magazin communication director 04 2011

Understanding rhetoric in corporate discourseA linguistic analysis of corporate communications

On BELFs and EFLs, NSEs and IBEsThe complications of English as an international business language

Proudly presenting theperfect press release(Almost) everything you need to know about good business writing

COMMUNICATION DIRECTORM a g a z i n e f o r C o r p o r a t e C o m m u n i c a t i o n s a n d P u b l i c R e l a t i o n s

www.communication-director.eu

04/2011

Colouring in communicationsFinding the words that fi t your organisation

3

04/2011 COMMUNICATION DIRECTOR

EDITORIAL

A popular website features a game called Bullshit Bingo. The instructions are as follows: “Before each meeting or conference call , visit Bullshit Bingo and print one copy of this game card for each player…. Check of f each block when you hear these words during the meeting or conference call. When you

get f ive blocks horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, stand up and shout “Bullshit ! ! ””. Some of the words include “Level Play-ing Field”, “Impactful” “Customer-Oriented”, “Leverage”, “Road map”, “Facilitate”, “Downsize”… no doubt we could be here all day, adding our own nominations to the list . Beyond its humorous intent , this website reminds us of the popular image of corporate communications : meaningless business-speak, empty phrases and convoluted concepts. At best , this kind of writ ing is evidence of woolly thinking, of concepts not quite fully grasped by the communicator. At worst , it represents an act of tacit deception: trying to create another, inaccurate version of events by pulling the wool over the reader’s eyes. This issue of Communication Director is designed to put a stop to all that ! Our focus is on lan-guage and writing in corporate communication: in other words, the tools of the corporate communicator’s trade. As one of the interviewees in our opening Storyteller article puts it , “As profes-sional communicators, we are there to write what our managers would write, if they only knew how. We’re the ones who know how to say it so the reader will get it .” Two of our authors refer to the famous ‘Five Ws’ of writ ing: the what, where, when, who and why. This suggests that good writing – as they def ine it , at least – is a measurable objective. It also describes a process of eliminating waste, l ike chisell ing away at an ungainly block of raw material until the essentials are revealed. We hope that this issue will be a step towards reaf f irming those essentials.

Marc-Oliver Voigt

[email protected]

Phot

o: M

oritz

Ven

nem

ann

4


TEAM PLAYER

How to improve personnel management and your career

Seeing eye to eye Face to face business meetings still have many advantages over their high-tech equivalents Richard Arvey

Best of both worlds Why one company combined their human resources and communications functions Interview with Nalin Miglani

BORDER CROSSER

Leading professionals working abroad Interview with Mauro Hoyer Director of Information, OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID)

STORY TELLER

Looking at the important questions of communication

What are words worth? The words we use and the language we choose are key elements of successful communication Dafydd Phillips

4

AGENDA SETTER Communication ideas in the eyes of experts

The power of silence

Showing a fresh face

LEADERS

CEOs in the eyes of the media

CEO Stockwatch by CARMA International

STRATEGIC THINKER The corporate and academic stand on communication

From natural disaster to national crisis This year, an earthquake, tsunami and the threat of radiation tested Japan’s crisis communications Lisbeth Clausen

Exploring the potential of IR 2.0Companies must work harder at integrating their online investor relationsKristin Koehler and Ansgar Zerfass

06“Rather than record a song, we felt the pub-lic would recognise the poignancy of silence and its clear association with remembrance.”

0610

14

24

28

32

36

40

50

“The problem was that radioactivity made the usual rescue measures especially hazardous.”

24

Phot

os: b

e m

ore

(3);

Priv

ate

5


54

58

62

66

70

74

Piling on the rhetoric in corporate communications Examples of environmental messaging show how companies apply the rules of rhetoricMagnus Fredriksson

This is my story, tell me yours Formulating a strong narrative for your company helps audiences relate to your workDavid Willows

The electronic evolution of the written word We are only beginning to measure how social media have affected the way we writePhilippe Borremans

ASSOCIATION European Association of Communication Directors

European Association of Communication Directors

QUESTIONS TO... The personal side of Communication Directors

Milva Karadzhova Head, Corporate Communications, Bella Bulgaria

78

82

86

90

92

98

Making global senseThe practical implications for Carlsberg of using English to communicate with its many international subsidiaries Interview with Anne-Marie Skov

Learn to dig deeper with linguistics Applying the science of linguistics to corporate communi-cations is an eye-opening exerciseJudy Delin

Business English: a lingua franca? English has emerged as the business world’s shared lan-guage of choice. But it is by no means a perfect solutionMarinel Gerritsen and Catherine Nickerson

Bringing an end to boring press releases A former journalist gives his tips on how to ensure your press releases catch attention for the right reasons Brandon Mitchener

On crafting the perfect message Whether writing for internal or external audiences, it is worth taking the time to choose the right approach Kossara Marchinkova

Five steps to speechwriting success The right words will help you connect with your audience; the right delivery will help you stick in their memory Fletcher Dean

“You can’t improve education, health, food production and supply without energy access. Imagine trying to ad-dress the health issue when people do not have electricity to even keep medicine in the right conditions.”

40“As communicators, we can use language to indicate group and personal identity on behalf of our organisations... and as a way of encod-ing personal qualities and characteristics.”

58

COMMUNICATIONS READER Book Reviews

6


In an attempt to raise their profile among British youth, and to draw attention to the sacrifices of those who served their coun-try, the Royal British Legion introduced the sound of silence into the UK music charts

by Neil Cranswick

THE POWER OF SILENCE

A lthough the days of standing on a Brit-ish high street in the wind and rain collecting money for charity may not entirely be a thing of the past, most charities have long since moved many of their funding activities online. But,

while charities have beefed up their online presences and made it easier than ever to donate to a range of good causes, straitened economic circumstances have meant that there is greater competition for each and every potential donation.

The Royal British Legion has existed for the last 90 years with the express intention of assisting those who have served, or are currently serving, in the British armed forces. Committed to the welfare, interests and memory of those who have served, The Legion is mainly visible through its annual Poppy Appeal: each November, volunteers sell paper poppies in return for donations. These poppies are tradition-ally worn on the lapel up until the end of the remembrance activities (Remembrance Day, which is held on November 11, and Remembrance Sunday, which is held on the second Sunday in November).

However, The Legion has recently seen some of their share of the publicity and money afforded to service chari-ties being given to Help For Heroes, a relatively new charity which also aims to provide support for ex-service people, although with a specific focus on helping those wounded, sick or injured in the line of duty. Founded in 2007, the charity raised over 100 million British pounds in its first four years, helped by its mixture of fundraising activities

and high-profile supporters. While not in direct competition with The Legion, Help For Heroes had stolen a march on the much older charity, gaining a younger audience through its use of digital communications.

Be More, the consumer practice of public relations firm Burson-Mars-teller, had observed the success of Help For Heroes in attracting youth support and felt that The Legion could similarly improve its strate-gies in this direction. Joe Sinclair, the digital director of Be More, told Communication Director how they approached The Legion as one of the organisations they would like to work with: “Our proposal sprung out of a conversation we’d been having in the office about how there was in-creasing confusion around the UK’s armed forces charities. We’d no-ticed a marked decrease in younger generations wearing poppies during the Remembrance period. We won-dered why. Charities such as Help For Heroes were doing a great job in attracting youth audiences via celeb-rity-endorsed activities and concerts. Considering The Legion’s ownership of uniquely powerful symbolic assets such as the Poppy Appeal and the two minute silence [the traditional, nation-wide observance in memory of servicemen and women], we felt that there was a real opportunity to make The Legion’s work relevant to new generations.”

POPULARISING THE POPPY APPEAL The idea presented by Be More turned out to be radically dif-ferent from the usual Legion cam-paign, although rooted in the tra-ditional observance of two minutes of silence: they suggested releasing a two-minute-long silent record into the music charts. Looking beyond the contradiction of silence appear-

AGENDA SETTERCommunication ideas in the eyes of experts

AGENDA SETTER

7


Phot

os: b

e m

ore;

The

Sun

; be

mor

e

Celebrities were used to capture public attention. Clockwise from the top left are: Iron Maiden singer Bruce Dickinson; The Sun newspaper coverage; girl group The Saturdays; and Radiohead singer Thom Yorke

ing in a music chart (however wel-come that may be), Sinclair summed up the challenge of this idea as “The Emperor’s New Clothes of public re-lations campaigns: it’s tough to get people to pay money for nothing!” However, The Legion were will-ing to try something new to reach a younger generation in an effort to increase the relevance of the 2010 Poppy Appeal – and, by extension, The Legion’s work – to a whole new audience.

The campaign was partly inspired by a Facebook campaign in 2009 to make Rage Against the Machine’s Killing in the Name number one in the Christmas music charts. While

that campaign was a protest movement against the domi-nation of singles released by X-Factor contestants, the ‘2 Minute Silence’ campaign was designed to make a more positive statement. According to Sinclair, the campaign was not focused on winning the highest chart position; rather, “Our music release was simply the content through which we were able to gain permission to engage the dig-ital generation with the wider goals and objectives of The Royal British Legion.” In an interview with the Daily Tel-egraph newspaper, Chris Simpkins, The Legion’s director general, expressed his wish that people would appreciate the significance of the absence of sound. “Rather than record a song, we felt the UK public would recognise the poignancy of silence and its clear association with remem-brance,” he said.

And, as with all pop hits, a music video was needed. To catch the attention of the target audience, the video fea-tured a range of celebrities, sportspersons, actors and musi-cians alongside ex-soldiers – and even David Cameron, the British prime minister. As a succession of famous and not-so-famous faces fill the screen, the only sound heard is the low hum of background noise. The involvement of famous faces was not just important to attract media attention, as Sinclair explained: “We also felt that the celebrity-fronted video for 2 Minute Silence worked as excellent collateral for knowledge gatekeepers, such as teachers and parents, to use in explaining the importance of the Remembrance period to younger generations.”

THE SOUND OF SILENCE The primary goal of the campaign was to generate positive coverage in youth-facing

AGENDA SETTER

8


Lloyd Salmons

Founder, Outside Line

Lloyd Salmons co-founded Outside Line with Ant Cauchi in 2000. Prior to this, he was responsible for setting up the international new-media marketing network at EMI, work-ing on campaigns which pioneered online music marketing techniques. Salmons has also been chairman of the IAB Social Media Council, helping to put his experience in to ensuring best practice across the industry.

A great deal to celebrate

The thought which fuels The Royal British Legion’s Two Minute Silence campaign is excellent, and I par ticu-larly liked the way that they used the silent record concept to spearhead the campaign. Reaching a younger de-mographic is a challenge which faces many organisations today, and focusing in on music in such a disruptive na-ture is a great way to stand out from the crowd. The quality of the video production was also commendable, along with obtaining suppor t from such a vast array of prominent A-list talent. It would have been nice to have seen the stories of the soldiers and the celebrities linked in some fashion, but the logistics of this would prob-ably have made this almost impossible to achieve. Personally, however, it is the fact that this campaign reached around 16 million social media users by harnessing the power of the ce-lebrities’ social media channels which I found the most interesting. This dem-onstrates that the ‘digital generation’ are increasingly being influenced by a new wave of media destinations, with the Facebook and Twitter profiles of their idols making for an increasingly complex communication landscape. All in all, there is a great deal to celebrate in The Royal British Legion’s campaign – the idea is spot on, the production is great and clearly the results have been positive.

