the internship expanded to both PR and advertising and it was such a great, informative time. And from there went on to work at agencies and Verizon. But that intersection of PR, communications and marketing has been the sweet spot of my career ever since. So really from the time of my internship to where I sit today, each step of the road has really been building on those skills. Whether it’s going deep in a certain subject or broad, it’s always been about delivering for our clients. It’s about bringing the right communication, whether that’s internal or external, bringing the right marketing to deliver on the business goal or the brand need. And really, the intersection of business and brand has been a focus of my career throughout, whether that was at Verizon or here at PwC.

How do you keep creativity alive when you’re balancing both brand storytelling and business results?

 I love working in a creative field and I get inspired every day. I am an avid reader. I always want to make sure that I’m looking at what’s happening both in culture and keeping up on trends. And certainly an avid reader of the news. And as I think about creativity, it’s working with the team. I get so inspired by the ideas from our team every day and the creativity that comes out of them daily. New ideas, fresh ideas, different ways of thinking about new challenges, but also new Ways to solve old challenges and also our agency partners. Before going to Verizon and PwC, I spent 14 years on the agency side. Our agency partners bring such fresh perspective and different ideas and give us a nice outside-in view that is valuable to me and they continue to be incredible partners to me as we think about how to think about problems differently and how to get an outside perspective.

Is there one buzzword that you secretly love and one that you’re ready to retire?

It’s not a buzzword, but I do always want the team to be focused on the customer and customer centricity and we have to keep the customer in the room. They have to have a seat at the table as we think about everything that we do. Maybe it’s not a buzzword, but one that I hold near and dear and want to make sure that we’re focused on as we build any strategy, as we build any brand work or communications plan, ensuring that we’re focused on the customer is important. The one that I’d like to retire is optionality. I hear a lot of optionality, and I do think it’s important to have options, but I do want to make sure that we can get clear on those and then have a path forward. We spend a lot of time thinking about options in our world. 

Isis Simpson-Mersha is a conference producer/ reporter for Ragan. Follow her on LinkedIn.

The post Kristin McHugh on newsroom dreams and brand leadership at PwC appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Naming an organization’s intranet is no small decision for internal communicators.

Ideally, it should say something about the employee’s mission, values or culture. It should be easy to remember but also have a little flair about it. In many cases, employees either submit names or vote on a slate of options to help them feel invested in the product.

We took to LinkedIn to ask about company intranet names. More than 125 people chimed in sharing their company’s names.

There were a few that turned up multiple times. The Hub, The Hive and Nucleus (especially popular with science-based orgs) emphasize centrality and coming together.  Insider and The Pulse (especially for healthcare orgs) take a more information-based approach to the intranet name: By coming here, you’re getting exclusive information to keep you on the cutting edge of your field.

Here are some of the names that stood out — some including the compelling stories behind them.

