Speaker 1: Welcome to World at Work TV, I'm Allison Avalos and I'm joined today by Keith Ketani of GuideSpark and John Heitenen with ADP and we're talking about communication strategies and employee engagement. Keith, why don't you start off by talking about why communication is so important and why do companies sometimes struggle with it? Is it the message, is it the plan to action that seems elusive?

Speaker 2: Well I think it really starts with the way employees today consume information. Today in our consumer lives we consume information, it's video, it's mobile, it's interactive and if you think about how corporations typically communicate, it's pretty traditional. You know, it's employee manuals, it's brochures, it's long text based emails and those methods just aren't resonating with today's employees and so I think that's been a challenge. Maybe the message is important but if you're not communicating the right way it doesn't matter.

Speaker 1: John, as you restructured your bonus plan, what considerations did you need to pay particular attention to?

Speaker 3: Yeah, so when we first started out we were just doing the traditional methodology of going out and doing in-person training with your standard PowerPoint presentation deck but we found with feedback that the presentation deck wasn't resonating so as we went back and we re-looked at it through a different lens of multi-generational workforce, we found that the communication style that was appropriate for our baby boomer wasn't really resonating with our Gen Y or Gen X population so we went through, we had to realize that we had to look at communicating across all generations, not just one.

Speaker 1: So John, what was the goal of your new communication plan and how did technology play a role?

Speaker 3: Yeah, so as we looked into the communication approach it was really addressing the multi-generational communication preferences so when you ask the question, how do employees prefer to receive communication, we found out that we needed to use a multiple communication strategy to achieve that so that we're not just focused on one particular employee group versus another. And so in terms of the technology that we used, it was a platform that allowed us to use a combination of video, it enabled us to embed web links to other internal or external sites and also it contained some of the more detailed context around our bonus plan.

Speaker 1: Keith, what would you say is the future of communication?

Speaker 2: So when I think about the future of employee communications, the model I like to use is to look at what's happening in our consumer lives because I think our consumer lives and how we communicate kind of look to the future of where we're going to go internal with our own organization. So in the short term it's going to be video, it's going to be mobile, it's going to be interactive. But what gets me excited I think in the future is to think about how personalization and how you can really target those communications to each individual based on data, which obviously has happened in our consumer lives. I think I get really excited about that as where I think the future of communications internally are going to go.

Speaker 1: Is that much harder to do, to tailor communications on that singular level? I imagine it leads to better rewards, but...

Speaker 2: Yes, it is much harder. But if you think about it, companies have a tremendous amount of data on an employee. They know how old they are, they know how much they make. So access to the data is actually going to be easier, but tailoring those communications across the broad communications that an organization have will be harder. So kind of a mixed answer there.

Speaker 1: John and Keith, what words of wisdom would you share with other HR managers who are going down a path of needing to take on a new communication strategy?

Speaker 3: So from my perspective, I think it's understanding the makeup of your workforce. So I come back to the multi-generational perspective, because on one extreme, the millennial generation that is starting to explode in the workforce, they're expecting communications that are more personalized and using technology, versus on the other extreme, from the baby boomers, they're still expecting communications that are in-person and more factual. So I think paying attention to the groups that you're communicating to and understanding that these groups will change dramatically over the coming years, and to adjust your communication style appropriately.

Speaker 2: So when I think about things that organizations should think about as they think about communication, the first I would start with is to challenge the status quo. I think communications in our daily lives have changed pretty dramatically. And so I think organizations get in a standard way of doing the same thing. And so the first thing I'd say is don't be afraid about challenging the status quo, kind of like how John has done at ADP. The second thing I'd talk about is that when they think about building a communications program, I think there are really three parts to that. You've got to build compelling content and information. And without information, you can't communicate. But then you also have to think about how you're going to get that content to your employees. And if you think about some of these organizations, particularly distributed organizations or employees who aren't at a computer, you have to be really thoughtful about how you're going to be able to connect that great content to your employees. And the last part of that is you've got to measure and iterate. I've worked with hundreds of organizations, and the one thing I can tell you is one size does not fit all. You really got to try something, measure it, and then iterate and approve. And I think that's how you really get successful communications.

Speaker 1: So John, as you went through this process at your organization, any obstacles to speak to you? And if so, how did you work through those?

Speaker 3: Yes, I think one of the things that people need to think about as well is the cultural readiness of their organization for change. When I first started going through the transformational change of using multimedia, using Geistbark solution, it was so different to the traditional way of doing communications, and it was met with resistance. One of the things that occurred during that period of time was ADP went through a rebranding. That rebranding recognized the different communication style in terms of moving from a formal to a more informal style and more conversational in approach.

Speaker 1: Thank you both.

Speaker 3: Okay.

Speaker 1: Thank you. For World at Work TV, I'm Alison Avalos.