State of Internal Communications 2021
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State of Internal Communications 2021 SIMPPLR RESEARCH SIMPPLR RESEARCH _______ State of Internal Communications 2021 Contents Introduction ...................................................................................................................... 2 Current State of Internal Communications ..................................................................... 4 Activities and Measurement ............................................................................................ 8 Common Internal Communications Challenges ........................................................... 12 Organization Alignment and Employee Recall ..............................................................14 Leadership Involvement with Communications ............................................................ 17 Internal Communications Technology .......................................................................... 21 Conclusion ...................................................................................................................... 23 Appendix 1 ...................................................................................................................... 24 About Simpplr ................................................................................................................ 33 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ INTRODUCTION The pandemic has been a catalyst for leaders to realize that companies can’t grow or even survive without a knowledgeable, engaged, and connected workforce. Internal communicators have long worked with antiquated internal systems and processes that have prevented them from executing at a strategic level that ensures a high level of communication and collaboration among departments. In the age of COVID-19, leadership across all sorts of organizations have come to recognize the importance of IC. The IC function ensures that everyone has a shared understanding of the business’s goals and is aligned with the company’s strategy. Internal communicators implement strategies to improve leadership engagement and visibility across the organization, including the right technologies to embrace the evolving workforce and optimize the employee experience. In other words, IC experts have a direct impact on how successful a business is, and COVID-19 has convinced executives to give IC the attention they finally deserve. Simpplr Research conducted the annual State of Internal Communications report to evaluate where IC is heading toward and to continue our benchmarks. While Simpplr Research’s 2020 report revealed insights on how COVID-19 has changed the role and perception of internal communications, this year’s report continues to inform readers on industry benchmarks and insights as we move forward into the next phase of the workforce. This year’s survey was randomly distributed to What is the size of your organization? more than 400 IC practitioners in the employee experience space, predominantly in the United 10,001 + 0 - 50 States, across varying industries and company 19% 14% sizes. Each question prompted more than 400 51 - 200 responses, with the last open-ended question 12% asking IC practitioners about their top two 2,001 - 18% biggest communications challenges. The survey 10,000 11% 201 - 500 interchangeably uses “leaders” to describe “excellent” and “above average” IC programs, and 26% “laggards” to describe “below average” and “poor” 501 - 2,000 IC programs. 2 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ At the end of the survey, we asked an open-ended question: “As you look ahead to the next 18 months, what are one or two of the biggest employee communications challenges that your organization will need to address?” Based on the thoughtful, open-ended responses, we uncovered three main themes: leadership, communications, and employee engagement. We highly encourage you to read through the comprehensive responses as you prepare and plan amidst a changing workplace environment, whatever your situation might be. The State of Internal Communications 2021 summarizes: • The state of internal communications today as the workforce recovers from the pandemic and adjusts to the new reality • Various methods that IC uses to measure and evaluate the success of IC programs • The extent of involvement of IC activities and how IC professionals measure their IC programs effectively • A list of common IC challenges across leading and lagging programs • Organizations’ abilities to align employees with company goals and why it’s critical 3 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ CURRENT STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS To start the survey, Simpplr Research prompted the question “how would you rate the current state of your internal communications?” to understand the general sentiment of programs from three perspectives. This question helps us understand the perception of IC programs across the organization. Note that we only surveyed IC practitioners and used them as a proxy of how top leadership and the rest of the employees would assess the current state of IC. How would you rate the current state of your internal communications? 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0% Your communications Top leadership Your employees Excellent Above Average Average Below Average Poor While over 60% rate communications above average, the most significant discrepancy is the employees’ perception of IC relative to the IC professionals themselves. This gap is worth paying close attention to, because it highlights the importance of regularly gathering feedback and engagement data to ensure that the tactics and messaging deployed by IC are landing. 4 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ How much do you agree with the following? 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0% Internal Internal Internal Our management Our organization Our internal communications communications communications understands clearly articulates communications can strongly can strongly impacts our culture the importance the importance function has clearly impact employee impact business and ability to attract of internal of internal stated goals and a engagement performance talent communications communications charter Strongly Agree Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree Disagree Strongly Disagree In the chart above, we asked IC practitioners a series of questions about their state of internal communications. Most respondents strongly believe that IC is important and impactful to the business. Nearly 80% of respondents note that IC strongly impacts employee engagement, and close to 90% either “agree” or “strongly agree” that IC impacts business performance. This overall sentiment is similar to the results in 2019. How much do you agree with the following? 100% 80% 60% Comparison with 40% same responses from 2019 20% 0% Internal communications Internal communications My management Our internal Our organization can strongly impact can strongly impact understands the communications function clearly articulates the employee engagement business performance importance of internal has clearly stated goals importance of internal communications and a charter communications Strongly Agree Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree Disagree Strongly Disagree 5 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ While 90% of practitioners agree and understand the power of IC on TIP: Aligning IC With organizations, the results begin to decline when respondents are asked Business Goals about the impact of IC from a management or organizational standpoint. Approximately 60% of respondents believe that their management understands If you want your organization to grasp the importance of IC, and only about 40% agree that their IC function has the importance of IC, it is important clearly stated goals and a charter. While there has been an increase in IC’s to align your IC strategy with the perceived importance, there remains an opportunity to prioritize IC tools and company’s strategy. This involves understanding the business goals and processes to align priorities among both employees and management. defining IC’s purpose with strategy and purpose. Adopt a philosophy for On a positive note, there is an overall 20% increase in recognition of IC how to manage, how to communicate, importance among management based on survey data captured in 2019. and how to operate and stick with it. Simpplr Research COVID report found that part of this increase is attributed to organizations that transitioned to a remote workforce as a result of the pandemic in 2020. Our organization clearly articulates the importance of internal communications 100% 80% 60% 40% 20% 0% Total Respondents Laggards Below Average Average Above Average Leaders Strongly Agree Agree Neither Agree nor Disagree Disagree Strongly Disagree The chart above breaks out organizational sentiment toward employee communications functions by program success. The data shows that leading organizations have found a way to market the importance of their function effectively. In organizations with high-performing IC, over 90% of respondents “agree” or “strongly agree” that their organization clearly articulates the importance of internal communications. 6 STATE OF INTERNAL COMMUNICATIONS 2021 _______ Since 2019, there has been a 10% uptick of lagging organizations that agree on articulating the importance of IC. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1. Since 2019, there has been an upward trend in organizations articulating the importance of internal communications. 2. While there is increased awareness the importance of IC, there is room for improvement in non-leading organizations.