• The Millennium Challenge Corporation, a global development agency, goes by Compass — not to be confused with the D.C. coffee shop of the same name.
• Financial services firm Morningstar dubbed its intranet The Pond – a nod to Henry David Thoreau who inspired the company name with his line, “The sun is but a morning star.”
• Heifer International, a non-profit that supports small farmers, allowed employees to choose the name “The Corral,” a fun nod to their work with livestock.
• Some companies try to evoke a cozy sense of home in their intranets, especially when they’re tied to their overall mission: Carnival Cruise Line’s intranet is fittingly dubbed “Homeport,” IKEA goes by “Home” while Habitat for Humanity chose “Homebase.” For a sportier angle, the Oklahoma City Thunder went for Home Court.
• Other organizations go for a folksy feel to show their warmth and homespun charm, like Land O’ Lakes’ Front Door and Simpplr’s Backyard. “We want it to be a space that’s connected to home,” said Regan Zuege, internal communications manager at Simpplr. “It’s familiar, comfortable, and always there when you need it.”
• Hubspot’s intranet is known as “The Wiki,” which Principal Content Strategy & Operations Program Manager, HubSpot Media Basha Coleman notes is a bit ironic. “You would think HubSpot would call it ‘The Hub,’” she commented wryly.
• CRM Pipedrive calls its intranet “Toru,” which simply means “pipe” in Estonian. The company now has employees in more than 50 countries, but it all started in an Estonian garage.
• Carrier Sekani Family Services provides healthcare services to indigenous communities in Canada. As Communications Specialist Jessie Scheele explains it, “Our intranet is called ‘Sus Yah’, which means ‘Bear House’ in Carrier language. The name came forward from an internal contest, and it represents a secure home-base for employees to find information, connect with each other, and get access to resources and support.”
• Employees also helped name the intranet at Alliant Health Solutions. “I launched ALLIE, which stands for Announcements, Leadership, Learning, Innovation and Engagement,” said Digital Communications and Content Manager Macrae Brennan-Fuller. “To drive excitement, I designed a naming contest so our employees felt invested and engaged throughout the development process. The contest was extremely popular, and 75% of our employees submitted potential names.”
• Some organizations favor fun plays on the organization’s name: For instance, Stratacomm dubs its intranet The Stratasphere and YouGov goes by Youniverse.
• And finally, a few nightmare stories. One user joked that their intranet is called “Sharepoint.” Another shared the worst possible way to do an intranet: “At one midsized agency that didn’t want to pay for an intranet at all it was called ‘Josh’s personal Google Drive,’” wrote freelance PR consultant Joshua Kail. “For years following my leaving that agency, I would still get updates to old and new client files because they would use my templates for incoming business. Despite my constant emailing their HR about this, it continued for quite some time. A huge security risk if I were not the ethical professional I am.”

What’s your intranet called?

Allison Carter is editorial director of PR Daily and Ragan.com. Follow her on LinkedIn.

The post The art of intranet naming appeared first on Ragan Communications.

One of Canada’s most recognizable retail stores is going the way of the dodo as Hudson’s Bay lays off its entire staff over the coming weeks, with around 10% of employees remaining on board through midsummer to oversee the final shutdown of the brand. The department store chain, which originated in 1670, announced earlier this week that over 8,000 employees would be terminated by June 1.

According to the Toronto Star, the move comes after unsuccessful efforts to find a buyer to keep the chain of department stores alive. Canadian Tire is slated to take over Hudson’s Bay’s intellectual property post-shutdown.

Beyond the loss of jobs, there are other major impacts on Hudson’s Bay employees. The company is not offering severance packages to affected employees, and benefits such as healthcare, post-retirement pensions, and long-term disability have been significantly reduced or eliminated.

Although it’s something no internal communicator wants to think about, knowing how to navigate a brand shutdown is an important skill for comms pros to have at the ready. The task lies at the cross-section of crisis and change comms and proper execution can go a long way toward maintaining relationships.

Montieth Illingworth, CEO of Montieth & Company (and Canadian), told Ragan that Hudson’s Bay’s legacy needs to factor into how communicators talk about the shutdown.

“The big thing that everyone is going to remember in the long run is how it was handled at the very end,” he said.

Tips for communicating shutdowns and job cuts

While the Toronto Star report didn’t dive into exactly how news was broken to Hudson’s Bay’s employees, there are certainly some tenets that internal comms pros should heed when relaying news of a mass layoff.

In a piece for Ragan last fall, Tommia Hayes, digital communication specialist at the United States Department of Education, outlined a few major ways that comms pros can handle layoff announcements.

• Lead with compassion and ask what’s needed. Layoff announcements, let alone the shutdown of a nationally recognized brand, can pose a major challenge for communicators and leaders. Centering announcement messages with compassionate language and understanding from leadership (who in this case, is also dealing with job loss) can help soften the blow a bit. This is also true for the thousand or so employees
• Framing matters. Within chaos often lies opportunity. For some laid-off employees, the shutdown might provide an avenue to pursue personal goals or other lines of work. While it’s important to communicate with empathy for those who are losing their jobs, communicators can frame conversations around the fact that there’s still a road ahead for affected employees. A great example of this in action is found in Spotify’s 2023 round of layoffs, in which the company communicated the details thoroughly and even offered to help with the job search for impacted employees. “Even though they’re hard, layoffs can help us pivot into positions that get us into the roles that are better fits or more desirable,” Hayes said.

