There was an interesting article in last month’s Success Magazine on how Howard Schultz, had to rebuild the Starbucks brand.
One of the things he did was just brilliant and cost him nothing but a little sweat and lots of transparency!
He created a series of internal memos he called “transformational memos” to instill confidence in the company.
Here’s what he had to say in Success Magazine . . .
“The ‘transformational memos’ were informative, infused with optimism and conveyed a degree of transparency that unnerved some people. I had some people telling me at the time ‘Howard, I think you are being too vulnerable’ but I had an intuitive sense that I had to be real”
This was one of many things he did because he wanted to rekindle the emotion that built the Starbucks brand.
Truth be told, most companies get a poor grade with their internal “keep the troops informed” communication. In fact, many of the companies I’ve worked with initially told me that they either have senior management address the troops at the annual convention or only if there’s a crisis.
That simply isn’t good enough!
Some of the best companies I’ve come across have things like:
A “Monday Morning Memo” sent via email once per week.
A quarterly “All hands” conference call.
Zappos has its monthly “ask anything” newsletter where employees ask their CEO, are you ready for this . . . anything!
So enough about my observations of good internal communication . . .
Please share yours or . . .
Feel free to weigh in with your opinion regarding the examples I shared.
Paul Castain is a bad ass who works with organizations and individuals who wish to achieve higher levels of badassery. He is so good that he no longer poses topless for his bio pictures. For more information on how Paul can help you and your company click here dude.
I love to see companies focus & strive to improve internal communication efforts. It’s an essential element to good customer service. We all have to remember that our employees are our #1 assets and they are our customers too. I applaude companies who put time & energy into communicateing to their internal customers.
That’s such a great point and its so much easier for us to serve our customers when we have a team that feels appreciated, in the know and part of the team!
Thanks for stopping by!
In my company we believe the team is the most important asset we have along with out customers, and they participate in most parts of the business life. They are aware of decisions, of the tough times, of the cheerful moments. It couldn’t be otherwise, if you really want to build a human business, you gotta put the “human” at the center of it, be it a customer or the last of your employees.
I really like what you said “if you really want to build a human business, you gotta put he ‘human’ at the center of it”
Quite frankly, I wish I had said it myself Gabriele . . . well done!
Thank you!
I really like what you said “if you really want to build a human business, you gotta put he ‘human’ at the center of it”
Quite frankly, I wish I had said it myself Gabriele . . . well done!
Thank you!
Hi Paul,
As you know, when we had our first phone chat last month, I took the liberty of getting real and very personal with you vis a vis my story. I did so both because I sensed you would be receptive from reading your own story (ies), and because it is who I am. When I speak to a group I will tell them up front I am gonna make em laugh and make em cry. It’s OK, it’s real. And to be sure, it does make some people a wee bit uncomfortable.
As you also know, I think Linked In is a tremendous tool for connecting, but in a strange way, it sort of fosters the ‘professional mask’ and may hide the real person. And that is one of the reasons I think Facebook is actually more compelling for getting to know someone who had previously been a dis-embodied voice on the phone or a signature block in an e-mail.
I suspect that social networking will foster more transformative and transparent vulnerability in even our most stodgy ‘professional’ relationships. In my view there is no turning back.
Just yesterday I was counseling a young lady who was completely torn up by the lack of internal communication in her firm — company to employee.
Jeff Hayzlett is rightly very proud of hiring Kodak’s first chief blogger and first chief listening officer – but those positions are customer facing by definition.
Perhaps the wise company emulating Mr. Schultz, will create a chief
listening/communicating officer that is employee-facing. The digital native generation coming to a cubicle near you, will likely require far more real, personal communication than their parents. Their parents (or maybe their grandparents 🙂 were the ‘sockit to me’ generation, the next wave is the SocNet generation and I sense they will expect real time, real deal communication to do their jobs effectively.
My guess is that transformative vulnerability and real-ness will ultimately translate very nicely to the bottom line. Thank you as ever, for your great sharing of real, actionable ideas!
I couldn’t agree more Kevin!
At a minimum, we have to make this form of communication a regular thing and not just when things hit the proverbial fan.
Your Kodak example is spot on!
Thank you Kevin and watch for an email from me later today.