CEC Insider

At CEB, mid-year performance review time is here.  Seven busy and slightly hectic months of 2010 have flown by (how is it already August?!).  I have lots of stories to share.  A few things I’m proud of.  A few goals to achieve in the next half of the year.  But how do I put the right story together to truly demonstrate my impact to my manager, let along my manager’s manager???  I doubt newsletter metrics or download numbers for my research pieces will do the trick.

Communicators, have you recently tried to demonstrate your team’s effectiveness?  One of the top cries for help we hear from CEC members is: “Metrics!  We need help with metrics… how to define them, how to present them, and how to link them to the business goals that senior leaders actually care about.”

In a recent poll about Communications dashboards, only 31% of communicators said they have a dashboard they present to senior leaders to demonstrate Communications’ effectiveness.  Of those, only 50% said they are satisfied with their current dashboard. However, this “satisfaction” is questionable if you look more specifically at these respondents’ satisfaction with their dashboard’s ability to do the following: Read More »

Over the past month, one of the most prominent images plastered across the media and web has been thousands of “fan boys” lining up for the latest iPhone 4.  Given the intense passion you can visibly see people associating with the Apple brand and products, few members were shocked when CEC found that emotional connections (more than experiences or trust) drives the active support an organization needs to penetrate today’s networked environment.  While agreeing with the theory, many communicators have argued that their categories/industries are too rational, regulated, or conservative to build such bonds.

Although it’s true that we’re not all Apple, I don’t buy that this finding doesn’t have immediate applicability for every communicator worldwide, and to try to prove it, I’m listing below 10 highly accessible ideas to develop more emotionally resonant content. Read More »

“What’s the most resilient parasite?”  Moviegoers will recognize this question from Christopher Nolan’s recent psychological thriller, Inception, and respond, “An idea!”

Perhaps it’s indicative of a London summer turned dreary (yes, I know, I shouldn’t be surprised!), but living in Leonardo DiCaprio and Marion Cotillard’s dream world for two hours in the Chelsea cinema this past Saturday was, I’m not ashamed to say, my weekend highlight.

Despite criticism that the film was either too complex or not deep enough, the fast-paced, action-packed drama was entertaining.  Nolan captivates his audience with a world in which it is possible to share dreams – that is, enter into another person’s dream while you are both sleeping – and steal deep secrets metaphorically locked in a safe or other secure location.   But extracting knowledge isn’t enough for the ambitious cast in Nolan’s film; instead the group is challenged to perform inception – to plant an idea in someone’s mind.

This is a particularly dangerous – some say impossible – task because, as one character explains, “the subject’s mind always knows the genesis of an idea.”  In other words, it is not enough to give someone an idea; for them to truly believe and act on it, they need to consider themselves the originator of that idea.

And here is where I can’t help but notice a link to Communications – we can no longer be successful if we solely focus on cascading our messages through channels to reach our audiences.  If the goal is for  stakeholders to act on our messages, we must find a way for them to feel they discovered these messages (and by consequence, discovered us). Read More »

Unlike some of the folks I work with, I feel like I’ve always been a “math” guy.  Numbers speak to me, motivate me, and make sense to me.  It’s one of the reasons my colleagues decided I would be a good fit for handling the day-to-day of our diagnostic and communications benchmarking efforts, and probably the reason I’ve been given the nickname “Dr. Frugal” by my family –hey, I love budgets, okay?  Before you start commenting and calling me names like “philistine,” “Hamlet hater” or “the great non-communicator,” hold on a moment.

After spending a fair amount of time with you communicators, I’ve become a convert and learned to appreciate the true power of words.  It’s IMPOSSIBLE to not appreciate the art of communications and how you’re able to move markets with a 5-minute message, let alone a 5-word message.  The pen is truly mightier than the sword, and it’s fascinating to hear stories about how a smart tagline, crystallized brand, or clear and personal strategy was ultimately responsible for a company’s success.  In my experience, there are three words that organizations can use, but often don’t, to effectively motivate their stakeholders to act.  I’ll give you a hint – it’s not “We’ve Got Booze,” “Want More Money?” or “Free CEC Insights.”  (Though that would be nice!)…. Read More »

I am as guilty as anyone of listening to the rumour mill. Information just seems so much more exciting when it’s a little bit illicit.  Whether it’s while you are making a cup of coffee (or tea for us Brits), grabbing lunch, or passing each other in the corridor, these informal exchanges with colleagues are the most powerful flow of information in your company. So, who are the most influential nodes in your employee network? How can we leverage the conversations already going on for our strategic advantage?