On the social media map

This was a highly original idea executed with flair. The celebrity support and volume of coverage in the target audi-ence media is impressive. I am always a little sceptical when I see agencies claim-ing things like “we reached over 16 million followers of the celebs involved”. How many of those 16 million actually paid that post or tweet any attention? However, the 200,000 views the video attracted on YouTube is a great figure, as that is 200,000 people who should now have an opinion of the charity as one that is engaging with young people and is relevant to them. The one thing missing from what I have seen is messaging about what The Royal British Legion does. Yes, a new generation may be more aware of the importance of the two minutes silence, but do they understand the role of The Legion in the welfare of the Armed Forces community? How many now know how The Royal British Legion differs from Help For Heroes? I am being picky, but I would have liked something to have addressed this and rounded out the campaign. I am also a big fan of measure-ment, so an awareness and understanding audit of their target audience before and after the campaign would also have been helpful, but I appreciate that charity budg-ets do not always stretch that far. They have really put themselves on the social media map with this campaign and I look forward to seeing what they do for this year’s land-mark Rememberance Day on 11/11/11 to capitalise on their new fans.

EXPERT OPINIONmedia. With that in mind, obtain-ing social media support from Brit-ish celebrities popular with younger audiences, such as Coldplay, Stephen Fry and David Beckham, in addition to those who appeared in the video, played a key role in helping The Le-gion and Be More achieve their aim. Results published after the cam-paign indicate that this social media support helped them reach over 16 million followers of the celebrities involved in the campaign.

Despite the obvious limitations of the release as a ‘song’, the message it conveyed was a powerful one that clearly resonated with the public; 2 Minute Silence reached number 20 in the British music charts (the first time a silent track has ever charted in the UK). The campaign achieved the positive coverage The Legion had hoped for, with over 400 pieces of media coverage (with a combined circulation of over 122 million), which was heavily-weighted towards media in which The Legion had his-torically been largely absent, such as MTV, NME, Sky Sports, youth blogs and music review sites.

A NEW AUDIENCE FOR AN OLD APPEAL Chris Sinclair summed up the campaign in the following terms: “We secured over 20 high-profile celebrities to appear in our music video and sold tens of thousands of copies of our single, all of which returned tens of thousands of pounds in revenue to support The Legion’s work in supporting serving and ex-service men and women.” In fact, The Legion’s 2010 Poppy Ap-peal raised over 36 million British pounds. But what is perhaps more important – at least in terms of the next 90 years of The Legion – is that its silence is now heard even more clearly by a younger generation.

Emma Sheppard

Head of PR, St John Ambulance

Emma Sheppard is head of PR for St John Ambulance, where she manages the 12-strong PR team, promoting the charity and how first aid is the difference between life and death, as well as the organisation’s commercial work. The team has won three PR awards this year. Prior to joining St John Ambulance, she worked for Breakthrough Breast Cancer. Ph

otos

: Priv

ate

AGENDA SETTER

10


Emphasising their sustainability is a key strategic tool for many car manufacturers. BMW have revamped their communications to underline this evergreen theme

by Dafydd Phillips

T he 2007 annual report by the BMW Group is a sleek, elegant affair. Smart black text and mini-malist graphs are precisely set on cool, white pages, illustrated by carefully-selected glossy images of

their acclaimed cars. Other pictures show technicians, rac-ing teams, landscapes and city skylines: efficiency, industry, power. However, skip forward just a few years later, and the tone is very different. In their report looking back on 2010, the wealth of information is still there, with head-ings such as “Consolidated companies”, “Cost of sales” and “Pension provisions”. But in the photographs the vehicles are on equal footing with candid shots of employees hard at work and customers testing their new purchases with un-disguised glee. The cars are pictured not in some gleaming showroom or under stark factory lights, but pulling up out-side a bar in Madrid (a ‘Cerveceria Alemana’, no less: a nice touch) or crowded by hungry seagulls in Vancouver. This time, the car is firmly part of the environment, a contribut-ing member of society. The 2010 annual report kicked off a new identity for BMW, with a wholly different look and feel to the group’s approach to sustainability.

THE NEXT STEP This theme of social awareness and focus on people’s interaction with BMW is continued via their What’s Next campaign, which had ran for a year before receiving an image-overhaul this July and gained momentum with September’s Frankfurt Motor Show. Ac-cording to Bill McAndrews, BMW’s head of communi-cation strategy corporate communications, the campaign’s new look is designed to bring it into closer alignment with the corporate strategy announced in 2007, as well as the group’s long-established sustainability strategy. McAn-drews’s department runs this new campaign, and the group drew on support from two Munich-based agencies, Becc

SHOWING A FRESH FACE

and InterONE. “We told them that we wanted to keep our What’s Next idea - it was a successful initiative, because we had done some studies talking to various groups, and most of them told us “well, it’s interesting what BMW has done in the past but where is the company going? What’s around the corner?” BMW has always been an innovator, al-ways thinking about the next step.”

HOME VIDEOS McAndrews described the planning stages to Communication Director: “We began to look at issues of sustain-ability and deciding how we want to deal with these issues (…) at its most basic level, we’re now com-municating what BMW has been doing for years.” As an example, he cites the campaign’s handling of the issue of demographic change, a key

challenge facing Germany, and Eu-rope as a whole. In one of the vid-eos on the What’s Next website, an employee with 40 years’ experience with BMW is filmed at the group’s plant in Dingolfing, about 100 km

When you go the site there’s a tenden-cy now to stay there and watch the videos, at least for a few minutes.

AGENDA SETTER

11


Phot

os: B

MW

Gro

up;

north-east of Munich. To a backing track of modishly fuzzy guitar music, Mr Lang is shown enjoying the ben-efits of considerable investment by the group into making the workplace more ageappropriate: tilted screens show, elastic floorings, cranes to lift heavy material.

The video is part of a set that spearheads the campaign’s revital-ised image, and focuses on employ-ee’s roles within the group: at the time of going to print, other videos include zero-emission vehicles and environmentally-friendly materials. For McAndrews, it is vital that the videos have substance in that they feature real employees (or ‘associates’, as the BMW Group prefers to say) talking about real issues. “We only use real customers and associates, real people”, he told Communication Director; “these are not models.” For

McAndrews, associates “are the best and the most cred-ible ambassadors we have.” He identifies BMW’s history of innovation and “tight-knit community” as lying behind the new drive that is conveyed in the videos. (As further evidence of this company pride, McAndrews points to BMW’s “extremely low” attrition rate).

TRAINING THE TEAM When asked whether these online videos were deliberately designed to position BMW as a great employer, McAndrews replied: “I’m not sure I would use the word ‘deliberate’, but the briefing was quite clear - we wanted the campaign to bring forward various aspects we feel are definitely in the forefront.” Regardless of intent, the campaign has certainly had an invigorating ef-fect on the workforce, according to McAndrews: “What’s interesting about the associates that have participated so far, is that we have received great emails back from them telling us that their colleagues are speaking with them about it – that it has sparked an interest in people. We have also received calls from journalists who’ve seen these ads who want to write about these topics. So that was a very positive side-effect. That’s another thing we are quite pleased about.”

Paradoxical posters: ‘A revolutionary who wants to achieve absolutely nothing’ and ‘A visionary who wants to preserve’

AGENDA SETTER

12


To underline the importance of the issues at the heart of the campaign, in-house training has increasingly dealt with sustainability, as McAndrews explains: “Over the last years, we have increased training programmes. For example, in the last year alone every employee had an average of 2.4 days of training, and the previous year it was 1.6.(…) and we believe, at the end of the day, this will make BMW an even more successful company.”

The wider campaign continues to grow, with roll-outs planned in vari-ous German cities. But there is a strong focus on the website itself, as well as other channels for communicating the group’s sustainability engagement. For example, want to learn more about brake energy regeneration or aerody-namics? There’s an app for that. Web-site traffic is closely monitored, as well as press coverage.

THE HUMAN TOUCH Beyond the electronic gadgetry, McAndrews stresses the idea of the campaign’s au-thenticity. “Being authentic gives us credibility”, he told Communication Director. “That makes the campaign more accessible, which in turn makes the company feel more genuine.” The very human faces featured on the What’s Next website are more than accessories to the gleaming, polished cars. They represent a very different as-pect of the Munich-based powerhouse, a warmer and more accessible side. Ac-cording to McAndrews, “At the end of the day, there’s nothing like a person to person connection, even in today’s world… perhaps especially in today’s world. I hesitate to say it’s a trend, but I see there’s more of a response to this type of ad. When you go the site there’s a tendency now to stay there and watch the videos, and it gives a whole new aspect of the company that always ex-isted – it just was never out there.

Romy Fröhlich

Professor of Communica-tion, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich

Romy Fröhlich is a former president of the German Communication Association (DG-PuK) and former head of the German Public Relations Association’s (DPRG) Commission for Education in Public Relations. She was a visiting scholar at the Ohio State University in 1989, and at the University of Newcastle, Australia in 2002. She is a member of several Associate Editorial (Advisory) Boards and scientific journal review boards.

Responding to a trend

The automotive industry is facing major challenges: tough and persistently tight emission limits, increasing commodity prices, increasing shortage of qualified and skilled personnel, growing competi-tion from Asia – to name only some of the most prominent ones. Corporate communication is well advised to strategi-cally assimilate those issues in a proactive manner (and early enough!), otherwise it shall be judged as inactive and shiftless, especially in the era of the internet and social media. A further worldwide trend is represented through what we call ‘authenticity’. BMW’s What’s Next cam-paign picks up on those challenges and responds to the ongoing trend for more authenticity. The concept is convincing because it places emphasis on real testi-monials – real customers, associates and staff. The technical quality and dramatur-gical approach is excellent. So far, so good. However, the whole concept is nothing new. BMW is tardily jumping on the cur-rent bandwagon rather than developing a unique and innovative concept. This ap-plies to the concept of communicative authenticity, as well as to the selected topics, for example sustainability and de-mographic change. The latter needs to be embedded into an ambitious and unri-valled diversity concept (age, gender, eth-nicity etc.). Instead it is poorly displayed through the improvement of workplace ergonomics for the elderly, recently intro-duced at many other corporations, too. The opportunities which the convincing overall concept offers have been largely wasted.

Marcus Krüger

Spokesperson, ADAC

Marcus Krüger has been spokesperson for the automotive industry in the public relations de-partment of ADAC, Europe’s largest automo-bile club. He began his career in 2000 at the Center for Automotive Research in the Univer-sity of Applied Sciences in Gelsenkirchen, a role he continued until 2008. During this time, he managed the automobile brand index ADAC AutoMarxX and worked on ADAC’s customer satisfaction study “Praxistest”.

Successful sustainability

In order to ensure that individual mo-bility can be maintained at today’s lev-els of quality, car manufacturers have to develop alternative drive and fuel technologies. A campaign like BMW’s What’s Next serves to illustrate the consistent focus on sustainability of a company. The public debate in Ger-many on the issue of sustainability generally proceeds from a technical perspective: comparing the CO2 emissions of different models is an im-portant part of tests. And when buy-ing a car, the ‘g CO2/km’ value is a cru-cial criterion and is firmly established in customers’ minds. Therefore, new vehicles are often advertised with this value in mind. The resulting problem is that manufacturers can easily be com-pared on this basis, so they have to find ways to differentiate themselves from their competitors. The What’s Next campaign seems suitable for this purpose. Aside from cool technology, the customer is shown the company’s many efforts. By focusing on people, the campaign receives a personal touch, one of the many building blocks to successfully building a brand iden-tity. However, it will only be successful if the technical facts show, in parallel, a similar picture. The campaign will therefore support and increase con-fidence in sustainability progress. In particular, the success of the manufac-turers of strongly motorised models depends on the credibility of their efforts to improve the environmental compatibility of their vehicles.

