Aim to be human, not perfect, as communicators

Last month PR industry leaders across the North East reconvened at the CIPR North East Strategic Communicators Forum to again discuss and debate what we have learnt during the pandemic so far.
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Taking forward the key elements of the previous event discussion cantered around four key areas, when forum members again shared good ideas, and considered how to enhance the value of communications to our organisations, and our region.

The overarching takeaway for me from listening to everyone’s experiences of communication in 2020 is that we should aim to be human, not perfect, as communicators.

Key areas discussed

• Personal Leadership and Wellbeing for you and your teams 
• Professional PR Leadership in an unprecedented situation
• Evaluating our Impact when we are working in whole new ways 
• Collaboration between organisations we serve

Personal Leadership and Wellbeing & Professional PR Leadership

Key challenges from the pandemic include focussed on logistical and practical issues relating to change driven by the pandemic as well recruitment and ethical issues

• The need to communicate with employees out of hours
• Introducing new channels overnight
• Logistical issues
• Some employees working from home whilst others are working for the office
• How to replicate the different types of conversations that would take place in an office
• Adapting to new environment
• Ethical issues relating to listening in to conversations, monitoring remote employees
• How to keep connected with team members on furlough
• Recruiting through lockdown

Solutions put forward included

• Having slower conversations, being aware of the external factors on people, consciously building in time and space for meaningful conversations
• Using resources such as the Wellbeing Assessment Plans from MIND
• Creating flexibility in working practices that meets the whole teams needs
• Using slots in regular communication channels to reinforce messages
• Limiting use of communication channels so they have a clear purpose – some for urgent activities, others for office chat
• Happy jar = write out what people say about you and your work
• Staged approach to returning to work after furlough and using keep in touch days
• Keep ourselves motivated and healthy – take care of ourselves – follow the advice we are giving our teams – book in time for yourself
• Not insisting on the use of cameras in meetings– starting off with them but then turning off when screen is shared
• Recruiting through lockdown – adapt interview questions and tasks to meet the current needs of organisation including ability to work independently and remotely
• Don’t forget we can still use the telephone – not everything has to be on Zoom

Evaluating Impact 

Measuring impact is no less important during a pandemic and is integral to successful crisis communication but challenges discussed included

• Adapting to new objectives & behaviours – and how to evaluate when they are evolving
• Knowing what you want to achieve and measure is part of the problem
• Do we understand what the impact could be?
• Unintended consequences of communication
• Behaviour change short-term, mid-term and long-term – which changes will stay, what is sustainable
• Crisis to creative comms – how to switch reactive to proactive
• Adapting to new behaviours
• Crisis to creative – reactive to proactive
• Be human not perfect = as individuals, tams and organsations
• Measuring understanding, engagement and sentiment is key
• How do we increase/maintain budgets when we can no longer influence customer choice rather than just based on availability
• Two-way communication – consultations need to work harder and be more innovative – digital exclusion
• Reappraising organisations purpose – reposition offering

Collaboration

One of the benefits of 2020 has been to joined-up thinking and partnership approach to working in the region, including between competitive organisations. To manage the extended crisis situation, it has been necessary to collaborate. We have all been in it together but with different objectives would collaboration be so easy, effective, or welcome. So how do we keep this collaboration going beyond Covid?

• With other regional bodies sharing consistent messages – create resilience forums with wide range of partner members
• Strengthened lobbying positions
• Work together to engage hard to reach groups – earned media is disappearing – need to shout loud
• Mapping the local community – the post Covid community landscape - collaboration on data collection, surveys, mapping from public engagement
• Sharing data and information to avoid survey fatigue
• Partnering on events, make effective use of digital to gain bigger more diverse attendance
• Amplify each other to create a regional voice – make the connections we need to tell stories better and get better reach

​The forum will continue in 2021. Date for your diary the first forum will be on Friday 29 January. Look out for more information in the New Year.

North East Strategic Communicators ForumThe Chartered Institute of Public Relations (CIPR) North East Regional Group has created a series of professional development and networking events for senior / strategic professionals in the North East's PR & communications industry. If you are the person with overall responsibility for communications in your organisation and you are interested in the forum please tweet or DM @CIPR_NorthEast or email Deb Sharratt.

Further events for strategic communicators from CIPR North East via the North East Strategic Communications Forum are planned throughout 2021. CIPR North East also has a various training, networking and social events across the year for all PR practitioners. Follow @CIPR_NorthEast on Twitter or LinkedIn to keep up to date.
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