The legacy beyond the shutdown

While it might seem like announcing a shutdown is a final act for an internal communicator, that’s not always necessarily the case. In the case of Hudson’s Bay, the purchase of the intellectual property by Canadian Tire means that the employer’s reputation is still at stake during internal shutdown conversations.

Illingworth said that companies in Hudson’s Bay’s situation need to carefully consider the company’s legacy during the shutdown. He suggested that the company should handle every piece of internal communication from the role of a helper, whether that’s in pointing out new career directions for employees or reaching out to individual groups of employees impacted by the shutdown to provide support.

He added that despite the fact that nearly 10,000 employees will lose their jobs this year in Hudson’s Bay’s liquidation, communicators can’t handle it with one brushstroke. He emphasized the need for proactive communication throughout the process, whether that’s setting up update calls leading up to the termination date or standing meetings in which employees can learn relevant information to help them transition beyond the company.

“You have to communicate with the affected employees based on the specific needs they may have,” he said. “When you’ve got that many employees, you can’t treat them as a monolith in any situation, especially this one. That can require thinking outside the box in how you talk about it rather than just cutting people loose.”

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

The post Comms lessons from the Hudson’s Bay shutdown appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Seventy-one percent of marketers expect generative AI will help eliminate busy work and allow them to focus more on strategic work.  

“That leaves you more time to be creative, create more campaigns, do more,” said Brad Taylor, CEO of Answer AI and Last Rev, in a presentation at Ragan’s recent AI Horizons Conference.  

Here’s a look at how AI is driving this productivity for marketers and communicators: 

Focus on high-impact work with AI agents  

Taylor said AI agents automate entire workflows, so marketers can focus more on creativity. 

AI agents learn new information, ask questions and gather sources, in addition to communicating and collaborating with humans and other AI tools. 

“Instead of just putting some text into a chatbot and getting a response, you give it a goal, and it goes off and accomplishes that task either fully autonomously or…with lots of human input,” said Taylor. 

One participant who leads team meetings said they have to take notes and facilitate an agenda. They would like an assistant to take notes and summarize topics.   

Taylor suggested AI could automatically categorize meeting transcripts to identify key discussion points and find action items for follow-up. 

In doing so, the participant would be more present in meetings and able to focus on coordinating projects. 

Adding a personal touch 

Taylor highlighted competitor research, summarizing reports and content generation as areas where AI agents can boost productivity and reduce busy work.  

Communications can also benefit from personalization powered by AI.  

But personalized outreach is a particular use that has elevated communications. 

In one example, a CEO created a voice agent that calls every single one of their employees weekly for a pulse check. After the calls, the CEO receives an AI summarized report with the employee’s temperature.  

Coca-Cola transformed its marketing by personalizing Coke bottles with common names. AI analyzed social media, sales, and customer feedback to find the most popular names and AI algorithms ensured the right names appeared on bottles.  

Here are Taylor’s steps to building an AI strategy:  

1. Define your company’s mission. Explore the value your organization brings to the world and how comms supports that mission.  
2. Next, Taylor asked participants to consider daily micro-activities. These are repetitive and time-consuming tasks such as sending email follow-ups and analyzing reports. “This is so that we can recognize different areas where we can have efficiencies along the process,” said Taylor 
3. Identify pain points, such as tasks you dislike or struggle with. Taylor said to explore areas where you might rely on others, or tasks that are resource constrained.  
4. List the software you use. For your organization, describe how you use each one and identify the gaps. “All of these different tools take up so much of your time,” said Taylor.  
5. Create a plan with AI to generate a detailed personal workflow and refine your strategy. Prompt AI with, “I am looking for ways to integrate AI into my work to improve efficiency and automation,” and then share the information gathered in steps one through four. Request suggestions for using your current tools more efficiently, recommendations for additional productivity tools, ideas for AI agents aligned with your daily tasks and role and an assessment of potential risks or limitations.

