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One of the most important roles a corporate communicator can play in their organization is that of the Chief Simplicity Officer. By championing the cause to simplify business processes, abbreviate policies and procedures, eliminate bureaucracy and encourage a culture of colloquialism and candor, you can help free your executives and employees up to get real work done.

I love this quote from a recent BusinessWeek article in which the author argues against overdone policy manuals:

You know who’s making money for your employer right now? Workers who are selling, building, or inventing stuff. You know who’s spending the business’s money right now? Other employees (most easily found in HR, IT, and Finance) who’ve been commanded to write, administer, and enforce the 10,000 policies that make up your company’s employee handbook. Overblown policy efforts squelch creativity, bake fear into your culture, and make busywork for countless office admins, on top of wasting paper, time, and brain cells. What to do instead? Nuke one unnecessary or outdated policy every week and require the CEO’s signature to add any new ones.

Though communication may not have direct control over your company’s policies and procedures, you can have a strong influence in setting the tone for simplicity. Recently, a Fortune 500 client of ours reworked their employee code of conduct manual under the editing eye of the employee communications team. The result? The hundreds-of-pages-long “snooze fest” that was became a 12-sheet page turner, filled with relatable anecdotes and plain ole’ English.

Long live the CSO.

I once worked for a top-level executive who really understood the concept of employee involvement. He didn’t approach it like a swim lane in a presentation; it wasn’t a phase in a project timeline. He naturally and sometimes spontaneously would ask employees from the front-line to be a part of a new project, initiative or change program. He would personally call to solicit their thoughts, what were they hearing, what was working, what wasn’t. He would pop into a cube and ask someone to attend a project meeting and share insight or feedback. Often, these ground-level participants were young, fresh-minded upstarts who would naturally infuse new ideas or known influencers who would race back to their cubes to share what they learned in the work sessions or brainstorming meetings. Other times they were people he knew were going to resist change and needed to be brought along. His department became known as progressive, dynamic, and quick to adopt change. Employee involvement. He just got it.

It doesn’t always have to be strategically planned out. It doesn’t necessarily have to come before or after certain milestones. Yes, focus groups are a level of involvement and yield valuable insight and information. Yes, formal ambassador training programs work, and bring employees to a certain level of understanding. And of course, C-suite support up front is a given for success of any new program or change initiative. But true employee buy-in (support, motivation, engagement, trust, ambassadorship) comes from involvement, which is more organic than a class or a session. It’s being a part of the movement. Being part of the forming, rejecting and accepting of ideas. Involvement is when employees have an impact on the decisions being made, whereby they choose to share with other employees, and choose to be motivated and engaged. Employee involvement – just do it.

In The New Human Capital Strategy, Bradley Hall, a consultant and instructor to Duke Corporate Education, advances a view we’ve long known about the importance of managers in driving corporate culture and in ensuring great performance. Hall says that for the world’s leading quick service restaurant chain, every restaurant is essentially the same except for location — same menu, same prices, store layout, etc. I can’t agree with his assertion of “sameness” because we know that this organization is among the leaders globally in understanding how to customize its store locations, menu offerings and more to meet the tastes and expectations of customers. Hall does, however, assert a critical point about what differentiates a low- from a high-performing store unit: the manager. He says the company can take a failing store, import a winning manager, and with basically the same crew of associates as before, the restaurant will begin to recover in a month. Great managers, he believes, deliver great results.

Hall’s view is one I’ve heard before from other intuitive leaders. One in particular, Mary Alice Taylor, who served as senior vide president at FedEx in the ‘90s, even went so far as to test her theory by relocating successful station managers into more than two-dozen underperforming stations in a drive to recapture more than $134 million in annualized costs related to profitability, reduction of turnover among customers and staff, and a critical push to achieve and exceed operating objectives while maintaining a non-union status. As with Hall’s point, what we learned in this experiment is when you move good managers into failing operations, they deliver. “In FedEx,” an executive told us when we interviewed him to understand the forces that drove the internal brand, “the local manager is the corporate brand. They live the brand and define it.”

