Using Internal Communications to Build High-Performing Working Cultures
Effective internal communication is crucial for organisations of all shapes and sizes and is a key element in driving overall business success and creating environments where people thrive. Employers are increasingly recognising the role it plays, but in order to see results, they need to source the right skills. With this in mind, how can businesses use internal communications to build high-performing working cultures, and what type of skills should they seek to deliver these results?
The Role of Internal Communications
Internal communications play a critical but often overlooked role, acting as the glue that holds any organisation together. It’s far more than just the dissemination of information; it connects individual contributions to broader goals, supporting trust, transparency, and engagement. Done effectively, internal communication lays the groundwork for high performance, empowering employees to collaborate, align, and thrive.
More broadly, it binds people together behind a common goal and feeds into the wider organisational culture, which is a set of shared values and beliefs shaping company operations and staff interactions. Ineffective internal communications can lead to confusion, disengagement, siloed thinking, and ultimately, underperformance. Shaping organisational cultures without internal communications is highly challenging, leading to people operating independently and without cohesion with the rest of the business.
Factors like a clear purpose and shared vision, strong but flexible leadership, open collaboration, and cross-functional teamwork all feed into effective organisational cultures, and internal communications bind it all together. However, leveraging internal communications to develop these types of cultures takes time, meaning that it is often an ever-moving goal for many.
Communicating a New Culture
Where do organisations start if they are looking to leverage internal communications to reshape their culture? Firstly, a strategic approach is required. Businesses should move away from solely relying on top-down memos or ad hoc announcements and instead develop a more nuanced, engaging, and collaborative style.
This involves defining communications objectives and understanding the overall aim and goals of the activity. This shouldn’t be limited to the communications team but should involve the entire business. Employers should consider the different ways individuals learn and take on information. Developing a clear brand voice and deploying messaging through the right channels is crucial. Rather than solely relying on email, a combination of channels like Teams, Slack, intranets, and newsletters should be adopted, depending on the nature and existing culture of the business.
This approach also needs to incorporate data and other available insights to support decision-making around channel use and messaging types that resonate with workers. Crucially, organisations must encourage two-way dialogue between staff and the rest of the business, creating an environment where employees feel comfortable seeking feedback and asking open questions to foster engagement and drive better results in the long term.
Skills Requirements
Delivering effective internal communications requires the right skills. What attributes should organisations seek in their next hire?
- Emotional Intelligence: The ability to show empathy and ascertain the broader mood of the workforce, adapting tone and messaging strategies appropriately.
- Strategic Thinking: Aligning activity with broader business objectives and advising senior figures on strategies that drive positive performance and results.
- Change Communications Expertise: Planning and mapping out communications activity to ensure smooth transitions during change, acting with clarity and confidence.
- Resilience: Adapting and managing pushback from the workforce during periods of flux.
- Data Literacy & Digital Fluency: Building strategies on data-backed insights, essential for modern specialists.
High-performing working cultures are not created by accident but through robust planning and effectively leveraging different organisational groups to reshape how people operate at work. Without effective internal communication supporting HR and talent teams, building these cultures would be nearly impossible, especially with many professionals now operating remotely or on a hybrid basis.
Identifying and recruiting the right skills and embracing their role in developing resilient, collaborative, and successful cultures will enable organisations to build effective teams both now and in the future. Ultimately, internal communication is not just about keeping the workforce informed; it’s about shaping mindsets and behaviours and taking everyone on board the journey to building a high-performing culture.
If your organisation is seeking a game-changing internal communications professional to join your team, get in touch with our specialist team to find the talent it needs to thrive. Read more of our blogs on LinkedIn.