Watch the full presentation below: 

The post How to build an AI agent to streamline your workflow appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Artificial intelligence’s rapid rise has sparked conversations about how the technology stands to alter the reality of the workplace. A recent study out of the United Kingdom reported that while there’s optimism about how AI technology can help in the workplace, the quick onset of AI implementation is proving a bit overwhelming for some employees.

The report, a joint effort between The World of Work Institute and The Henley Business School at The University of Reading, found that 56% of employees felt optimistic about AI applications at work. At the same time, 61% of employees felt overwhelmed at the pace of change and the implications AI might have on work as a whole.

Additionally, 63% of survey respondents reported using AI at work currently — a figure that’s poised to increase in the months and years ahead.

AI isn’t just changing the work landscape — it’s changing how employees think about their relationships with work. Internal communicators stand to play a major role in how their employees see AI factoring into their jobs and how they feel about AI’s relationship with their organizations.

Communicating about employee AI sentiment

The report also revealed the emotions that the rise of AI elicits from employees. Just over a quarter of employees reported feeling cautious about AI use at work, while another 23% were curious about how it might fit in.

In any organization, there are bound to be differing feelings about AI implementation among different groups of employees. That’s why communicators need to reaffirm the importance of the jobs their employees do through frequent and visible messaging channels.

For example, internal communicators could intersperse their AI-centric messaging to employees with use cases of how colleagues are interacting with the technology on the job. This not only helps make AI usage more tangible for people when it’s seen in action, but it also shows the value of human input behind the tech. That people-centric angle helps build trust and familiarity.

The importance of AI guidelines for a positive, productive relationship with tech

While it might be encouraging to see that a good chunk of employees in today’s workforce feel good about what lies ahead with AI, it’s important to note that we’re still in the earliest stages of a major technological shift. The data bears this out — the report stated that 49% of respondents said their companies had no AI guidelines in place. In addition, 60% said they’d be more willing to embrace AI with the proper training.

When asked about their frustrations with AI, the report said the following sentiments came up the most frequently:

• AI can make mistakes
• AI needs very reliable data to work effectively
• AI might eventually take jobs away from employees

These uncertainties can’t necessarily be solved by better employee communications. But employee communicators can work with leadership to share messaging surrounding AI policies and guidelines when they’re implemented.

In a piece ahead of Ragan’s AI Horizons Conference this February, Brian Solis, head of global innovation at ServiceNow outlined some overarching concepts for discussing AI guardrails communicators should keep in mind.

• Communicators should get leaders involved in the process of AI implementation – and it should be transparent. Solis said that organizations and comms pros who take the lead on forming AI comms principles will blaze the trail forward. “Those who lean into AI early — experimenting with its potential and guiding its ethical implementation — will shape the future of corporate messaging.”
• Lead with trust. Trust is at the core of effective internal comms. The same needs to be true of any potential AI guidelines that are communicated. For instance, communicators should lean into the fact that in many cases, humans still have the final say over AI tech at work. This can help foster trust in the skills and well-earned positions that employees hold.
• Position comms as an AI guide and resource. Communicators should relay any potential AI guidelines with messaging that aligns with a company’s existing culture. For example. Comms pros should use wording and channels that employees will find familiar and as part of a continuum of existing comms efforts. Doing so can help establish comms as both an important employee resource and a critical business function. “When you take charge of the AI narrative, you move from being a messenger to being a strategist,” Solis said.

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

The post How communicators can help employees make sense of AI at work appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Communicators are continually refining and adapting their approaches to suit the tastes of their audiences and their evolving needs. This is particularly true in the case of internal communications channels.

According to data from Ragan’s 2025 Communications Benchmark Report, a signature research project conducted for members of Ragan’s Communications Leadership Council, 72% of communicators adopted or upgraded at least one channel or tool in the past year. And for the second year in a row, AI was the top candidate for adoption, outpacing all other channels and technology investments.

