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October 19, 2006

Research = Listening

I couldn't have said it better myself. That's why you simply must read this article on MarketingProfs by Jay Lipe, ““The Art of Listening: Market Research Tools That Any Company Can Use” on how important (and easy) it is to conduct research. (Note: you may need to subscribe to view the article, but the subscription is free.)

Many people I know in HR and communication conduct research only occasionally: the bi-annual employee attitude survey or the once-every-so-often communication audit, for example. Although Mr. Lipe is primarily focused on external audiences, not employees, he makes the point that research doesn’t have to be complicated or expensive or extensive. In fact, he advocates using simple techniques to conduct research on a regular basis.

When you come right down to it, he writes, research is really all about listening: “For thousands of years, people have conducted market research. I don't mean with fancy focus groups or complicated conjoint analysis, but just by asking questions and listening to the answers.”

Research has a number of benefits, as described in the article, including the fact that it can deepen relationships. Again, Mr. Lipe is most concerned about external stakeholders, but his point applies equally to the company/employee releationship. “The bottom line is this: People like it when you ask for their opinion. They feel they are contributing to your company’s success.”

I urge you to read Mr. Lipe’s article—and to think more about how you can use research to improve the work you do with employees.

Posted by Alison Davis at 04:55 PM

October 12, 2006

How effective are your meetings?

My colleague just returned from a manic month of major meetings, including a gathering of a company’s top 100 leaders, a session for a corporation’s global communicators network, and a regional conference put on by a leading communication organization.

Her conclusion? Despite the fact that a lot of great information was shared at these meetings, communication and HR professionals have a lot to learn about creating dynamic and effective meetings. Here are just a few of the mistakes these planners made:

• Bad venue. At one session, more than 100 attendees were shoehorned into a small windowless room designed to hold no more than 70 people. As a result, participants were oxygen-deprived, cramped and cranky.

• Too many presentations. PowerPoint presentations can be effective, but not when they’re the only game in town—when hour after hour, the meeting consists of nothing but presentation after presentation. Mind-numbing.

• Not enough visuals. With all that PowerPoint, you’d think there’d be plenty to look at. Yet many meetings offer few visuals to break up the sea of words spoken and words on the slides.

• Poor time management. Speakers allowing no time for questions. Sessions running long, stealing time from later sessions, cutting into breaks, truncating lunch. Not enough time allocated to hold a breakout session. All are examples of poor time management, which ruin the meeting flow and cause participants to zone out.

• Not enough dialogue. If a meeting’s only objective is to disseminate information, do yourself a favor and save a bunch of money by publishing a report instead of flying people to an offsite. But if the intention of your meeting is to create learning so that people can solve problems or take action, then you must build opportunities for dialogue into the agenda. That requires time, space, and planning.

Are your meetings meeting their potential?

Posted by Alison Davis at 12:33 PM