EXPERT OPINION

Phot

os: P

rivat

e

14


Brinkmanship in the US and in the Eurozone dangled the global economy over a precipice during the latest period cov-ered by CARMA International’s survey of media reporting of the world’s business leaders – July 1 to September 28, 2011. Just in time, politicians and central bank chiefs acted in the hope of bringing the global economy back from the edge. Over this period, extreme turbulence shook financial markets as fear and dread grew at the prospect of a double dip recession for the global economy.

As if mirroring these storms, the top 20 rankings of CEOs in the CARMA survey experienced a shake-up, with half of our last survey’s names being replaced by risers from lower down the listing or by newcomers. However, one story dominated: a torrent of further revelations of phone hack-ing at newspapers within Rupert Murdoch’s News Cor-poration. While the wily Murdoch avoided unfavourable mentions in the last survey, he was unable to stem the tide.

CEO STOCKWATCHWatching the people who run the commercial world

by CARMA International

This survey shows the media frenzy yielded Murdoch twice the volume of reporting than that of the next most reported CEO, Warren Buffett. Yet only four per cent of Murdoch’s mentions were negative.

The bankers led the risers into the top 20. Brian Moyni-han of Bank of America took third place, while reports of huge losses caused by a rogue trader propelled Oswald Gru-bel of UBS bank into fifth place. Other bankers catapulted into the top 20 were Ralph Norris of Commonwealth Bank of Australia in 10th place and Frederic Oudea of Societe Generale in 19th. Josef Ackermann of Deutsche Bank rose to fourth (up from 13th), while Stuart Gulliver of HSBC edged up one place to 17th. By contrast, Jamie Dimon of JP Morgan slipped to 15th place (from seventh).

Two CEOs, Leo Apotheker of HP (sixth place) and Car-ol Bartz of Yahoo (13th) were fired by their boards amid negative publicity. By contrast, Steve Jobs’ resignation on

Top 20 CEOs worldwide | Top CEOs by volume in Q3

0 200 400 600 800 1000

News Corporation/Murdoch

Berkshire Hathaway/Buffett

Bank of America/Moynihan

Deutsche Bank/Ackermann

UBS/Grubel

Hewlett Packard/Apotheker

Apple/Jobs

Google/Page

BHP Billiton/Kloppers

Commonwealth Bank of Australia/Norris

Fiat/Marchionne

Volkswagen/Winterkorn

Yahoo/Bartz

Apple/Cook

JP Morgan/Dimon

BP/Dudley

HSBC/Gulliver

General Electric/Immelt

Societe Generale/Oudea

Daimler/Zetsche

Top 20 CEOs in Europe | Volume of coverage in Q3

0 20 40 60 80 100 120 140

News Corporation/Murdoch

Berkshire Hathaway/Buffett

Deutsche Bank/Ackermann

UBS/Grubel

Bank of America/Moynihan

Hewlett Packard/Apotheker

Apple/Jobs

Volkswagen/Winterkorn

Sberbank/Gref

BP/Dudley

Gazprom/Miller

Daimler/Zetsche

Fiat/Marchionne

Societe Generale/Oudea

RWE/Grossmann

Lloyds TSB/Osorio

Google/Page

Facebook/Zuckerberg

Metro/Cordes

Apple/Cook

LEADERSCEOs in the eyes of the media

15

LEADERS


health grounds spurred some highly favourable reporting. The much admired tech visionary died on October 5. Jobs’ replacement at Apple, chief operating officer Tim Cook, appeared in 14th place. Two CEOs of carmakers rose into the top 20: Martin Winterkorn of Volkswagen (12th) and Dieter Zetsche of Daimler Chrysler (20th).

Interestingly, in terms of themes, finance issues attracted less reporting – 44 per cent of overall volume, four points down. Reporting of management/leadership rose two points to 24 per cent. However, legal/regulatory issues re-corded the biggest increase – more than doubling from six per cent to 13 per cent. This surge was stoked by reports of the phone-hacking scandal at News Corp, and more than half of Murdoch’s mentions were linked to legal issues. By contrast, reporting on commercial/products and services/solutions both fell one point to nine per cent and six per cent respectively. Labour accounted for one per cent of re-porting. The smallest shares were held by society, govern-ance and environment/sustainability, with less than one per cent each.

RUPERT MURDOCH OF NEWS CORPORATION Rupert Murdoch’s fall to earth provoked a media frenzy. As a tidal wave of fresh phone hacking allegations flooded News Corp’s UK newspaper operations and sent shock waves

through public opinion, Murdoch finally lost his grip on the news agenda. Among the most damaging accusations was that a private investigator working for the News of the World had hacked into the mobile phone of the murdered British teenager Milly Dowler after she went missing.

Murdoch shut down the News of the World as politicians turned on the media mogul who had long held them in

favourable neutral unfavourable

Quality of CEO coverage | Percentage of favourable, neutral and unfavourable coverage

Murdoch

Buffet

Moynihan

Ackermann

Grubel

Apotheker

Jobs

Page

Kloppers

Norris

Marchionne

Winterkorn

Bartz

Cook

Dimon

Dudley

Gulliver

Immelt

Oudea

Zetsche

0 % 1 0 % 2 0 % 3 0 % 4 0 % 5 0 % 6 0 % 7 0 % 8 0 % 9 0 % 1 0 0 %

Soci

ety

Labo

ur

Themes most beneficial for CEOs | Favourability of topics

100%

80%

60%

40%

20%

0%

% favourable % neutral % unfavourable

Fina

nce

Man

agem

ent

Com

mer

cial

Prod

ucts

&

Serv

ices

Oth

er

Lega

l

Envi

ronm

ent

Gov

erna

nce

16

LEADERS


thrall. “Emergency debate – MPs on the attack”, declared the Financial Times on July 7: “Rupert Murdoch is clearly a very, very talented businessman, he’s possibly even a genius, but his organisation has grown too powerful and has abused that power. It has systematically corrupted the police and has gelded this parliament, to our shame”.

On July 9, the day Murdoch flew into London to confront the intensifying crisis, the FT carried a full-page analysis of “The Murdoch empire at bay”. In the 42 years since Mur-doch bought the then world’s best-selling newspaper, “the outsider whose Australian origins and taste for muck-raking journalism earned him the reputation of ‘Dirty Digger’ be-

came the most powerful media owner Britain has seen”. The FT believed this had changed dramatically: “But this week, a tabloid scandal Mr Murdoch would once have relished broke his spell over the political class, fracturing the new establishment that has formed around his London court in dramatic, permanent and costly fashion. The rupture poses the biggest threat to his empire since News Corp almost went bankrupt 20 years ago, and to James Murdoch’s status as his hand-picked successor” (“Digger in a Hole”, FT, July 9).

The furore led to Murdoch bowing to political pressure to drop his bid for control of British Sky Broadcasting

Worst performers on favourability

Best performers on favourability

100%

80%

60%

40%

20%

0%

% o

f vo

lum

e

Buffett Moynihan

The best and worst presented CEOs | Top performers vs bottom performers: differences in topic

Murdoch

100%

80%

60%

40%

20%

0%Buffett Moynihan

Top CEOs | Geographic spread of coverage

APAC

EMEA

LATAM

NAM

Bartz

Themes most associated with CEOs | Share of coverage of issues monitored in media

Finance(44%)

Management(24%)

Products (5%)

Labour (1%)

Other (2%)

Legal (13%)

Products, services

Management

Legal

Labour

Society

Governance

Finance

Commercial

Environment

Other

Society (1%) Governance (1%)

Environment (0%)

Page Apotheker

ApothekerMurdoch

Commercial(9%)

Page

Bartz

GET TO KNOW 10,000 PEOPLEWITHOUT VISITING THEM ALL.Consumer polls tell you what people do, but not why they do it. Which is why we createdEuroPNStyles, our comprehensive study of 10,000 people across Europe, designed to understand consumer habits, not just report them.

How do you convert a brand follower to a brand engager? What role do friends play in influencing health behaviours? When is social media not the right channel? Together with our ability to understand your brand, this means we can identify exactly what you need to say to them, and how you need to say it, in order to change their consumer behaviours. Then, of course, we can build a campaign to say it on your behalf – and all in a fraction of the time it would take you to visit them.

For more information on EuroPNStyles, email: [email protected]

www.porternovelli.com/uk

18

LEADERS


run for years, causing further erosion in the credibility of the Murdoch brand and costing News International mil-lions of dollars in potential legal settlements” (August 11). The Washington Post reflected on the “very different news media” that separated the US and Britain. “Both cover the news and, sometimes, raise a ruckus. But what’s acceptable (or at least tolerated) among reporters in Britain would be considered shocking here” (“Phone-hacking scandal puts media differences on display”, July 15).

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung called the scandal “the worst operational accident in the long career of the 80-year-old Murdoch” and suggested it was becoming “more and more likely that the old shark Murdoch, who is still CEO despite his advanced age, will have to give up his posi-tion” (July 23).

The Brazilian newspaper Valor Economico noted the cor-porate governance implications. “‘Rupert Murdoch inad-vertently placed corporate governance at centre stage. What people see now is that Murdoch’s practices are not good for business,’” says Carl Rosen, president of International Cor-porate Governance Network (ICGN)” (Valor Economico, August 25). The Australian Financial Review noted the feeble response of the News Corp board: “The independent directors, who have a fiduciary responsibility to the compa-ny’s shareholders, have remained silent amid the widening scandal at Murdoch’s media empire” (July 20).

The FT’s Lex Column (July 20) offered a crumb of com-fort: “Corporate reputational damage does not last forever”, observing that Siemens had emerged from a bribery scan-dal that cost it 2.5 billion euros and forced out the formerly well-respected chairman. “Still, while News Corp could af-ford to pay a similar 60 per cent of last year’s profits in fines, it has many more ill-wishers than Siemens. Also Rupert Murdoch, chairman, wants to stay.” Stay he might, but it

Murdoch | Coverage by region

APAC (36%)

EMEA (38%)

NAM (23%)

(BSkyB). The FT’s Lex Column observed that decision re-flected “News Corp’s realisation that the proposal – rightly or wrongly – has become so politicised that it could not pos-sibly proceed. With the scandal beginning to reverberate in the US, however, the company needs to do more to calm the political firestorm that has engulfed it.” (FT, July 14). An-other FT headline of July 14 declared: “Rupert Murdoch, like Napoleon, is a great bad man”.

The unfolding saga fascinated media around the world. “Dirty digging disgusts UK, threatens BSkyB deal”, said an Australian Financial Review headline of July 8. “Bringing down the over-mighty and the arrogant is one of the trade-marks of Murdoch-style journalism. The list of ministerial careers ruined and the reputations of public figures trashed is a long one. This week he has discovered just how it feels to be on the receiving end”, the AFR said on July 15.

On July 16, British national newspapers ran a signed apol-ogy from Rupert Murdoch over “serious wrongdoing” by the News of the World, the day after he had finally accepted the resignation of two trusted lieutenants: Rebekah Brooks, head of News International and Les Hinton, CEO of Dow Jones and publisher of the Wall Street Journal. On July 19, Murdoch appeared before the culture select committee of the British Parliament to answer questions, calling it “the most humble day of my life” (FT, July 20). The FT said Murdoch was “hesitant and deferential”, though the Daily Telegraph thought him “angry, obdurate and self-righteous” (July 20). The AFR thought Murdoch got through the hear-ing with “less damage than might be expected” (“Murdoch outfoxes his foxes for now” AFR, July 23).

