Communication Catalyst: Elevating Organizational Design Through Strategic Messaging
Jim Rohn said that "effective communication is 20% what you know and 80% how you feel about what you know." When it comes to organizational design, which inherently introduces significant change, the importance of communication cannot be overstated. During the organizational design process, effective communication goes beyond just sharing information; it involves addressing the emotional aspects experienced by individuals amid high uncertainty and ambiguity.
Like any transformative change, successful organizational design relies heavily on communication. Employing the right communication tactics at the appropriate moments can relieve the anxiety people feel about potential outcomes such as displacements, new roles, new responsibilities, and shifts in leadership. In this article, we outline the most impactful communication activities for each phase of the organizational design process.
Organizational Design Phase One: Initial declaration of organizational design effort
At the outset of any organizational design effort, it is critical to identify the impacts to key stakeholders. Leverage interviews to gather an understanding of the nature of the changes, new ways of working, tools and processes resulting from key changes, the potential fears or uncertainties that exist and how this will benefit team members and the organization.
The next step is to set the communication strategy and draft the initial plan. The three core elements of the communication strategy are to:
Raise awareness and engagement
Support adoption of the changes
Reaffirm the mission, vision, and values
To raise awareness and engagement leverage information learned from the interviews to craft key messages that articulate the why of the organizational design effort and the risks of not changing.
Support adoption of the changes with communications that help increase understanding of the why of the org design work and how it will enable the organization to be stronger and to garner support and trust. The plan will need to ensure the communication approach is tailored to specific audience needs and provides consistent messaging across the organization. Employees need to be informed and equipped with the right information at the right time.
Also provide feedback loops within the plan. It is important that employees not only receive communications, but that they can communicate back to the organization in an easy, yet effective way (e.g., surveys, dedicated email box, Q&A sessions with managers).
Reaffirm the mission, vision, and values of the organization and using empathy in communications. Organizational design work exposes sensitivities that are important to account for and provides an opportunity to reinforce the strength of your culture (or rebuild culture as a strength if the culture is not strong at the time of this work).
It is important to be transparent so that your people do not feel like they are operating in the dark (while balancing the need for confidentiality). Organizational design can cause employees to feel uncertain about their jobs and careers. Their lives are being impacted so it is important to meet them where they are and communicate with them in ways that match your company’s values and culture.
It’s now time to draft the communications plan. At this point, you know enough to build the framework and initial elements of the plan. This sets you up to be able to actively listen for enhancements to the plan during the design phase that will lead to greater effectiveness.
Organizational Design Phase Two: Designing the new organization
During this phase of the organizational design process, it is important to establish and develop critical partnerships. At a minimum, ensure that there is a three-way partnership with Human Resource Business Partners (HRBPs), Change Management, and Communications. These three groups can work together during the design phase to actively listen for changes and impacts that will be important to address or modify in the communication plan.
It is important to create a mechanism for monitoring “water cooler talk,” rumors, inaccurate information, and fears people are discussing. The HRBPs will be particularly helpful in raising awareness of this across the organization. Gather this information and formulate a way to address it in the plan (e.g., a high-level FAQ document, talking points for people leaders, regular touch points with key influencers).
Organizational Design Phase Three: Implementing the design
As the organizational design outputs are ready to implement, this is the time in the communication plan to begin increasing awareness and engagement, garnering support for the changes across the organization, and grounding all stakeholders in the mission and values of the organization.
Particularly effective during this phase are:
Layered communications, where multiple communication vehicles are used to deliver similar messages (layering provides varied opportunities to capture attention and match individual preferences)
Communication cascades will also be effective to provide structure and to manage the timing of critical and potentially sensitive communications
Implementing the planned feedback loops so that you can react quickly to concerns
Activating change champions within each function. These champions are influential voices at multiple levels. Establish a cadence of check-ins. Leverage these groups of leaders to temperature check the organization and to reinforce the most critical messaging
Organizational Design Phase Four: Post implementation
In post implementation, check-in on the success metrics that were established at the beginning of the organizational design initiative. Gauge effectiveness of the changes as well as an understanding of how the changes are being received. From a communications lens, consider what worked well and what can be improved for future work. The caveat is to be thoughtful in who you survey. While you want helpful and honest feedback, you do not want to stir negativity if there are some who are not happy with the changes implemented. Intentionally design the survey so that the results will tell you where to focus your efforts across the strategic elements: awareness or engagement, areas of adoption, or continuing to come back to the core. Also consider continuing feedback loops at a reduced frequency to solidify the progress made in the design work.
At Switch, when we engage clients with organizational design services, we highlight that identifying and including the communications lead / team and change management lead / team from the beginning is critical to the success of the work. The right communication and change strategy will enable your organization to effectively navigate the organizational design process. Reach out if we can help your organization develop and execute a communications strategy and plan to support organizational design efforts or other change initiatives.
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