CEB has been partnering with Rob Cross, an expert in all things to do with social networks, to better understand the answers to some of these questions. Rob has developed a scientific approach of mapping influence across organizations and highlighting those individuals who hold disproportionate power – those who excite and build energy, and those who kill it – within employee networks. We are excited to host a webinar with Rob on the 20^th July to share some of the themes from his work.  CEC members can register for the webinar today.

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As the English football team returns home with their tail between their legs, you can hear a collective sigh of relief from most of us tortured fans. We no longer have to go through the anguish and frustration that is watching a team of individually talented (and very highly paid!!) footballers fail to gel as a team.  The World Cup has yet again reminded me of how important teamwork and peer support are in driving success.  The anxiety felt by the millions of England supporters on sofas and in pubs everywhere is probably a similar anxiety employees have felt with all the cuts, layoffs and change companies have been going through over the past 2 years—a sense that everyone is looking out for number one and not each other.

So how are engagement levels faring as we start to see the first green shoots of recovery in the economy? I took a look at CLC Human Resources’ engagement survey across over 145 organizations and 204,000 employees worldwide and picked out a couple of trends that show that we’re not out of the woods yet:

• Engagement is still at risk—With 21.6% of employees in the “disengaged” category, it’s clear that this is a problem with real roots. The low levels of discretionary effort coupled with high levels of intent to stay are causing very real performance issues for a lot of companies. Read More »

I am embarrassed to say that I watched “Out of Africa” for the first time just a few days ago. There’s no doubt I have a soft spot in my heart for Africa—I’ve spent close to a combined three months in Uganda and Kenya, I was in South Africa  for the World Cup two weeks ago (it’s Ayoba time!), and I’ve even visited the Nairobi farm of Karen Blixen, the author of “Out of Africa.” But I’d never gotten around to actually watch Meryl Streep fall in love with Robert Redford in the film.

When I finally curled up on the couch to watch it in my London flat last Monday, I was swept away by the beautiful scenery and passionate romance. But I was also encapsulated by another aspect of the movie—the importance of storytelling.

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I can’t last an hour in a mall.  I’ve never really “shopped” without a mission to fill a specific (perceived) hole among my material goods.  And the only coupon I can ever remember using was an online discount at last Sunday’s golf course.  I’m oddly proud of all of those facts, and so it pains me to report that Groupon may be the most perfect example of everything CEC has uncovered about succeeding in today’s networked environment.

I assume most are familiar with Groupon’s mechanics: subscribers receive a daily e-mail offering a discount at a local retailer, restaurant, or service provider.  The site shows a minimum number of purchase commitments required by the merchant and a running tally of how many have been made.  Once the minimum threshold is reached, the deal “tips” and the transactions are processed (98% of deals tip).  Merchants acquire new customers, subscribers get a discount, and Groupon takes a cut off the deal.

I never got the appeal as a consumer, but as an observer of business trends, I’m paying much closer attention to Groupon now based on its alignment with CEC’s most recent best practices.

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Q: Why do we communicators crave true benchmarking data?

A. Lots of reasons!

• To understand how we compare to our peers
• To get a sense of trends facing our function
• To see where peers outsource activities to a vendor
• To understand what new activities we should be taking on
• To make a confident case to company leadership for more resources or different allocation (as Mike recently said—it can help us make the case for a little more R-E-S-P-E-C-T!”)
• To plan for 2011 (yikes—it’s coming way too fast!)

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If not, maybe he or she should.  For the uninitiated, World Cup fever is here once again, and superfans around the world are getting up at the crack of dawn to watch their favorite teams compete on an international stage.  Even in the United States, where Major League Soccer is only 17 years old, conversations around Ronaldinho, Ronaldo, and Robert Green at the water cooler have become ubiquitous.  With all of this passion and chatter in the workplace when one’s team scores a goal, it’s worthwhile for CEOs—and their Comms teams—to ask themselves, “How can we ignite that same sort of support for the company’s goals?”
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