By far, the largest percentage (29%) of communicators added AI channels, well above owned podcasts (16%), intranets (14%) and social media (13%). This signals a laser focus on technology that drives efficiency or simplifies workflows.

At the same time, nearly a third (28%) of communicators said they did not add or upgrade any new channels or tools in 2024, suggesting that a sizable minority of companies feel they have the tools they need to carry out their strategy and are focused on optimizing their use.

The full Communications Benchmark Report is available to members of Ragan’s Communications Leadership Council. Non-members can download the executive summary.

Others qualitatively noted additional tools they started using in 2024:

• Technology and platform enhancements: Respondents noted they invested in project management software and internal communications tools, particularly intranets.
• Internal communications and collaboration: Adoption of newsletters and email tools indicate a push toward better internal communication. The launch of new engagement platforms highlights the shift toward interactive and community-driven internal communication.
• Content creation: Companies also invested in paid webcasts, webinars and videos to enhance their communication strategies.

Despite growing interest in, and attention to, new technologies and platforms, legacy tools endure as key channels for communications professionals. On the internal side, email (71%), intranets (39%) and e-newsletters (35%) remain the most effective channels for internal communications.

While many companies retain a hybrid work environment, the loud call from prominent companies like Amazon, AT&T and JPMorgan Chase as well as U.S. government agencies for a return to the office full time is clearly evident in the data.

Face-to-face meetings grew by 7 percentage points year over year, and virtual company/team meetings or events slipped 5 percentage points to 30%. Despite that fall, virtual meetings are still perceived as effective channels by 30% of communicators, but it’s worth noting that number was as high as 50% just two years ago.

Deskless and dispersed comms trends

These patterns also align with respondents’ selection of effective communication tools for their deskless and/or dispersed workforce. Deskless workers are usually not in an office and may be stationed on a manufacturing floor, a hospital wing, construction site or a retail store.

For these workers, email and town halls are perceived as the most effective channels for communicators to use, followed by intranets, face-to-face communication (presumably delivered by a frontline manager) and digital collaboration software.

The dispersed workforce is spread across multiple offices, regions or locations. For these workers, email and intranets are seen as most effective, followed by town halls and digital collaboration software. Unlike deskless workers, face-to-face communication is not perceived as particularly effective for this group.

While AI continues to make inroads and promise disruption, for the time being communicators appear to be using it to transform and upgrade tried-and-tested internal comms channels.

The post Ragan Research: AI makes inroads into internal comms but traditional channels remain resilient appeared first on Ragan Communications.

PR is having a moment of transition.

The old ways of media relations are passing away, replaced with influencer relations and a powerful class of journalist-entrepreneurs in the form of podcasters, Substackers and more. PR professionals are also working hard to earn a strategic seat where they can not only explain decisions, but help make them, from celebration to crisis and everything in between.

These were just some of the topics of discussion at The PR Daily Conference, held last week in D.C. Hundreds of professionals from across corporate, nonprofit, government, education and agency life came together to learn, to share and figure out how to move forward with strategy and skill.

There were hundreds of insights from the dozens of presentations across two tracks. We’ve shared a few of our favorites below, but if you’re hungry for more, you can enjoy the conference on demand.

• “When people put their kids to bed at night, nobody tells bedtime facts. Doesn’t happen. They tell bedtime stories,” said keynoter Jonah Berger.
• Will Hodges, PwC, told us that when it comes to AI, start small and stay human-led.
• Jenn Francis, Accenture, told us to “Think use-case rather than tool. Lead with value, collaboration is essential, drive continuously.”
• “If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough” said Angela Salerno-Robin, Weber Shandwick
• “There’s more risk in buttoning up and not saying anything because you miss more opportunities,” said Joe Buccino, Spirit Aerosystems.
• From journalist Jennifer Strong, NEVER ASK FOR INTERVIEW QUESTIONS AHEAD OF TIME.
• From our leadership panel, remember that CEOs uniquely think horizontally across all parts of the organization. By getting involved with strategy, you can help them in all areas of the business.
• From Pamela Greenwalt with SAG-AFTRA, prepare meticulously for a major action and adhere to rigorous message discipline.
• When trying something new, we’re often times afraid to fail. but trust that you probably have a stronger support system than you realize backing you up – just go for it! said Danielle Hughes, BodyAmour.