The New York Times observed News Corp had “a his-tory of living by its own rules and operating beyond conse-quence. That ended last week” (July 25). Further investiga-tions seemed likely to make for “an inquisition that could

19

18

17

16

15

14

13

12

11

10

$

(m

illio

ns)

News Corp | Mired in controversy

01.0

7.20

11

06.0

7.20

11

11.0

7.20

11

16.0

7.20

11

21.0

7.20

11

26.0

7.20

11

31.0

7.20

11

05.0

8.20

44

10.0

8.20

11

15.0

8.20

11

20.0

8.20

11

25.0

8.20

11

30.0

8.20

11

04.0

9.20

11

09.0

9.20

11

14.0

9.20

11

19.0

9.20

11

24.0

9.20

11

July 7 “Murdoch shuts News of the World” FT

(July 8)

LATAM (3%)

July 19 “‘The most humble day of my life’” FT (July 20)

July 13 “News Corp scraps bid for BSkyB” FT (July 14)

Sep 23 “Coulson sues Murdoch group over legal

fees” FT (Sep 24)

19

LEADERS


The FT argued that, in many ways, the evidence pointed the other way, as UBS was very different from the bank Grubel inherited. He had cut assets sharply and restored profitability, while the investment bank was starting to get back on track. Grubel had also strengthened the bank’s capital base in line with tough new requirements by Swiss regulators. However, with pressures on profitability, the “order went out last year that it was time for the bank to start taking a little more risk again”. The FT observed that, despite praise from Swiss politicians and shareholders for his work in steering the bank through a damaging private banking tax row in the US, “the blunt-speaking banker from Germany has done little to keep the establishment on side – criticising regulatory reforms at every turn, lambast-ing politicians”.

After the trading scandal, some of Grubel’s earlier sup-porters had started questioning his style, even comparing it to the autocratic style of Sir Fred Goodwin, the disgraced former CEO of Royal Bank of Scotland. The FT quoted a “banker who knows him”: “‘No one questions Ossie, that’s the trouble’”.

“Such judgments would dismay Mr Grubel, who most agree came out of retirement for no other reason than to do his bit for Switzerland, and has taken a moral stance on a range of issues – including his own pay,” said the FT article (September 17). With his support waning, Grubel failed to win the board’s assent to his plans and resigned at the next board meeting in Singapore. Headlines included: “UBS chief quit after clash over strategy” (FT, September 26), “Resignation Brings Low a Swiss Banking Star” (Wall Street Journal Europe, September 26).

However, Grubel’s departure also dented confidence in UBS. “Dramatic exit seals bank’s fall from grace”, declared another FT headline. The article said the Swiss group “would be unlikely to join the ranks of the global invest-

seems Rupert Murdoch has lost his hold over British media and politics forever.

OSWALD GRUBEL OF UBS The leadership of Oswald Grubel of Swiss bank UBS was dealt a blow – later to prove decisive – when news broke that a “rogue trader” Kweku Adoboli had been arrested on September 16 over a 2 billion US dollar loss at UBS’s London investment banking arm.

In February 2009 Grubel was persuaded to come out of retirement to clean up UBS after the bank had raked up 50 billion US dollars of losses in the 2007-08 financial crisis. Yet ‘Saint Ossie’, as he was nicknamed, failed to prevent the latest trading scandal, which involved alleged criminal ac-tivity dating back to October 2008, the peak of the financial crisis. “Under chief executive Oswald Grubel”, declared The Wall Street Journal US, “the bank said it put in place new risk-management practices, pulled back from propriety trad-ing and focused on a low-risk client-driven model. This in-cident will test the faith of investors, clients and regulators” (“Faith in UBS Goes Rogue” WSJ US, September 16).

“Trading loss puts spotlight on Grubel’s leadership” de-clared the FT on September 17. The German banker had been regarded as a “demi-god” back in 2009, as “gruff as he was revered”, having steered Credit Suisse effectively through the boom years. UBS had lurched from one prob-lem to another in the immediate aftermath of the 2007-08 crisis, said the FT: “But now Ossie was here – and the Swiss establishment believed everything would be all right. It has not turned out that way. The question bankers and regula-tors are asking now is: was the alleged rogue trading revealed this week the fault of Mr Grubel and a natural consequence of the way he managed the bank?”

Grubel | Coverage by region

APAC (28%)NAM (20%)

20

19

18

17

16

15

14

13

12

11

10

$ (m

illio

ns)

UBS | Accusations of autocracy

01.0

7.20

11

06.0

7.20

11

11.0

7.20

11

16.0

7.20

11

21.0

7.20

11

26.0

7.20

11

31.0

7.20

11

05.0

8.20

44

10.0

8.20

11

15.0

8.20

11

20.0

8.20

11

25.0

8.20

11

30.0

8.20

11

04.0

9.20

11

09.0

9.20

11

14.0

9.20

11

19.0

9.20

11

24.0

9.20

11

EMEA (51%)

Aug 23 “UBS to cut workforce by 3,500”

FT (Aug 24)

LATAM (1%)

Sep 15 “UBS: Rogue Trader Hit Firm”

Wall Street Journal US (Sep 16)

July 26 “UBS pulls back on investment banking”

FT (July 27)

20

LEADERS


ment banking elite” (September 26). Grubel’s resignation had thrown the bank into “renewed turmoil” (WSJ Europe, September 26).

The FT’s Lex Column (September 26) denounced the UBS board for having “put its own interests above those of investors” and given in to public opinion. “By losing its nerve at the critical moment, it has lost the man most able to steer the Swiss bank back on course (again), and, in doing so, cre-ated unwelcome uncertainty. Mr Grubel accepted from the outset that the buck stopped with him, but he was expected to stand down only once stability had been restored”.

LEO APOTHEKER OF HEWLETT PACKARD Leo Apotheker’s tenure as CEO at Hewlett Packard met an abrupt end in September, only 11 months after he took over from Mark Hurd, who was controversially fired over allega-tions of sexual harassment and invalid expense claims.

The beginning of the end for Apotheker came with his announcement on August 18 of HP’s intention to spin off its huge personal computer division, abandon HP’s Touch-Pad tablet computer launched in July, and focus more on software, helped by the expensive acquisition of Autonomy, the UK software group, for around 7 billion British pounds. The news sent the shares into a tailspin: “Hewlett-Packard’s shares have lost more than a quarter of their value in two days as investors take fright over the timing and scale of a strategic overhaul by one of the world’s largest technol-ogy groups” (FT, August 20). “Investors Rebel against H-P Plan”, said The Wall Street Journal US (August 20).

The FT said the mistake was to have announced the changes at the same time as a profits warning (“HP should have avoided a big bang”, August 25). But a letter to the pa-per disagreed: “A big bang is precisely what HP needed and

Apotheker | Coverage by region

EMEA (47%)

40

38

36

34

32

30

28

26

24

22

20

$ (m

illio

ns)

HP | The ousting of Apotheker

01.0

7.20

11

06.0

7.20

11

11.0

7.20

11

16.0

7.20

11

21.0

7.20

11

26.0

7.20

11

31.0

7.20

11

05.0

8.20

44

10.0

8.20

11

15.0

8.20

11

20.0

8.20

11

25.0

8.20

11

30.0

8.20

11

04.0

9.20

11

09.0

9.20

11

14.0

9.20

11

19.0

9.20

11

24.0

9.20

11

its chief executive Leo Apotheker ought to be commended for prescribing the right medicine at the right time” (FT, Letters, August 30).

If HP’s board shared the correspondent’s confidence in Apotheker, by late September it had ebbed away. Shares rose sharply as speculation grew that it would fire the hap-less CEO. The Wall Street Journal US was scathing: “May-be Hewlett-Packard’s board should fire itself. After his dis-astrous 11-month tenure, news that Leo Apotheker may be ousted as chief executive drove HP shares up as much as 11 per cent. That vote of no confidence is understandable. Mr Apotheker has failed to get control of H-P’s flagging busi-nesses, has surprised investors with strategy changes and has proved a poor steward of shareholder capital.” (“Apoth-eker’s Potion Proves Poisonous for HP”, WSJ US, Septem-ber 22).

The HP board’s appointment of Meg Whitman, former eBay CEO, as successor to Apotheker did little to shore up confidence. The Wall Street Journal US said the change was “unlikely to quell the turmoil” at HP (“H-P Defends Hasty Whitman Hire”, September 23). The FT said her ap-pointment from among the board’s own members was “only likely to fuel the controversy that has dogged the company for years” (FT, September 23).

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung considered the ousting of Apotheker had not come soon enough. Finally, it said, the HP board had noticed that “Leo Apotheker does not have what it takes to be a leader. To this day, it remains their secret why they appointed Apotheker CEO a year ago”. It added, “The members of the board of HP should also re-sign”. In another article, FAZ called Apotheker “a language genius with a communication deficit” (September 24). The FT observed that the chief complaint against Apotheker

APAC (22%)NAM (24%)

LATAM (7%)

Aug 18 “Autonomy agrees to £6.7 billion HP take-

over” FT (Aug 19)

Sep 22 “HP names Whitman to take over from Apotheker” FT

(Sep 23)

Aug 19 “Investors rebel against H-P Plan” Wall

Street Journal US (Aug 20)

21

LEADERS


appeared to be that he was not a good communicator, either with investors or employees. “This is not a helpful charac-teristic in a chief executive”. However, it also blamed the board: “However, Mr Apotheker’s plan was endorsed by the board. Retreating on it, while abandoning him just a month after its unveiling, smacks of panic” (FT, September 23).

FREDERIC OUDEA OF SOCIETE GENERALE Turmoil in European financial markets thrust Frederic Oudea of Societe Generale into the media spotlight as he fought to defend the French bank from assaults on its share capital. The bank’s second quarter profits fell as a result of it mak-ing a writedown on its Greek sovereign debt holdings and Oudea warned that its 2012 profits target looked hard to reach “within the scheduled time frame” (“SocGen hit by exposure to Greece”, FT, August 4). However, the CEO attempted to remain upbeat: “The Q2 results testify to the Group’s resilience in an uncertain economic environment” (BBC News, August 3).

In mid-August, as Societe Generale found itself among the banks worst affected by market volatility, Oudea came out fighting. On CNBC television, he denounced as “‘stupid and unfounded’” rumours that Groupama, a French rein-surance company and owner of about four per cent of Soci-ete Generale’s shares, needed to sell some of its stake to raise capital (“SocGen fares the worst in bank rout”, FT, August 11). Les Echos also reported on the interview (August 11).

On September 14, the FT commented that “Frederic Oudea, chief executive of one of France’s most embattled banks, Societe Generale, has hit out at a succession of sys-temic problems – from rumour-mongering to unhelpful ac-counting rules – as he steps up his attempt to draw a line un-der the market’s bearish views of French lenders”. (“SocGen takes aim at market bears”, FT, September 14).

Oudea, who is also head of the French Banking Federa-tion, told Le Figaro that French banks were solid because Europe’s stress tests earlier in the year had found them to be so (WSJ Europe, September 23). Besides proving a stalwart leader for SocGen, Oudea also acted as an effective figure-head for French banks during tough market conditions.