Winning managers understand the critical role they play in connecting senior executives to front-line employees. They know they are the most trusted channel for communication in companies everywhere; in fact, I like to say that when a manager and her report meet to discuss a change or pivotal event, “the rubber meets the road” when they engage together in this hallowed moment in time.

Great managers know they must “translate” what they’re told so that it makes sense to the people who work for them. Great managers truly listen for feedback and channel it to their supervisors and leaders so that the company can react and adjust its plans, actions and communications. Great managers are the best communicators, without exception.

It begs the question: What are companies thinking today when they eliminate managerial ranks – the men and women who play such a critical role at the front line? Who will take their place? When covenants are broken with managers and their reports during periods of downsizing, rightsizing, offshoring, restructuring, the stripping of compensation and benefits, should we be surprised when great managers decide they no longer want to act as “connective tissue” in welding together a culture wracked by change? In so many ways, they want to stand on their own — not relying on others for HR field support or local marketing, for example. And when it comes to their integrity, trust and reputation, you can expect they may ultimately decide to stand alone here, too.

Yesterday, the Wall Street Journal published “Economists Call for Bernanke to Stay, Say Recession Is Over.”  To accurately portray the article, let’s be clear that what they are really saying is that the worst is over, but I suspect this is still welcome news to anyone who owns a home/stock/business, has a job, wants a job or just has grown weary of the dismal news we’ve been hearing since last year. 

As an internal communications consultancy, this has been an interesting time for our business and our clients.  Pick up any paper and you’d find stories about companies in “bet the farm” situations, organizations making the tough decision to layoff employees and corporations overhauling their HR structures to try to conserve as many resources as possible.  Certainly, our clients haven’t been immune to the challenges created by the financial crisis. 

Various articles (including this one) have been written about the value and importance of employee engagement and internal communications during a time as unsettling as many had ever seen.  For many companies, talking to their employees and trying to help them navigate through difficult periods became the #1 communications priority.  Sadly, others continued with communications-as-usual or, worse, buried their head in the sand and left it up to employees to connect the dots.

Now that we’re starting to think about returning to “normal” and working in an economy that’s starting to stabilize, what happens next?  A survey released by Watson Wyatt indicates that many companies plan to curtail spending in employee communications in areas like pay, benefits and business strategy. 

While I understand that everyone wants to relax a little and return to normal, I have to argue that this is absolutely the wrong approach.  Have companies made it through the worst of the recession?  Maybe.  But not without consequences to employees, who likely have worked more for less, seen colleagues leave and tried hard to understand sudden changes in their company’s strategic direction or priorities. 

Employees still (always!) need to hear from supervisors and corporate leaders about the company’s near- and long-term direction, especially how they can contribute to making it a reality.  And, as we all take a deep breath and things normalize, employees will wonder how their company will go about reversing any policies that have been put in place.  Will you start 401k matching again?  When will the hiring freeze end?  Are you going to reinstate reward/recognition programs?

One of the lessons of this turbulent economy was that many companies learned how to be better communicators – they finally seemed to understand that if their employees weren’t engaged, the game was over.  So, the recession may be receding (and my fingers are tightly crossed on this one) but communications shouldn’t. 

Anyone who knows me knows that I am a total sucker for new product introductions.  I love brand extensions, entirely new categories, you name it – if it’s new, I want it!  And I’m usually up on Sunday mornings waiting for my New York Times and New York Post to show up so I can check out the coupons and see what’s being introduced.

So, a few weeks ago we were in a store and saw some new products from Tide up on the shelf. Being a product junkie, I knew that there would be a coupon since it’s a new P&G product.  Curiosity piqued, I couldn’t wait and see what the story is with these three new offerings.  Sure enough, this Sunday there was a coupon.  I instantly clipped it out and took the rest of the page to the computer to look up the Web site to see exactly what it was and how it worked.  As I sniffed around on the site I noticed they had a link to “Reviews.”  I clicked through the initial reviews and was taken aback to find that among the seemingly company-posted comments to get a coupon and a few early adapter raves,  there were reviews that quite specifically said the product did not work. Wow.

