The internal or corporate communications team is often mandated to look after the organization’s brand and reputation. However, many a times teams tend to overlook the importance of their own reputation and what it takes to safeguard it religiously.
Read the following two scenarios.
In a presentation to your company’s leadership on the role of communication in organizational effectiveness a member calls out, without reason, that the employee newsletter – one of the channels you manage is poorly received and needs dire attention. This side tracks the conversation and everyone in the room begins to have a point of view. You know very well that the newsletter is doing well and can back it up with research on readership and interest levels. You also know that your team has worked hard to get the newsletter to the shape it currently is. If you attempt a response to the barb you will go down the path of derailing the meeting and come across as defensive. If you don’t do anything others in the room who don’t have context will assume the newsletter has serious challenges. In one moment your team’s reputation is on the line. How do you protect it?
Your team has organized a learning session to educate employees on the significance of social media presence building. You identify an internal resource that has shown potential and is keen to share experiences. You have also taken the effort to brief and prepare the speaker such that the audience who comes in receives the right guidance as they go about building their profiles. Unfortunately, the session doesn’t go as planned with the speaker unable to articulate his thoughts in a way that meets expectations of the audience. You receive strong feedback that they would think twice about attending future sessions that your team organizes. This puts you in a spot since your team’s reputation is getting compromised. How will you handle this situation?
Every day, your team and you can get to face similar situations where your work comes under scrutiny and you need to protect your reputation. Here are a few ideas to ensure your hard work doesn’t get jeopardized by loose comments and cannon balls.
Clarify your stance: Explain why your team exists, how they add value, what your plans are and how everyone can pitch in. Use research and analytics for sceptics who aren’t convinced about the worth of your communication effort. Proactively present your team’s agenda. Ask to be invited for leadership team meetings where you can talk of the communication plans. Conduct ‘meet and greets’ with team who want to use communication more.
Give direct feedback: Defend your position and give direct feedback to those who pass loose remarks without context. Talk about how their comments can damage not just your team’s reputation but also their credibility. Articulate how your relationships at work can get marred by such comments. Finally, encourage them to speak to you directly if they have feedback on specific channels or communication that you do.
Be assertive: In cultures where hierarchy is given importance speaking up is an issue. That is also taken as a sign of weakness or an inability to present views. To protect your team’s reputation you need tostep up and assert your perspectives in forums that matter.Establish your expertise and stakeholders will change their approach to your team’s work. For example, if you want your leadership to participate on your internal social media platform you need to first go there and be familiar with the medium. Gain expertise, either by practice or by learning from course or from external sources. But, be known as the resident expert on internal social media for leaders to see you as credible – and therefore your team as reputable partners to work with.
What do you think? Are there other barriers to establishing a communication team’s reputation?
Share them here.