MARTIN WINTERKORN OF VOLKSWAGEN Martin Winterkorn has presided over booming sales for Volkswa-gen’s nine car brands this year, fuelled by strong demand from emerging markets. Nevertheless, his ambition to turn VW into the world’s dominant carmaker met several road-blocks. Besides delays in its planned merger with Porsche, VW’s partnership with Suzuki descended into acrimony when Suzuki sought to end the relationship. The FT quoted Osamu Suzuki, the Japanese carmaker’s 81-year-old chair-man: “‘We asked for a divorce…There is no longer any pur-pose to VW’s shareholding’” (“Suzuki asks VW to dissolve alliance”, FT, September 12).

Relations between the two carmakers had already dete-riorated to the point where executives were said to be no longer speaking, said the article. Winterkorn, speaking to the Wall Street Journal Europe, blamed “slow decision making” at Suzuki for the partnership’s lack of progress. Underlying Suzuki’s unhappiness with VW was a sense that the German company was infringing on its independ-ence (FT, September 12). Osamu Suzuki was “astonished” by VW’s accusation that the Japanese carmaker had violated the partnership agreement by agreeing to an engine supply deal with Italy (“Escalation of words has strategy repercus-sions” FT, September 13). Suzuki claimed he had informed Winterkorn in January of his intention to use another en-gine supplier.

45

40

35

30

25

20

15

10

5

$ (m

illio

ns)

Societe Generale | Affected by market volatility

01.0

7.20

11

06.0

7.20

11

11.0

7.20

11

16.0

7.20

11

21.0

7.20

11

26.0

7.20

11

31.0

7.20

11

05.0

8.20

44

10.0

8.20

11

15.0

8.20

11

20.0

8.20

11

25.0

8.20

11

30.0

8.20

11

04.0

9.20

11

09.0

9.20

11

14.0

9.20

11

19.0

9.20

11

24.0

9.20

11

Aug 3 “SocGen hit by expo-sure to Greece” FT (Aug 4)

Oudea | Coverage by region

APAC (12%)

EMEA (66%)

NAM (22%)

Aug 10 “SocGen fares the worst in bank rout” FT (Aug 11)

Sep 13 “SocGen chief takes aim at market bears” FT (Sep 14)

22

LEADERS


By contrast, during the week of the spectacular Frankfurt motor show, Carlos Ghosn of Nissan and Renault and Dieter Zetsche of Daimler gave a “rosy assessment of their partner-ship” (FT, September 15). As the BBC observed: “With its coffers currently overflowing, with some 19 billion euros (26 billion US dollars) in net cash that could back an acquisi-tion spree, it is clear that Winterkorn and his sergeants must get better at embracing different cultures and bringing them together successfully” (BBC News, September 13).

SO WHAT DO WE LEARN? In many ways, the latest reporting period was dominated by the spectacle of Rupert Murdoch, once among the most dominating figures of the British media, being brought down to earth. As a result, Murdoch’s growth strategy through control of BSkyB had to be abandoned, and his influence over public and political life has been diminished.

The phone hacking affair proved, yet again, that the con-sequences of illegal and immoral activities will reach the

top of an organisation. Among the lessons for other business leaders is that to ignore, deny or fail to address behaviour of employees that breaches acceptable codes of conduct is no protection, and no one can count on ultimately escaping reputational damage or censure.

The phone hacking scandal dealt a blow to Murdoch’s in-fluence in British life, but he has still retained his position. Oswald Grubel was not so fortunate. That a rogue trader could run up huge losses undermined the respect, even rever-ence, in which Grubel was held for his ability to run a bank. It appeared that Grubel had failed to change the culture of the trading floor. So much for his claims to have tightened risk controls. Perhaps it was not so much that he had disap-pointed the hopes of the Swiss establishment that led to his resignation; after all, he had repaired UBS’s balance sheet. It could, instead, be more that his remorseless lambasting of politicians and reforms and an apparently autocratic man-agement style had alienated his supporters. Colleagues were said to have hesitated to question him. This does not make for a well-functioning board room.

That a senior banker of Oswald Grubel’s standing was prepared to take a moral stance is admirable. But perhaps more diplomacy and a more consensual style of management might have left him less isolated and helped ensure his sur-vival. For UBS, it is questionable whether Grubel’s depar-ture was the best outcome. His exit has clearly dented confi-dence in the bank, which may have lost the person most able to steer the bank through its latest troubles.

The firing of Leo Apotheker also demonstrated the im-portance of communication skills to a CEO. Though his plan to revamp and refocus Hewlett Packard may have had merit, he failed to communicate it effectively to investors. However, the HP board bungled its firing of him and un-dermined confidence by rushing the process of finding a successor, appointing someone deemed to be an odd fit to the role. By contrast, Frederic Oudea enhanced his repu-tation during the market turmoil by proving an effective communicator for Societe Generale and a figurehead for the French banks hit by their exposure to Greek sovereign debt.

For Martin Winterkorn, the deterioration of Volkswagen’s alliance with Suzuki into unseemly acrimony in the glare of the media highlighted the risk of partnerships. Though the Volkswagen brand may be too powerful to be seriously hurt by the squabble, it may make other potential partners less ready to get into bed with the German carmaker. The episode shows the importance for CEOs of showing an un-derstanding of other cultures and respect for businesses op-erating in them.

Winterkorn | Coverage by region

LATAM (1%)APAC (13%)

EMEA (73%)

NAM (13%)

140

130

120

110

100

90

80

$ (m

illio

ns)

VW | Unhappy marriage with Suzuki

01.0

7.20

11

06.0

7.20

11

11.0

7.20

11

16.0

7.20

11

21.0

7.20

11

26.0

7.20

11

31.0

7.20

11

05.0

8.20

44

10.0

8.20

11

15.0

8.20

11

20.0

8.20

11

25.0

8.20

11

30.0

8.20

11

04.0

9.20

11

09.0

9.20

11

14.0

9.20

11

19.0

9.20

11

24.0

9.20

11

Sep 12 “Suzuki demands di-vorce from VW” FT (Sep 13)

Sep 22 “Suzuki demands retraction from Volkswagen” FT (Sep 23)

WHEN RESULTS MATTER

When results matter. We can help. For more, see www.hillandknowlton.com or call Jason Frayne on +44 (0)7766 246841

Generic HK full page ad.indd 1 10/20/2011 3:36:10 PM

WHEN RESULTS MATTER

When results matter. We can help. For more, see www.hillandknowlton.com or call Jason Frayne on +44 (0)7766 246841

Generic HK full page ad.indd 1 10/20/2011 3:36:10 PM

24


FROM NATURAL DISASTER TO NATIONAL CRISISEarlier this year, Japan experienced a tri-fold emergency as an earthquake caused a tsunami and the threat of radiation, testing government communications to the limit

by Lisbeth Clausen

O n March 11, 2011, the world was informed by images that spoke their own language. Large ships were thrown towards land, and houses and cars floated on by. A magnitude nine earthquake caused a tsunami to wipe

away most of the Aichi prefecture in the northern part of Ja-pan, only 250 kilometres from Tokyo. To date, the death toll of the tsunami has reached more than 25,000 people. On top of this, the nuclear plant Fukushima Daiichi caught fire and the threat of radiation instantly became a global issue. The spread of radioactivity was an alarming and devastating side effect of the natural disaster. The radioactive threat caused

STRATEGIC THINKERThe corporate and academic stand on communication

by the earthquake complicated mat-ters and made crisis communication an overwhelming challenge to the Japanese government.

STEPS AND STAKEHOLDERS The Japanese government’s han-dling of this ‘mega crisis’ was in-fluenced by Japanese cultural issues that at times hampered decision making processes and made inter-nal and external communication ineffective. The government’s dis-

25

STRATEGIC THINKER


es of communication by having a strategy and turning cri-ses into goodwill was complicated by the lack of leadership. While the Japanese had foreseen that an earthquake would follow the historical earthquake in Tokyo in 1923, the one in 2011 still came as a surprise. The seismological warn-ings were very last-minute and no precautions were pos-sible. Although all the steps of classic crisis communication were taken, the actions were reactive with little attention to national and international stakeholders, as the following analysis shows.

JAPANESE GOVERNMENT Following an earthquake in Kobe in 1995, the Japanese government was compli-mented for restoring infrastructure but criticised for their lack of organisation and acting too late in the immediate aftermath of the disaster. This time the government quickly mobilised 10,000 people from the Defense Forces, includ-ing the coast guard, fire service and disaster relief teams. Hundreds of military aircraft and ships were dispatched to northern Japan. Highways were reserved for emergency use, rescue organisations were activated and nuclear plants were immediately shut down. However, the handling of the danger and of the disastrous effects of the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear facility in north-central Japan was widely criticised. The United States were particularly fierce in their criticism that information was held back thus jeopardising the security of citizens. “As radiation spread, Tokyo kept quiet”, was a headline in the Herald Tribune. The under-lining dilemma for the Japanese government was to keep people informed while refraining from disseminating news that would cause people in Tokyo to panic. The 35 million-strong metropolis was already suffering from the shut-down

semination of information concern-ing the nuclear accident was reactive rather than proactive: this became the biggest dilemma. The aim is ideally to turn crises into goodwill through management, or at least to prevent reputation damage through clear objectives, lines of command and plans for communication. In this year’s crisis, the Japanese gov-ernment’s reactive dissemination of information undermined the integ-rity of the nation and its leadership ability.

WHAT IS CRISIS COMMUNICA-TION? Communication of natural disasters inevitably involves a number of considerations about how, whom, when and what to communicate. The steps include being quick with the initial response, accurate and care-fully checking facts and keeping all spokespeople informed while mak-ing public safety number one. It in-cludes using all available channels to involve citizens and finally to provide rescue, stress and trauma counselling. An unforeseen factor following the tsunami was that the incident went from being a natural disaster – or ‘victim crisis’ – to becoming a nuclear radiation threat – or an ‘accident cri-sis’, which raises the question about responsibility: could this have been prevented?

THE STEPS The decision-mak-ing processes and the alignment of communication efforts were influ-enced by a mentality of securing ac-curacy through detail and consensus, but this was not effective in the ini-tial phase of the crisis management. While harmony and consensus is of importance in Japanese management, here taking immediate responsibility became a matter of utmost urgency. The ability to foresee the consequenc-

Interest groups & NGOs

Local citizens

Japanese government

InvestorsCorporations

Media

Other governments

Business community

Humanitarian Groups

Table I The stakeholders – model for a nation in crises

26

STRATEGIC THINKER


of electricity, and the fear of food and water supply short-age was spreading. The Japanese prime minister, Naoto Kan of the Social Democratic Party, later stepped down in the autumn. Although Kan made it a political quest to finance post-disaster reconstruction and promote renewable energy, his departure was largely perceived to be due to the lack of leadership during the crisis.

OTHER GOVERNMENTS Financial and humanitarian aid was promised by other countries in the region and from other parts of the world. The United States soon mobilised military support and navy warships. Germany sent dog troops and France sent a robot. Taiwan was the number one monetary contributor followed by China. The latter also offered to send a warship – which was understandably de-clined by the Japanese government due to the two countries’ shared history. Korea and other nearby countries offered fi-nancial support and large numbers of rescuers. The regional support to the Japanese people was received as a positive sign: Japan’s aggression during the Second World War still lingers in the mind of the region’s older generation.