That got me thinking about discussions we have with clients in the corporate and executive blogging world about how open to be in allowing feedback and authentic two-way conversations from and with employees.  Insidedge has long believed that candor must be encouraged and that dialogues and different perspectives are beneficial to the overall community, and here it was in practice in the consumer marketing space!  To me, this was proof positive that credibility is not necessarily undermined by disagreement. In fact, I would argue, it’s boosted their credibility – it certainly has in my mind.

So I say kudos to the brand marketing team at Tide for keeping it real and accepting that people have very different opinions.  The lesson applies to internal dialogue, too.  There are benefits to be open to all comments.  Not only does it open a true dialogue and demonstrate to all that you’re confident enough (in Tide’s case, in their products) to provide a forum for true feedback but you just might learn something that helps you do business just a bit better.

There’s a plethora of media coverage in the States today about “The First 100 Days” of President Obama’s administration. Interestingly, the Obama camp has dubbed the First 100 Days as a “Hallmark Holiday,” suggesting that the milestone is arbitrary and unimportant.

Yet, CNN is dedicating two prime time hours to the subject, and Obama himself is conducting a prime time news conference that’s been on the books for weeks.

So while 100 days might be arbitrary as a number, it is consequential when it comes to how people measure the early work of a new leader. It doesn’t matter whether that leader is President of the United States, or president of your company.

Leadership changes are prime opportunities to step up employee communications. If your job is to support a new CEO, it’s your responsibility to ensure that she or he has a very visible profile from Day One. Here are a few questions any employee communicator should ask a new CEO at the first opportunity:

1. What’s your vision for the organization? What are your priorities?
2. What do you expect employees to do to help the company achieve your vision?
3. What one message is most important for our employees to hear right now?
4. What goals are you setting for yourself in the first three months of your leadership? Six months? One year?

The answers to these questions will give you the information you need to develop a stump speech your new CEO can use immediately in connecting with employees. These messages should become the mantra of the entire company during the First 100 Days of a new leader. Repetition will build understanding, and understanding will drive action.

Finally, by setting these standards early in a new administration, your new CEO can establish a clear roadmap for the organization. Every accomplishment and challenge can be framed in the context of these early goals. More important, your new CEO will establish him or herself as an authentic, accessible communicator employees can trust and support.

Naturally, new CEOs have countless issues competing for their time and attention. It’s your responsibility to help them understand employee communication should be front and center among those issues.

There’s a lot of talk about President Obama’s first 100 days. Is he on the right trajectory? Will the country start to see real change taking shape by the end of April? There’s also a lot of debate on how important the first 100 days even is. For example, check out “The Folly of the ‘Hundred Days’” by David Greenberg in The Wall Street Journal and Michael Watkins’ response on Harvard Business Publishing’s site.

Regardless of where you fall on this political judgment, the concept of the first 100 days is an important one to consider from a communications standpoint. At the end of the day, first impressions matter. With any significant corporate change, we, as communicators, play an important role in shaping that first impression.

Whether it’s a new leader, a new strategy, a new brand or a new organizational structure, employees will make a judgment early on as to how successful the new “it” will be. We can help by:

1. Setting expectations upfront about what is expected to be accomplished and by when.
2. Educating employees about the challenges ahead.
3. Communicating frequently about progress, using a variety of vehicles to get your message out there and maintaining a consistent story across the board.
4. Speaking the truth. Regardless if the message is good news or bad news for employees, make sure they are hearing the truth.
5. Taking a pulse of the employee response along the way to determine if you need to modify the business and/or communication strategy.

I look forward to seeing how the first 100 days plays out, both for my personal well being and my professional life. In addition, this is a good time to take a step back, see how I am personally reacting to President Obama’s first 100 days and apply those learnings the next time my company/clients are facing a significant change.

A few weeks back, a client grudgingly agreed to include a presentation on storytelling at his company’s senior leadership team meeting. Since the bulk of the meeting was about building a culture, I argued, my client should ask his leaders to share stories with one another about what bonds them to the company.

My client suggested that the storytelling discussion I scripted was merely “communicating for the sake of communicating.”  There was no place for that at a business meeting. Storytelling would contribute little to the meeting. It would have no impact on the company’s ability to meet its business goals.

