What is the biggest lie internal communications tells itself? (Video)

Something Else is a monthly video series where ICology host Chuck Gose asks the questions and communicators provide the answers.

This month's question and answers are: 

November's guests:
 

Paul Barton, Paul Barton Communications
@paulbartonabc

When I heard this question, it reminded me of the George Bernard Shaw quote that says, "The single biggest problem with communications is the illusion that it's taken place." I think that's absolutely what we need to guard against as internal communications professionals. We sometimes get so focused on sending messages out that I think we lose sight of whether those messages are actually getting through or not.

 

Brian Moore, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
@brianmoore320

Our materials, internal communications, communications if you will, our podcasts, our videos, our messaging in the written word or our live events are the most influential and the most important things to driving culture in our companies. I think that's the biggest lie. What I think is the answer is that the biggest driver of culture change in a company are the employees themselves.

 

Priya Bates, Inner Strength Communications
@priyabates

I think the biggest lie is that internal communicators deserve a seat at the decision-making table. The truth is they earn a seat at the table through strategic communication planning, understanding the business and linking what they do to measurable results. Without that, they'll never get there.

 

Kristin Hancock, The College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba
@kristinanneh

I think the biggest lie that we tell ourselves in internal communications is that employee engagement is entirely measurable. I think there are aspects of it that we can measure and we should measure, but ultimately employee engagement is a feeling and we're doing us a disservice if we think that we can actually quantify that.

 

Rachel Miller, All Things IC
@allthingsIC

I believe the biggest lie or the biggest problem that we have in internal communication right now is that people understand measurement. I don't think that's the case. I think that's a lie. I think that many internal communicators are having to bluster their way through, when it comes to conversations with stakeholders, particularly about measurement. Measurement isn't a dark art. There are many models, many ideas, many theories, many practical things you can do to help you measure. I think the lie that internal communications tells itself is that people know how to do this.

 

Heather Pommernelle, Talent Driven Value, LLC
@heatherpomm

For myself, I think one of the hardest ones to overcome was the thought and the lie really that my craft, the communications, however beautiful I made it, videos, images, whatever I did, that alone was going to help change behavior and I guess help, yes, maybe, but if other things weren't in alignment, then it wouldn't really do much good.

 

Rocky Walls, 12 Stars Media
@rockywalls

Originally, I was going to say that the biggest lie internal comms tells itself is that they don't have enough time. The truth is you don't have enough time, and I think the biggest lie internal comms pros tell themselves is that they can do everything, and so I see a lot of internal comms professionals trying to take on massive projects that really aren't in their job description or massive amounts of really small projects and not being able to do any of them really, really well. The best internal comms pros I know pick projects very carefully, projects that are going to make an impact and they do those really, really well, and say no to everything else.

 

Daron Aldridge, Cook Children's Heatlh Care
@daronaldridge

I think that the biggest lie that we tell ourselves as internal communicators is that we're a team of only two or three or five, when in all actuality, we have an entire employee base that could serve as unofficial members of our internal communications team. We just need to make sure that we recruit and empower them to get our message out there because they would be able to do it in the way that we could never imagine.

Special thanks to Candidio for their support of Something Else.