CORPORATIONS Tepco, the Tokyo Electric Power Company in charge of maintaining the Fukushima Daiichi power plant, was soon criticised for neglect and insufficient handling of the catastrophe. According to observers there was a gap in the communication line between the govern-ment and Tepco executives. As a last resort Tepco asked 50 workers at the radioactive Fukushima Daiichi plant to go on a special mission to cool down the reactors. Consequent-ly, the so-called ‘Fukushima Daiichi Samurai’ were made national heroes for their rescue mission. Their names and identities remain unknown to the public (this is perceived as highly mysterious in countries outside Japan, where peo-ple would be praised as individuals). The effect of radiation on the health of the ‘heroes’ has not yet been made public.

THE BUSINESS AND FINANCE COMMUNITY The impact on Japan’s economy was first described as devastat-ing. Following the disaster the Nikkei immediately fell sev-eral per cent. A crisis in the world’s third largest economy also had a global effect, and the long-term economic blow to Japan is significant. The 1995 Kobe earthquake cost Japan 132 billion US dollars in damage and was the world’s most expensive natural disaster. The estimated cost of this tsuna-mi recovery is estimated more than 300 billion US dollars, breaking new records. Meanwhile optimistic statements were communicated by the former finance minister Ma-koto Utsumi. In his view, the incident may even spur Japan

to active reconstruction, with long-term positive benefits, and although Japan may not be able to repeat the economic miracle of the 1980s en-tirely, Minister Utsumi believes that regional and national reconstruction is possible. Japan, as we have seen, has the money, know-how, technol-ogy and, not least, the courage to face difficulties.

THE LOCAL CITIZENS Because of radioactivity, the area near Fuku-shima Daiichi will be closed dur-ing our lifetime. In the surrounding area, Japanese citizens are diligently and meticulously cleaning up. They patiently accept their destiny and mobilise their fighting spirit, or ‘gambaru’. Japan is one of the rich-est countries in the world and most Japanese are insured in a number of ways against illness or fire, yet few are insured against natural disasters. In the disaster area of Aichi and the surrounding prefectures, apartments, houses and cars were washed away and places of employment perished. The locals have suffered great losses. They are on their own – or at best, at the mercy of the government’s res-cue efforts. Locals working in the large multinational companies are secured with lifetime employment

Communicating in the face of a tsunami

The desire to secure accurate information hampered the ability to respond quickly

Dissemination of information was reac-tive

Other governments were quick to help

Citizens showed great resourcefulness

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

27

STRATEGIC THINKER


ity made the usual rescue measures especially hazardous, particularly in the Fukushima area in the proximity of the nuclear reactor.

NGOS AND INTEREST GROUPS The greatest effect of the earthquake and tsunami crises is the agenda setting of the issue of nuclear energy. The anti-nuclear groups have demonstrated in Japan and world-wide. The criticism of Tepco in Japan and the fear that nuclear plants around the world may be poorly maintained and dangerous in case of natural disasters made movements and governments take action. Japan announced that it will cut down its nuclear power plants, while Germany made similar claims. China said it would stop building more plants. The US media brought attention to a problematic plant in Nebraska, which is under water. The question of sustainable energy has been reappraised – at least for now. Recently, 60,000 people demonstrated against nuclear power in Tokyo’s Meiji Park. This is a clear message of dissatisfaction and a demand for change, not only from activists but also from the Japanese people.

LEARNING FROM DISASTER What can we learn from this case? The Japanese population won much sympathy from the world for its dignified way of handling the crises – in this sense many things were handled better than the damages of the Katarina hurricane in the United States. However, Japan’s national image was severely damaged in the aftermath, primarily due to insufficient informa-tion about radiation. Also, the follow up on the recon-struction was problematic. The opaque relationship between political decision-makers and private enter-prises created mistrust in the government’s capabil-ity to steer the country through its mega-crises. This may have been pre-vented through transparent communication lines and quick decision-making. Proactive communication through clear management of steps and stakeholders could have turned disaster into goodwill.

contracts, but underneath this layer of privileged citizens are many small businesses and family operations, farmers and fishermen. In times of crisis they are the economic losers. Since the Kobe earthquake, many of the craftspeople in the poorer areas around Kobe have not been able to rebuild their business. They are out-side the communications ‘power line’ and have no voice.

THE MEDIA During national disasters, all Japan’s citizens turn to the TV channel NHK. News of the tsunami was broadcast 24/7 with in-formation about how to handle the catastrophe. Just how pressing the situation had become for the Japa-nese government became apparent when Emperor Akihito appeared on television for the first time since his inauguration in 1989 to deliver an unprecedented speech of encourage-ment to the Japanese people. NHK

also broadcast the Emperor and Em-press’ visit to one of the government shelters in the tsunami area. Post-ers in the shelters had slogans like “Gambaru Nippon!”: “Japan, let’s keep fighting!”

HUMANITARIAN GROUPS Do-nations were made worldwide by countries, corporations and indi-viduals. Humanitarian groups in-cluding the Red Cross, Save the Children, Doctors Without Borders and religion-based international and local groups were activated. The problem for the human rescue teams on this occasion was that radioactiv-

Lisbeth Clausen

Copenhagen Business School

Lisbeth Clausen is an as-sociate professor at the Asia Research Centre and the Department of Intercultural Communication and Manage-ment at Copenhagen Business School. Her research interests are corporate communication and cultural globalisation with a focus on Japan.Ph

oto:

Cop

enha

gen

Busin

ess

Scho

ol

The problem was that radioactivity made the usual rescue measures

especially hazardous.

28

STRATEGIC THINKER


EXPLORING THE POTENTIAL OF IR 2.0 Financial communications increasingly rely on social media. But a recent study shows that online investor relations still has a way to go

by Kristin Koehler and Ansgar Zerfass

F inancial markets are experienc-ing turbulent times. With the prevailing Euro crisis and the

upcoming signs of a new economic downturn, investors, analysts, busi-ness media and other stakeholders in the financial community operate within an atmosphere of high un-certainty. Information and rumours are triggered by myriad discussions on the internet and the social web. Listed companies cannot ignore this highly-volatile situation. Lead-ers in corporate communications and investor relations face the challenge of engaging in a digital dialogue to (re)build reputation and gain trust on the virtual battlefields of opinion. In this context, social media platforms gain in impor-tance, especially for those who have to deal with large numbers of retail shareholders. Until now, little has been known about the actual use of social media for investor relations. An empirical study conducted by the University of Leipzig closes this gap. The research shows how com-panies in the US, the UK, France, Germany and Japan master finan-

29

STRATEGIC THINKER


Phot

o: p

hoto

case

.de

cial communications on Web 2.0. International differences in usage patterns reveal culture-specific rela-tionships with shareholders and the other participants in the financial markets. Full results of the study are available at www.slideshare.com/communicationmanagement.

MAJOR CHALLENGES Inves-tor relations are characterised by a high degree of regulation and legal standards. While the set of different shareholders and financial stake-holders are to some extent very well known to companies, their interests and demands often remain unclear. Traditionally, institutional inves-tors, analysts and financial journal-ists interact directly with investor relations officers and the company’s top executives. Regular platforms for this are investor relations conferenc-es, calls and one-on-one meetings. Retail shareholders are less well-known. They are usually targeted by corporate media (annual reports, shareholder newsletters) and inves-tor relations websites.

During the last decade, online investor relations helped to signifi-cantly improve transparency and real-time information of all market participants. The use of online tools in financial communications is quite common nowadays (it has even been approved by stock authorities for modernising the disclosure system). However, these approaches still fo-cus on the information function; news and figures relevant for the financial community are presented online, but it is up to the recipients to decide how they use it, and in-teraction with the company or with other shareholders is not stimulated. Social media add several new di-mensions to financial communica-tions on the web: structuration,

interpretation and networking are typical functions that can be fostered by integrating participative platforms into the overall investor relations strategy.

However, instruments and activities represent only one area of change. Investor relations officers have to deal with new opinion leaders from the social web, and most importantly with a change in how investment decisions

are shaped and made. Investors, as well as intermediar-ies (analysts, financial journalists), use social media for a selective search of information, as well as for publishing user-generated content and for communicating and col-laborating with others interested in specific shares. As a result, Twitter and the online community seekingalpha.com have established themselves as effective predictors of stock movements and earnings surprises. Investors refer to social media as a valuable knowledge base, a means to test their own investment decisions, and a noisemaker for the stock to go up. Retail shareholders rely on social media for other purposes: they demand that their voice is heard and use social media to democratise access to the company’s investor relations function. This rising demand adds to a number of benefits that investor relations officers already enjoy when implementing social media: new information technologies provide direct access to a broad set of inves-tors on a real-time basis. Small-cap companies may ben-efit from an increased awareness, amplified content and identifying new investors; large-cap companies can out-perform their competitors by acting as innovators.

STRONG ACTIVITY, SLOW INTENSITY Our interna-tional benchmarking study of 150 listed companies shows that investor relations officers increasingly integrate social media communication within their portfolio. However, most companies lack consistent strategies towards online financial communications. 142 out of the top 30 compa-nies in five countries (France, Germany, Japan, the UK and the US) used applications such as audiocasts, videos, blogs, share buttons, apps, RSS feeds etc. on their investor relations website. Despite relatively high adoption rates, the intensity of use differed significantly. Almost every blue chip at least provided webcasts accompanying earn-ings releases, quarterly reporting, or the annual general meeting. But interaction with the financial community on

Dialogical approaches like blogs or chats that offer the possibility for feedback are still nascent.

30

STRATEGIC THINKER


a regular basis and high levels of online engagement re-mained underrepresented. Furthermore, listed companies tend to stick to their traditional instruments and simply upload presentations from investor conferences, analyst meetings, or conference calls. Dialogical approaches, such as blogs or chats, that offer the possibility for feedback are still nascent.

Investor relations professionals are even more cautious when considering external social media platforms. Only 77 of the 150 companies analysed offered specific chan-nels for stock-related issues on one or more of these plat-forms. However, the study revealed that using external platforms correlated positively with a higher engagement, based on the number of presentations (SlideShare), videos (YouTube), tweets and re-tweets (Twitter), or posts and comments (Facebook). Twitter is the most actively used platform, while Facebook as a social network tended to be the most dialogical. Engaged companies linked to these external platforms from their investor relations websites; for example, by implementing share buttons. Obviously, many listed companies have discovered the value of inte-grated online communications and how social media fos-ters such an approach.

TALKING POINTS Topics most often discussed in in-vestor relations 2.0 are financial figures, corporate social responsibility and others. (Here, ‘others’ mean non-man-datory announcements that are not part of the statutory and legal requirements according to disclosure and dis-semination policies). Different channels are used for vari-ous topics: financial figures, strategic partnerships/coop-eration, corporate social responsibility and others tend to be the topics most suitable for external social networks. Changes in the composition of the board, mergers and ac-quisitions, cooperations and strategic decisions are more prevalent in social media platforms integrated in investor relations websites. The topics identified by content analysis illustrate today’s spectrum for financial communications on the web.

On an overall level, it is safe to say that social media are mostly used for information purposes and not for interact-ing online with shareholders or financial intermediaries. Online stakeholders still do not have the opportunity to get in direct contact with top management and interact on the board level, like institutional investors and well-known sell-side and buy-side analysts do.

INTERNATIONAL DIFFERENCES There are signifi-cant differences between the use of social media within

various countries and stock indices. Whereas French and UK businesses were more involved in interpretation via social media, Japanese blue chips solely referred to the information function. Corporations in the US clearly led the field with a broad and functionally-balanced social media engagement. DAX listed compa-nies in Germany were second and FTSE-listed businesses from the UK followed in most aspects.

