When it comes to improving internal communications, having a solid grasp of user roles and good collaboration is key. Here are a few ways to improve internal communications workflows across your organization, with a little help from Reach’s new Communicator role function.
Know your internal comms mandate
Understanding your company’s mandate—courtesy of your leadership team—is the best way to clarify the purpose of an internal communicator within your organization.
So what exactly is a mandate? In a nutshell, it explicitly confirms that the political will exists for the internal comms function within the organization and confirms the organization’s support in achieving a set of goals.
A mandate can mean the difference between simply following orders as the designated internal communicator and having a strategic seat at the leadership table.
With a clear mandate and a defined role for yourself, you now have the authority to execute that mandate and exercise your best judgment on how best to communicate with employees.
Related resource: download our free Mandate Overview and Leadership Questionnaire tool.
Hand over the reins
You ideally want to eliminate any “bottlenecks” in the internal comms process, especially when it comes to your intranet and security. Solidifying communicator roles and permissions is pivotal to doing so and keeping things running efficiently.
If a single department or intranet manager is responsible for all communication and changes on behalf of other users, time is wasted in communicating what needs to be done and then waiting for the changes to be implemented.
Having user roles and permissions as a feature in your internal comms software can help with this exponentially. Not only does it boost collaboration, but it also increases efficiency in your role. IC’s new Communicator role lets your team access the features and data they need while keeping sensitive information secure.
Identify your ideal chain of command
A chain of command describes the way in which organizations traditionally structure their reporting relationships and communication. These can apply to your organization (and the internal communicator’s place in it) as a whole, or they could be used within a department, such as a multi-person internal comms team.
Take some time to understand and establish the internal comms chain of command within your organization. Who will be responsible for sending and receiving different types of messages? Who approves changes?
When it comes to who reports to who, there is more than one approach, and which one you choose will depend on your unique organization.
Related reading: building your chain of command within internal comms.
Create an approval process for your internal comms
Once you have established a chain of command for identifying key messaging, you need an approval process to go with it. Here’s a simple way to view it: a chain of command is how the people on your team are structured; an approval process is how tasks move through that team.
Having an approval process for your internal comms work will prevent unnecessary mistakes, like sending out a message to the wrong employees or having bottlenecks of content waiting for leadership approval to get sent out.
Here’s what Sprout Social has to say on this topic:
“First you need to determine who or what team is in control of your internal comms strategy. Who will read, write or approve the messages you send to your team? Next, you need to know what stakeholders from each department can contribute to the approval process for content.
Is your current team too small? Are there too many cooks in the kitchen? Assessing your current strategy should indicate where you can add on or trim fat on your internal comms team.”
Even if your internal comms team is just you, an approval process helps establish clarity from the start and helps things run smoothly. For example, maybe a member of the leadership team or a marketing colleague can look your work over and occasionally advise on any issues.
The Communicator role in our software ensures that those users only have access to the audiences, messages, and data that they own. Everything else, including the sensitive information that you’re working on, cannot be accessed. You can rest easy knowing that your team is more productive without granting them unnecessary access to any irrelevant information.
Improve internal communications with IC
User roles and permissions are only the beginning of how IC can revolutionize and improve internal communications. Interested in learning more? You can start a free trial or book a demo today!