The post Biggest takeaways from the PR Daily Conference appeared first on Ragan Communications.

When thinking about internal comms, it’s easy for your mind to revert to the same old tactics for employee outreach. There’s the intranet posts, the blog updates and the employee newsletters — those are tried and true ways to get through to your people.

But in a fast-paced work environment that often sees employees dispersed in different locations, experimenting with new tools proves useful. It can even mean looking in unusual places, like the world of content streaming for pathways to foster genuine connections with employees.

We spoke with Ashray Urs, head of Streamlabs at Logitech, to learn more about how internal communicators might be able to learn a thing or two from the world of streaming.

Discovering a solution

Urs told Ragan that while Logitech’s Streamlabs wasn’t made with internal communications in mind, the team discovered that it greatly improved production quality for meetings and made communication between colleagues smoother.

“Streamlabs was designed for online live streamers, but we’ve found it can enhance the production quality of internal video communications,” Urs said. “This includes all-hands meetings, department meetings and earnings calls to improve audience engagement and interaction.”

Urs said that using streaming platforms can help internal communicators beyond the visual aspects of a simple video call. He alluded to features that streamers use like interactive chats and dynamic pop-ups, including polls to keep audiences engaged. If it works for content streamers, it can work for internal communicators, too.

“Visually uninteresting meetings are likely to lose their audience quickly, especially if those audience members aren’t required to be on camera or don’t have effective ways to interact with the presenter,” Urs said. “Content creators and professional entertainers utilize these extra features to host exciting live streams for their communities and internal comms teams can utilize these same tools to drive better wide-scale communications across their organization.”

Urs added that while content streams are wildly popular in the consumer world, they haven’t yet made the transition to the world of work. Comms pros who can harness it stand to be at the cutting edge of comm tech.

“The potential to engage workforces internally through Twitch-style live streams is still largely untapped,” Urs said.

Rethinking the audience

The best communicators find success because they’ve got a deep knowledge of their audience’s content consumption habits. Urs cited a statistic from G2 that states that on average, people watch about 18 hours of video content a week, and internal communicators can form their strategies as a way to tap into that time — but only if they can do so in a way that’s authentic to their company’s internal voice.

“Acknowledging people by name and soliciting live feedback can make people feel like they’re part of a conversation and not just listening to another boring meeting,” Urs said. “The live stream format also offers a powerful way to connect with employees in real time and allow them to contribute, even if they’re based far away.”

Driving adoption

This might all sound great on paper, but every communicator runs into a simple question whenever they’re rolling out a new tool.

How can we get people to use this thing?

Urs outlined a few helpful methods:

• Creating new content ideas through self-assessment. Urs recommended that communicators examine the connection between comms tools and culture in their company. Determining which platforms employees use is just as important as figuring out the ones they’re not using.
• Utilize interactive streaming features like polls. “If polls and Q&As are popular with employees in your virtual watercooler on Slack or Teams, that’s something you can replicate on a broader scale at team meetings,” Urs said. “Noticing these patterns and formulating communication strategies to match them is how you can build a case for new communications technologies in the workplace. This will also help give your live stream productions a unique voice once you implement the latest tools.”
• Think like a streamer. Urs also recommended a mindset shift for internal communicators looking to stream. Don’t just use the platforms. Think like a streamer does when creating an audience and building your identity. “Just as creators develop their brands when streaming, companies can use similar tools and tactics to build trust and authenticity with their workforce,” says Urs.

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and hosting trivia.

The post What internal comms pros can learn from streamers appeared first on Ragan Communications.

Greetings, comms pros! Let’s take a look at a few news stories from the past week and see what we can learn from them.

1 . TikTok Shop internal memo tells employees to work remotely ahead of potential layoffs 

TikTok is in the news again, but this time it’s not about the legal status of the app — it’s concerning an internal memo asking employees to work from home and announcing layoffs from its retail arm this week.