The study also showed that excel-lent investor relations 2.0 is possible, regardless of the country of stock index. Further research is needed to identify the drivers for these differ-ences, which might be found in the realm of national cultures, profes-sional role taking and market struc-tures. Comparing the mean values of the investor relations 2.0 score, tech firms were (as expected) more active in investor relations 2.0 than other industries. Surprisingly, busi-ness to business companies were more engaged in investor relations 2.0 than their business to customer counterparts.

BEST PRACTICES Cisco Inc., an information technology company based in the US, outperformed any other company analysed in the in-ternational benchmarking study. Cisco’s investor relations depart-ment broadened its social web en-gagement with regard to platforms, dialogical approaches, intensity of use and networking functions. The corporation runs a blog dealing with opinions and insights from Cisco that is prominently linked from its investor relations website. Investor relations-relevant topics can be eas-ily found within the blog’s ‘analyst relations’ section. Corporate infor-mation is shared on Twitter, Face-book, YouTube, and Scribd. How-

31

STRATEGIC THINKER


is active on Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, too, and talks about financial issues on these platforms. As for Cisco, GE does not offer specific channels for investors on Facebook and Twitter. This is quite a surprise, because more than 20 different GE Facebook channels can be identified, e.g. for corporate, environment, careers, busi-ness units, and regional di-visions. At the same time, GE uses YouTube channels dealing with investor rela-tions and the annual share-holder meeting.

ROOM FOR MORE The German software company SAP runs dedicated inves-tor relations Twitter and SlideShare channels that solely comprise financial information. The corpo-rate YouTube and Facebook channels cover financial topics among other issues, and they are linked to the investor relations website. The DAX-listed company extensively uses video com-munication to present its business, products, man-agement team and its com-mitment to sustainability. Investor, analyst, and press conferences, as well as the annual shareholder meet-ing, are accompanied by webcasts. Still, feedback channels are limited within SAP’s investor relations ac-tivities on the web.

These examples show that social media can be integrated into financial communications. However, bearing in mind that our research focused on inter-national blue chips, the full potential of social media within financial communi-cations remains untapped.

ever, only the presentation-sharing platform Scribd represents an inves-tor relations-specific channel. Cisco offers a number of webcasts on the investor relations website which not only deal with mandatory events, like the annual shareholder meeting, but also with analyst meetings, in-vestor conferences, and other Cisco-specific formats (tech talk) – live and for download.

In its GE Reports blog, General Electric also deals with investor rela-tions topics. The blog is prominently linked from the investor relations website, and most recent posts are displayed within the news section. Private investors can benefit from daily reports and company insights. Jeff Immelt, chief executive officer of GE, addresses shareholders in video interviews and blog posts. The comment section is actively used, which supports the impression of a collaborative corporate culture. GE

Social media are of importance for investor relations and communication within the financial community

Social media offer financial communica-tions the possibility of greater transpar-ency, interaction with a broader public, and new stakeholders

A content analysis of the top 150 listed companies in five major markets (US, UK, France, Germany, Japan) shows that social media applications are al-ready implemented on almost any IR website. However, networking and dia-logue does not yet play a role

Financial communicators are even more reserved with regards to exter-nal social platforms like Facebook, Twit-ter, YouTube and SlideShare. Monitor-ing those networks should be at least obligatory for IROs

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Ansgar Zerfass

University of Leipzig

Ansgar Zerfass is a profes-sor of communication man-agement at the University of Leipzig, Germany. He has been researching digital com-munications in the corporate context since the mid-1990s and received several awards for online campaigns while working as a communication professional. Ph

otos

: Priv

ate

Kristin Koehler

University of Leipzig

Kristin Koehler works as a project manager for the Aca-demic Society for Corporate Management and Communi-cation, a non-profit initiative by blue-chip companies and several universities in Germany. She is also a research assist-ant at the University of Leipzig, Germany. Her research covers investor relations, social media and online public relations, and communication management.

32


E ver wonder if all those meetings you have with your colleagues have any value at all? It often seems as if they go off track, are dull and boring, have too many distractions and so forth. Are these face-to-face meetings really worth

it, especially compared to methods of interaction using other forms of business communications, such as teleconferencing, email, etc.? I would argue that, indeed, face-to-face business meetings can add great value compared to these technol-ogy-enhanced communications media. First, I note that

Although face-to-face meetings can be overshadowed by their high-tech alternatives, they still have a valuable role to play

by Richard Arvey

SEEING EYE TO EYE

TEAM PLAYERHow to improve personnel management and your career

there certainly seems to be a trend to use electronic media more fre-quently, and, correspondingly, there is a decrease in face-to-face meet-ings, especially those that involve travel and time away from the office. Recent surveys confirm this observa-tion, and the primary reason offered as explanation is that electronic me-dia are more cost-effective. However, there are still potential disadvantages

33

TEAM PLAYER


There are occasions when face-to-face meetings are more useful compared to electronically-aided communications.

studies comparing face-to-face communication groups versus computer-mediated groups (those using email, tel-econferencing, videoconferencing, etc.) in terms of their decision making effectiveness, the time to make decisions, and member satisfaction. Their results indicated that “the overall impact of computer-mediated communications in-dicates that its use is associated with more negative work outcomes than face-to-face groups”. The authors conclud-ed with this statement: “Computer-mediated communica-tion may be an efficient and rapid means of disseminating information, but the research to date suggest that is not the most effective means of making group decisions… managers must make the decision as whether the cost sav-ings in travel expenses and time outweigh the potential decrements in the quality of the decisions reached”. (Bal-tes/Dickson/Sherman/Bauer/LaGanke in Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 87, 2002.) So, if the research suggests that face-to-face business meet-ings are more effective, why does this occur? There are a number of possible psychological components of such meetings that help explain why. These include:

1: Face-to-face meetings allow members to engage in and observe verbal and non-verbal behaviour styles not cap-tured in most computer-mediated communication devices. There are subtle behaviours in hand gestures, voice quality and volume and facial expressions that are not noticeable in email discussions chat rooms and the like. Video confer-encing can come close, but does not capture the dynamics of all members – for example, participants may miss the expressions of others when one member is talking.

2: Face-to-face meetings occur in ‘real time’ as opposed to non-synchronised time. Computer-mediated commu-nications are often delayed because of a number of rea-sons, are not always received and are sometimes disrupt-ed. Also, time-zone differences between group members can be an issue.

3: Such face-to-face meetings allow participants the opportunity to develop important exchange relationships among themselves. These exchanges might be in the form of business negotiations, personal favours, promises, un-derstandings, etc. that cannot often be achieved via other communication modalities because of their personal and informal nature.

4: Face-to-face meetings afford participants the oppor-tunity to develop transparency and trust among the vari-

with computer-mediated communi-cation devices, such as when partici-pants carry on working, check email, engage in SMSing, have irrelevant conversations, and so on. In fact, there are occasions when face-to-face meetings are more useful compared to electronically-aided communica-tions. Under conditions of low time-pressure or low urgency, when deci-sions are less important, when there

is no need to reach consensus, and when the dialogue is primarily used for information exchange, then com-puter-aided communication devices are suitable. However, where there is a need for more complex social interactions, when tasks and deci-sions are more difficult and complex, and when there is a need to respond quickly, face-to-face communications are perhaps a more effective media channel. It is also probably true that a combination or appropriate mixture of both face-to-face meetings with computer-mediated communications will best serve the interests of organi-sations.

THE VALUE OF FACE-TO-FACE There is also some compelling re-search detailing the value of face-to-face meetings. From a simple busi-ness perspective, a variety of studies have shown the superiority of face-to-face business meetings compared to electronic communications devic-es. One particular study published in a prestigious journal of organi-sational behaviour abstracted and statistically summarised the results of 22 published and five unpublished

34

TEAM PLAYER


ous members in ways that are not always possible in other forms of communication.

5: Face-to-face meetings allow members to evaluate and judge the integrity, competencies and skills (e.g. verbal skills) of other participants in ways that are not accessible when using computer-mediated mechanisms.

6: Face-to-face meetings allow participants to develop strong social relationships. Such activities facilitate social bonding and showing commitment through sharing mutu-ally-meaningful experiences in a common physical space.

7: Face-to-face meetings also help participants to learn the relative norms of the organisation as well as its idiosyn-cratic culture. Information such as the value and meaning of time (i.e. the importance of showing up on time), who has more or less relative power in the organisation, what is valued, etc. are things which otherwise might not be observed in electronically-based communications devices.

8: Face-to-face business meetings allow important ‘side-line’ conversations among participants that are often very valuable in terms of helping members deal with complex decisions, information sharing and exchange, indicating agreement or disagreement with issues, etc.

9: Another advantage of face-to-face meetings is that they can provide a forum for members to obtain and give social support. Such support might come in the form of providing tangible assistance, information and emotional support that might be less forthcoming or less convincing in computer-aided media communications. Organisational life can be lonely and face-to-face meetings can help to al-leviate feelings of isolation and stress. A related advantage is that individuals are more apt to develop social identities: how they define themselves in terms of group member-ship. Attending face-to-face meetings helps individuals develop more clear understandings of how they themselves ‘belong’ in the organisation in which they work, how they fit in, and their relative status among group members.

10: Another component of face-to-face meetings is that they can allow the direct expression of humour that is not always clear when conveyed using computer-mediated communications. Often the correct ‘tone’ of emails are misunderstood, leaving receivers feeling angry and upset. In face-to-face meetings, members may feel more free to laugh, pun, and otherwise inject humour into conversa-

A variety of studies have shown the superiority of face-to-face meetings com-pared to electronic communications.

tions, whereas telecom and other computer aided media communica-tions are typically more sterile and represent ‘only business’.

11: Finally, another value added by using face-to-face meetings is simply that they permit human contact with one another, a primitive need shared by most human beings. Emailing

and teleconferencing are not as likely to meet these needs, notwithstand-ing the enormous popularity of Fa-cebook and other social networking media that essentially provide elec-tronic connections between social friends. However, the huge popu-larity of these websites suggests that more people might be even hungrier for social contacts than are being satisfied in their present day-to-day business and personal lives.

Face-to-face meetings can.....

Show verbal/non-verbal behaviours

Take part in real time

Help develop exchange relationships

Foster trust and transparency

Display skills and values of attendees

Allow for side-line conversations

Help foster social support

Allow for tone to be conveyed

Permit human contact

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

35

TEAM PLAYER


II. HOLDING THE MEETINGa. Welcome and introduce membersb. Identify who is in charge and any special roles to be

taken by the attendeesc. State the purpose and/or objectivesd. Review the time frame for the meetinge. Do an attendance or head count checkf. Determine the necessary decision making processes g. Make sure that discussions are not monopolised by one

or two peopleh. Try not to get distracted by off-agenda itemsi. Summarise the major decisions made (if any) and action

plans resulting from the meetingj. Agree on the level of confidentiality k. Terminate the meeting if it is over

III. AFTER THE MEETINGa. Prepare minutes and distribute them as soon as pos-

sible b. Follow-up on action itemsc. Gather feedback about items or events that detracted

from the meeting

By making meetings much more effective not only will we help ensure the quality of the work performed in the or-ganisation, but it will enhance the working and personal lives of individuals.

