It seems to me that this interactive email is exactly the same thing we could do with employees to create a communication engagement. Great idea-- but what about the company with frontline employees who do not have email or time to get engaged from sources other than a manager or supervisor?

We've found that -- for campaigns from United Way and other fundraisers to recognition of National Quality Month -- a mixture of print and electronic media is far more effective than just pushing electronic communication. We combine that with a communications "commitment" -- telling employees up front what we're going to send and when we're going to send it -- and sticking to the schedule we say we're going to use, they're less likely to overlook our message than they would an unexpected or surprise tranmission, especially when the communication isn't directly related to their daily assignments.

You are totally correct that business is not keeping up with the evolution of the consumer and how they make their decisions. In regard to your belief that communication is following a fashion trend is also appropriate.

Pushing info at people is really not the most effective method to communicate. As you are doing, the use of a blog for communication is the coming wave. As opposed to a static email or web page, the blog offers people the ability to respond/provide feedback, a key element of true communication.

With a blog communication, the audience can respond requesting clarification or better yet, other members of the audience can respond to the request. The blog promotes a community environment and provides the community the ability to present a 360 degree view of the message. This is exceptionally important in a global environment where English is not always the common language.

Following your fashion thread, a blog is a needed accessory for a communication wardrobe.

As a fan of several blogs, I have long pondered how blogs will impact employee communications. From my perspective, blogs are appealing because they seem so direct and honest. Not filtered, not approved and not censored. By that definition, does anyone think that John Kerry writes his own blog? Would a CEO's blog on an employee intranet site have any street cred? I agree that blogs are an essential accessory, but to extend the fasion metaphor, how do you successfully pull off that look? Thoughts?

Frontline employees who work at our manufatcuring site do have access to computers/email, however, they're not using their breaks/lunch/dinner time to access company information. (Is this expectation even fair?) The site relies on managers/supervisors to share information during regular monthly/quarterly meetings but that may not be enough. And managers may be sharing what they think is most important. We recently launched a site newsletter, but I think we need to come up with a way to better engage and equip the managers so they are delivering important news and information -- since they are the ones employees turn to. I'd love to hear what communicators in a similiar situation are doing to reach this audience.

We launched an employee Web site in March that focuses on benefits, company news, wellness information, industry links, and some other odds and ends. It is an Internet page, not an intranet(outside the firewall); therefore employees can access it from work, home, anywhere 24/7.

The problem is that of our 26,000 employees, only a small percentage is going to the site. We need to promote it more and make sure the content is changing regularly. We have thousands of employees who work on the floors of dialysis clinics, and they don't have regular access to a computer. So we did a small cross-section survey and asked if employees have Internet access at home, and 86% said yes, and 61% said they would access company information from home. We also have a feedback button that ees can use to offer feedback on the site, ideas, or any comments.

We want managers to be part of this process as well, but the idea is to provide a place where employees can go and access all kinds of information either at work on on their own time, and make it a self-service kind of site. In the future, we will have total compensation statements and paychecks on there, so it will become even more personal.

We have a long way to go, but we're crossing our fingers! Any thoughts on this approach?

I completely agree that one-size does NOT fit all. We've taken an interesting approach to communicating one initiative on a broad scale.

To communicate the importance of participating in our company's employee engagement survey, we solicitied "champions" (non-communicators) from within the business to take template messages and communicate them...

a) in the best way possible for their work group -- whether that's through email, on a website, in a newsletter, or in team meetings and
b) in the most relevant way for their audience. They were able to take generic messages and spin them specifically for their business areas to make provide the "What's in it for me."

Did it work? In 2000 our survey response rate was 26%. We put this methodology into place in 2002 and the response rate jumped to 65%. This year, we honed in and created shorter, smarter, and easier-to-customize messaging. Response was nearly 88%.

I'm sure there are many factors that contributed to this success. However I also beleive strongly that allowing employees to take ownership of the messaging at a very local level and make it relevant to their work group has had a tremendous inpact on the outcome. We will use a similar approach to reporting survey outcomes this year.

I'd love to hear if anyone else has had a similar experience. Are we relying only on our own filtered ideas of what's best for employees or are we opening our eyes and ears and letting them guide us to what's best for them?

Alison, thanks for getting the dialog started. I'm interested to see how it progresses!

Like all of you I'm sure, we've heard from employees that they now receive so many e-mails that they often don't open or pay attention to them--even those coming from their executives. What we've learned through a communications survey of our 17,000 employees worldwide (with an almost 2/3 response rate) is that employees preferred way of getting important information is face-to-face from their immediate managers; second is face-to-face from business unit heads, and third is business segment president. Both print and electronic were choosen as "support" communications vehicles.

Even before the survey, we recognized that information circulation, understanding and buy- in was good at the top of the organization, but it broke down between top and middle management, which left employees even more unable to "connect the dots."

We are now in the pilot stage before launching a communications training program for all middle-level managers with direct reports. We are teaching them not only "the how," including the necessity of two-way, but more importantly, "the why" communications is critical for engaging employees. We are also providing them with tailored business messages and talking points on strategic direction (blessed by their business unit president) that they can use to help employees more clearly understand business priorities and how it all relates to how they contribution---as our colleague Cooper reported, to "localize" the information. We are also working on a number of on-going support tools for these managers, such as a resource guide (print and electronic) their own web site with tips, regularly updated presentations, success stories, etc.

We are planning to use this new cadre of communicators to create a better culture of communications throughout the organziation.

I hope to report an improved communications environment in the months ahead as we roll this out across the organization and measure progress.

I would welcome any advise or suggest/failure stories from my colleagues out there.

Thanks for getting this started.

For the next few years, until this concept of "self-service" becomes a reality and all employees have easy on-line access, the multi-media approach will probably work best. We will continue to rely on mailing to home, on-line, and communications by managers. Our biggest inroad is with managers and giving them what they need (not corporate-speak)to bring the message along.

We have found through research and our annual Communications surveys, that one size does not fit all. In response, we use a variety of communications vehicles and avenues for many messages. For example, October is the month when employees register for health benefits. Registration takes place online via our intranet, and announcements go out via email (multiple reminders), in hard copy via the weekly corporate mailing, in Corporate's weekly E-Bulletin and/or Health Care's Weekly E-Update and reminders are also posted to the intranet. In addition, we use payroll stuffers to reinforce the message to hourly employees. In theory everyone reads their email; in reality, since so much corporate information is available on our intranet, some people would rather log on to get their information, so we ensure it's available in numerous mediums.

We (the cross-divisional Communications Strategy team) are currently working on new and better ways to reach frontline employees, something that evidently concerns many of us.