Eventually, though, he acquiesced. So here’s what we did:

One of the company’s top executives – a former trial lawyer – led a storytelling discussion. He anchored the discussion in his own stories of persuading juries to agree with his point of view. The exec also defined some of the key elements of a good story – characters, conflict, context, etc. Then he asked the attendees at the meeting to work in small teams to identify meaningful stories from their experiences at work. He challenged them to think about examples of when employees lived by the company’s values or took new approaches to solving problems.

I knew what would happen – it almost always does.

The very first person who shared his story had to pause for a moment and recompose himself. This story was so meaningful and so personal to him that telling it choked him up. More than that, the story provided a great example of the kind of culture this company is aiming to achieve – where the business excels when people do the right thing.

For the next 45 minutes or so, people passed the microphone from one table to the next, eagerly sharing stories. What we heard gave real texture to the values and goals of this company. Some stories were funny, some serious. But all of them connected with the people in the room on an emotional level. And I believe they left the meeting with a better sense of what kind of company they are working for. They left with a greater sense of pride – and, I think, a commitment to drive the kind of culture the company wants to achieve.

People relate to stories. When you tell stories in your organization, you are giving your employees clear examples of what they should be doing (or what they shouldn’t). Stories endure.

Maybe you can’t say, “We told a dozen stories this quarter, and our profitability rose 8 percent.” But tell a few stories in your organization, and I’m confident you will begin seeing people mimicking the positive and productive behavior that’s personified in those stories.

This morning’s news included Pfizer’s acquisition of Wyeth, and the consequent synergy targets and layoffs, as well as thousands of job cuts at Caterpillar, Sprint Nextel, Home Depot and GM. Just a few more pieces of somber corporate news we’re hearing on a near daily basis these days. Businesses are grappling with some very tough decisions, including the decision to cut staff to achieve cost reduction goals.

2.6 million jobs were shed in the U.S. economy in 2008 – the most since 1945. The employees impacted by these job cuts face steep challenges indeed, but what about the survivors? The employees left behind after the downsizing. There’s no doubt about it – layoffs can contribute to low morale, decreased trust and company loyalty, increased gossip, and reduced productivity among survivors. This is on my mind today as our clients face this predicament, and I am hearing firsthand their feelings of sadness, loss, instability and even guilt about being spared when long-term colleagues and friends have not.

Communication can play a key role in addressing these feelings and the larger issues they can lead to, especially personalized manager communication with employees. It’s key that managers acknowledge the situation, the impact its having and the feelings their employees are likely facing. Acknowledge and share, but also lead by example. Focus on the future, reprioritizing and building community among remaining employees.

In individual or small team discussions with their managers, employees should be allowed to share their anxieties, but then encouraged to commit to realigning priorities and working together to define and achieve new goals. Survivors will be looking for a sense of security. They need to be assured of their value to the company and to feel involved in identifying non-critical tasks and projects that can be shelved with the reduction in resources.

Managers should reinforce the message that things are different now and employees must change the way they work. But change brings opportunity – opportunity for new skills, relationships and growth. In these tough times, open and honest discussions between managers and employees can help survivors say goodbye to the past and commit to the future.

Increasingly we read of the need for “gatekeepers” in this new age of digital and social media. This past week alone, one of the more interesting pieces on this topic appeared in the Sunday New York Times Magazine in an article titled “Google’s Gatekeepers” that profiled the team inside Google tasked with screening content on YouTube.

As sites like YouTube evolve and those posting content grow increasingly brazen, the article suggested that the standard-bearers now in place for content review would give way increasingly to teams of lawyers who will show “more concern for corporate profits than about free expression.”

What’s the message for global organizations evolving to new portals with blogs and increased interaction with employee resource groups globally? Expect the same. Many have heard of employees who were fired because of an improper blog posting, or a corporate blog that disappeared without notice because employees sought to voice serious questions about the conduct of senior leaders. We’ve long held that companies adopting blogs need policy and protocol to ensure that these sites, once in place, are tested for integrity, protected and remain a vital part of the internal communications mix.

Those who fail to establish clear guidelines will doubtless tread the path of others who have been forced to suspend or kill blogs because of issues of good taste, propriety or appropriate conduct. When censorship or content control outweighs transparency and two-way communications, then we’ll be faced with a more serious question: Who will stop the rain?