According to Business Insider, the memo was authored by Mu Qing, the head of TikTok Shop’s US operations.

We have undergone careful analysis of how to create more efficient operating models for the team’s long-term growth and, as a result, will be communicating organizational and personnel changes to the e-Commerce US operations, US operations center, and global key accounts teams beginning early on Wednesday, May 21 (PT). Our goal is to communicate with employees swiftly and with as much clarity as possible. All updates will be made via your company email, followed by HRBP outreach. To best facilitate these conversations, it is recommended that you work remotely on Wednesday, May 21. We appreciate everyone’s patience and understanding as we navigate these difficult discussions. We are committed to supporting our teams throughout this transition with as much compassion and support as possible.

For all the uncertainty and upheaval TikTok has dealt with over the last year or so, this memo handles an impending layoff with clarity. The memo emphasizes the need for dialogue in a time of major change, and it also acknowledges the difficulty of layoffs while claiming the company will handle the move in a way that’s supportive of employees. The reasons for the layoffs are clearly stated, the memo addresses the impact on employees and it underscores the importance of communication during times of change. That ticks the boxes for layoff comms done the right way. In addition, allowing employees to work from home when a layoff is coming can make things easier on both impacted employees and their teams from both an optics and logistical standpoint.

Will the follow-through of the job cuts be handled this deftly? We’ll see, but it seems that TikTok’s internal comms arm is saying the right things during a big strategy shift. 

 2. Meta tells managers to be tougher judges of performance

A few months ago, we covered a news item that reported Meta employees were questioning whether the company’s layoffs were really related to performance, as the tech giant claimed.

According to a report from Business Insider, the company is indeed doubling down on efficiency and changing the standards of its performance metrics. A memo viewed by the publication stated that it’s telling managers at the company to rate more workers in the “below expectations” category. The memo cites this move as an “opportunity to make exit decisions” while simultaneously claiming that there won’t be associated layoffs.

Meta’s use of managers to deliver on a mandate from higher up is notable. Managers are arguably the most key cog for communicators who have to spread messages and cultivate company culture on the team level. But when there’s a mandate to rate a percentage of your team in a certain performance bucket even if the quality of their work doesn’t merit it, you’re placing constraints on how your managers can effectively relate to their teams and how well they’re able to convey the company line.

Managers are a great resource for communicators to help relate what the company is saying — even if the message isn’t necessarily a positive one. But if managers aren’t able to properly talk about performance with clarity and honesty and are instead forced to put employees in buckets, it can cause major roadblocks for clear team communication.

3. Report: Deskless workers are largely unsatisfied with internal comms

A new report from Staffbase revealed that just 10% of deskless workers are very satisfied company’s internal communications efforts. In addition to this stark statistic, the report also showed that only 38% of employees rated their internal comms efforts positively, regardless of their work location.

This data reiterates the need for robust internal comms as an organizational connector. The Staffbase study emphasizes this by reporting that 61% of employees who considered a job change did so because of poor internal communications. We covered the connection between retention and internal comms last week through an analysis of this study, and we found several conclusions.

• Internal comms can’t be an organizational afterthought, as it has a direct impact on an employee’s perception of the company and talent retention.
• Care needs to be paid to catering internal communications to subsets of employee populations — a one-size-fits-all plan risks alienating people.
• With 60% of employees reporting that internal comms has an impact on productivity, communications need to relay this information to the top brass and explain how comms effects the bottom line.

 4. How about some good news?

• A 2,000-year-old scroll has been deciphered via X-ray — despite it also being charred by Mt. Vesuvius.
• The first human bladder transplant took place at UCLA.
• A researcher in Boston is protecting snowy owls from jets at Logan Airport.
• Ragan Training is great for communications pros to find inspiration and resources.
• You should be rewarded for your work. Find out how to earn an award here!

Have a great weekend comms all-stars!

Sean Devlin is an editor at Ragan Communications. In his spare time he enjoys Philly sports and trivia.

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