Bogaard Arena Approaches

Being a professional communicator is no longer just about putting out the company newsletter or posting the latest leadership message on the intranet. It’s about helping people in the organisation connect with each other.

Bogaard Arena espouses three basic principles:

1. There are four very different communication needs inside organisations, from leadership messaging around strategic alignment to unblocking information flows deep inside the business.
2. Everyone in an organisation is a communicator and responsible for participating in and helping to inculcate the communicative environment they work in.
3. At a systemic level, the communicative capacity of an organisation needs to be managed and shaped so that effective communication is propelled (through processes, tools, policies, procedures, learning and behaviours).

Communication solutions depend entirely on the context and direction of the organisation.  Find out what kind of communication needs there are and what kind of communication successes your leaders are looking for.

Plan Strategically

• What are your goals?
• What communication objectives will help you achieve those goals?
• What does that mean in terms of communication activities and how can you measure them?
• What improvements could be made to improve the impact of your communication work?
• How can you get a balance between information overload and producing different materials to suit different people?
• Does any of this link with communication work taking place in another part of your organisation?

See Communication as a Process

Create or improve the ‘engine’ through which communication will flow:

• What content is coming through? From who, to whom and when?  (compile a communication calendar)
• What kind of content is this?  Will it be fact-based (best for written channels) or change-based (best for spoken channels)?
• Are the people who will be originating that content happy to use a submission and sign-off process?
• Does that content need feedback and if so, from whom and how is that being collected?

Develop People as Communicators Through Learning

Much about communication effectiveness relies on the competences of people who send and receive messages. Tailored awareness seminars can make a big difference to how people see their relevance to communication and how they understand that changed actions and behaviours could make an impact.  Imagine if everyone knew the answers to these questions:

• What is communication about today?
• Why does it sound easy but is notoriously difficult to get right?
• What’s the difference between communication that employees need to do and communication that the communication department does?
• What are the communication tensions that we need to navigate?
• What is your communication role in this organization and how can you do it better – to what ends?
• What known working communication practices can  you use to help you?

Is it working?  Audit your Communication

When lines of communication aren’t as effective as they could be, find out where the blockages are by conducting interviews and analysing communication data. Very often, simple changes improve efficiency and reduce frustration.

• Are people getting the information they want?
• How could people behave differently to yield better communication results?
• Are your managers fulfilling their role as communicators?