A real tale about bad internal communications

This isn’t an award-winning case study in great internal communications. Just a real life story where the absence of it is all too evident. Lessons can be learned which is why I am sharing it.

The normally cheery and uber helpful ticket check guy at my local railway station told me today he is being replaced by a machine. Indeed, rather like the Sword of Damocles, said machine is already in situ, right behind him silently waiting to take over his job.

Now I love change – particularly when it’s for the better – but my current operator Southern Rail and the equally appalling bunch waiting in the franchise wings - haven’t a clue about running trains. Which is really frightening when you consider that’s all they are supposed to do. When you throw in Network Rail it’s a rail recipe for disaster.

None of them communicate well – with staff, with commuters/customers or with each other. That means every day feels like a crisis comms scenario. And as a comms pro I have managed a few of those. Indeed, good old Southern Rail isn’t doing great on employee engagement bearing in mind the machine that’s replacing my experienced, cheerful, helpful chap has already been installed before he’s even collected his P45. I could fly to New York in the time it has recently taken me to get to work in London but thanks to my chap at the station and his help and advice he does make me feel valued as a customer, albeit one spending some thousands of pounds for the sheer, giddy pleasure of delays, cancellations and random jettisoning on to freezing platforms. He sadly tells me the service we are all getting is ‘disgraceful’. Not surprising when everyone can see it is and he doubtless gets the brunt of commuters’ increasing rage on a daily basis.

Where is the company’s leadership in all this?

I politely enquired when I might have an opportunity to find out why the service is deteriorating so and was told senior managers prefer their ‘Meet The Managers’ sessions on the concourses of large, open stations rather than smaller ones.

“They are very scared of actually meeting customers face-to-face”, says my man in the know.

Nuff said.

Henry Kissinger and keeping calm in a crisis

'There cannot be a crisis today; my schedule is already full.' Henry Kissinger knows what he's talking about and you can't imagine this famous former US Secretary of State not keeping his head when all around are losing theirs. Watch out FIFA!

The same keep-calm-and-carry-on approach is true for the numerous comms pros responding to a 'top tips for handling a crisis' post on Linked In this week.

My top tip, based on managing a crisis in several organisations, is how critical it is for IC and leaders to have a core plan and stick with it - avoiding all temptation to respond and react to everything. 

The human instinct to panic is great and never more so when your crisis is playing out in the media, or with unions, regulators, stakeholders and customers. But please resist 'tit-for-tat' comms as a response to everything everyone is saying about your organisation. It only makes your business look like it's losing control and can also prolong and fuel the crisis. 

That doesn't mean your comms plan should remain static. Indeed, as all good internal comms practitioners know, any communication approach needs to measure its effectiveness in terms of clarity and understanding and in a crisis regular pulse checks with employees are vital so you can respond accordingly.
Just don't lose you own head as tensions rise and keep the messages clear, relevant and timely.