BEST OF BOTH WORLDS In conclusion, while it is clear that face-to-face meet-ings are perhaps being used less frequently and there are substitution effects via the use of computer-aided com-munication devices, it is my belief that face-to-face meet-ings are still important and that eliminating them as an option would be a mistake. However, I hasten to add that using both computer and face-to-face communication channels would be beneficial. The debate now shifts to de-ciding what the best mixture should be.

HOW TO IMPROVE YOUR MEET-INGS So far I have elaborated on the value of face-to-face meetings as well as the various psychological benefits of such meetings. But how can we make them more effective? Essentially, the overall value of business meetings is a simple function of costs and outcomes. Anything that lowers the costs of face-to-face meetings (i.e., travel costs, time, hotels, food etc.) will increase their utility. In addition, one can improve meetings. A quick internet search re-veals a number of articles and books about how to improve the efficiency of business meetings; I have abstracted various guidelines to making business meetings more effective from these sources, and present them in the fol-lowing:

1. PRIOR TO THE MEETING a. Decide whether a meeting is neces-

saryb. Decide who will attendc. Decide how long the meeting will last

and where it will be heldd. Define the purpose and/or objectives

of the meetinge. Prepare an agenda, including topics

for discussion, presenters, time allot-ted for each topic, etc.

f. Circulate information to those who will be in attendance

g. Indicate that participants should be on time and have read the relevant ma-terials

h. Assign roles to participants if needed (i.e. note-taker, facilitator, etc.)

i. Decide who sits wherej. Ensure that the location will be acces-

sible with good acoustics and air con-ditioning, etc.

k. Make sure adequate materials are available (e.g. over-head projectors that work, laptops that function, pens, etc. How many times have you gone to a meeting and the technology fails?

l. Prepare name tags if necessary.

Richard ArveyNational University of Singapore (NUS)

Professor Richard Arvey is head of the Department of Management and Organi-sation at the NUS Business School. He is an organi-sational psychologist and received his PhD from the University of Minnesota. His researches processes associ-ated with motivation and job satisfaction, as well as the de-terminants of leadership. He has taught and conducted re-search at the Universities of Houston, Tennessee, Califor-nia-Berkeley, and Minnesota.Ph

oto:

Priv

ate

36

TEAM PLAYER


Tata Global Beverages has combined its communications and human resources under one head: Nalin Miglani, chief human resources and communication officer. Is this the way forward for other companies?

Interview: Dafydd Phillips

You come from a strong background in human resources, but when you took on your current position in 2008 you became responsible not only for Tata Global Beverages’ hu-man resources, but also for its communications. Why do you think Tata wanted to combine the human resources function and the communications function under one head? The key challenge for Tata Global Beverages was to change people’s view of the organisation and engage them in our transformation journey. This had to be achieved both in-ternally with employees and externally with our other key stakeholders, so it made strategic sense at Tata Global Bev-erages for human resources and communications to work together as one team. In a nutshell, the beverage interests of the Tata Group were brought under one umbrella – ranging from Eight O’Clock Coffee in the US, Tetley Tea in the UK, Australia and Canada, Tata Tea in India, and so on. There was a clear change management aspect to my role as we were essentially building a new company. We had to stop thinking like different companies and think and oper-ate in a cohesive way. We had to align ourselves from an employee communications and human resources structure point of view, and introduce ourselves to the outside world to audiences such as analysts and media. We were embark-ing upon a journey of integration and transformation, for which both human resources and communication capabili-ties would be vital. The benefits of the joint role were clear. Having said that, I feel it can be a powerful combination in other organisations.

Could you briefly describe your current role?My role is first and foremost as a member of the Tata Glo-bal Beverages executive office, playing an active part in the total management of the business. My position as hu-man resources and communications head is not an added responsibility, because I consider these to be organisation

BEST OF BOTH WORLDS

functions that are responsible for de-livering business success in the same way as any other function. I think it is very important that my team and I position ourselves and operate as rounded business people with par-ticular expertise or specialities – not purely on a functional axis. We are fundamentally in the business, not a partner to it or supporter of it.

And what kind of responsibilities do you have? My responsibilities include, among others, delivering business strategy and enabling culture change; boost-ing Tata Global Beverage’s corporate brand among stakeholders, such as retailers, or partners, such as Pepsi-Co; capitalising on our leadership potential to drive the business toward our mission and vision to be the glo-bal leader in good-for-you beverages; developing Tata Global Beverage’s employer value proposition to ensure we attract and retain the best talent; and refreshing and harnessing exist-ing capability.

Why do you think that it is more usual to find combinations of marketing and communication functions than of hu-man resources and communications?Marketing is thought to be the natural home for communications

37

TEAM PLAYER


in many organisations, simply be-cause marketing does a considerable amount of brand communication already. It is also common to as-sume that capabilities required for marketing communications can be deployed for internal communica-tions. It can seem obvious to house communications in marketing if you look at the design from an internal capability point of view. However, if you now bring in the lens of the ex-ternal audiences that communica-tions teams are normally responsible for, you start to see a different pic-ture. The efforts of communications teams are normally directed at audi-ences who have a different ‘choice’ atmosphere. Unlike consumers of fast moving brands, the normal target audiences of the corporate communications teams – investors, potential employees, customers and

media – make their emotional and rational alignments in a different way. These audiences need more details of the company, presented to them in a consistent but interesting way. These audiences build a relationship in which they may have to invest a significant stake i.e. career, capital or

shelf space. For this reason it can be shrewd to co-locate communications teams with teams with a higher knowl-edge of the internal dynamic of the whole company. The relationship with the intended external audiences is more synchronised with the relevant internal teams.

Do you foresee more companies adopting this approach?To be honest, I don’t know. What I do know is that em-ployer branding is getting ever more important. Great companies are competing for great talent. Internal com-munication, employee engagement and the external com-

For this reason it can be shrewd to co-locate communi-cations teams with teams with a higher knowledge of the internal dynamic of the whole company.

Phot

o: P

rivat

e

38

TEAM PLAYER


munications of employer value proposition can be synchro-nised in a very powerful way. For example, what is being said externally about the employer can have crucial role in motivating employees. The truth is that people want to be proud of where they work. Competitive intensity in the market is increasing, particularly in fast-moving consumer goods, so if you can build a compelling corporate brand and healthy reputation externally, it will have a dramatic impact on your ability to attract and retain talented individuals. You can build employee engagement from the outside-in.

You are very passionate about brands. To what extent can the human resources function help drive a company’s brand and how should the communications department help them? The human resources team is a critical driver of a com-pany’s brand. For example, they can develop 360-degree programmes to build marketing and sales capability with-in the business; develop reward strategies that are more consumer-oriented; design the organisation in a way that makes it most responsive to the marketplace; and they are fundamental to the attraction, development and retention of great talent. By linking with the communication team at Tata Global Beverages, they ensure that everything they do is consistent with some communication principles we have developed internally, thereby strengthening the impact of each initiative. These principles include include the fact that the communicating organisation is different to the managing organisation – traditionally we think of organisations as having a CEO, other board members and some middle management, essentially a defined organisa-tion structure based around functions or departments and the work of the organisation is carried out via this hierar-chy. We believe that the communication goals of the busi-ness do not have to be achieved via this route. We want to access the ‘communicating’ organisation rather than the ‘managing’ organisation. From a human resources and communication perspective this involves facilitating a group of motivated and engaged individuals who sit out-side the traditional organisation hierarchy to drive culture change at every level within the business. This team has moved us forward further and quicker than we could have managed through any centrally-managed programme us-ing the formal management cascade. Also, having human resources and communications as part of the same team has meant that we’ve been able to stretch our principles across everything that the wider team does. Our perform-ance appraisal process (‘The Conversation’) and our per-sonal development planning processes are consistent with our communication style, but the processes themselves

also fundamentally reflect who we are. For us, the quality of the con-versations held between a manager and their team members is infinitely more important than ticking boxes and creating admin. We don’t even store paper records. That fact alone communicates.

How do external communications fit into all of this? When you turn to external commu-nications, the key is to align it with internal communication and provide access to insightful information about the company on a constant basis. The latter becomes possible by the mem-bership of the head of the human re-sources and communication function in the executive team. When external

communication resources are co-lo-cated with the human resources and internal communications function, a lot of synergy is possible with relation to the creation and deployment of in-tellectual content, communication materials and channels. For instance, we develop webinars for employees on the back of our quarterly perform-ance updates to analysts and media. Our external messaging and data is reflected internally.

What can corporate communicators learn from their colleagues in the hu-man resources department?Well, at Tata Global Beverages, communicators understand that communications is not effective if it is carried out in isolation of the or-ganisation dynamic. We follow the set of communications principles

When external communications are co-located with human resources, a lot of synergy is possible.

ADVERTISEMENT

39

TEAM PLAYER


Would you encourage commu-nicators to consider a career change into human resources?I don’t think communicators should consider a career change to human resources. While the two functions benefit from interaction with each other, both are very different in their capability requirements. There are many specialist streams in human resources e.g. remu-neration, organisation design, capability building and talent management that require spe-cialist knowledge and experi-ence. It is also possible that such specialist streams do not appeal to people in the com-munications function.

that I outlined above such as the communicating organisation is dif-ferent to the managing organisation. A base of these kind of principles is not possible without a rich and dy-namic co-existence with not just the human resources team, but also the rest of the business. It makes com-munication a strategic function with a business-oriented destina-tion, rather than a production line of communication materials. It ena-bles the communications team to constantly face up to the fact that communication has to be dynamic, adaptable, relevant, interesting and often entertaining. The human re-sources team, through its daily in-teraction with internal audiences, bring this to life in a real way. Ph

oto:

Priv

ate

Nalin Miglani

Chief HR and Communication Officer, Tata Global Beverages

Nalin Miglani has held nume-rous HR leadership roles in Asia, Africa, Europe and North America. He joined Tata Glo-bal Beverages in 2008, having previously worked at The Co-ca-Cola Company and British American Tobacco.

ADVERTISEMENT

40


MAURO HOYERDirector of Information, OFID


BORDER CROSSERExperiencing the unknown – PR professionals working abroad

41

BORDER CROSSER


Phot

o: P

rivat

e

From coal researcher to director of information: your career has certainly been a varied one. Could you help us trace the thread of communications through it – when did communications management first play a role in your career?Let me begin with my background. My first university degree was an en-gineering degree in fuel and energy. Coal at the time – and even now – is one of the most important fuels being used. I joined this coal research labo-ratory in Venezuela, which I left after two years to join Venezuela’s national oil and gas company, PDVSA. I think my beginning as a coal researcher taught me to be patient, and also that, in many cases, you get results by trial and error. After 10 years at PDVSA, I was seconded to the Ministry of Energy and Mines, where I was ex-ecutive assistant to Minister Alirio Parra. I acted as chief of staff and had to deal with communications, includ-ing press releases, press conferences, interviews for the Minister, etc. I also had to work very closely with the in-formation department at that institu-tion, so that gave me a lot of back-ground for my future career. When I returned to PDVSA two years later, I was appointed manager of interna-tional institutional relations. It was a new position and I had to introduce a publication and get more engaged in conferences and exhibitions. So many of the tools regarding communication started to appear in my professional development. Also, very importantly, in the mid-2000s I was the general manager of Petroguia, a publication house in Venezuela where the core business was the communication of products for the energy sector. From that position I had to deal with the whole process of printed and digital publications, which also became an asset for my future career.

As well as different disciplines, your career also covers sev-eral regions of the world: South America, the Middle East and now Europe. In your experience, are there certain ap-proaches to business or to communications in one of these regions that doesn’t carry over to another?I think more than regional, there are cultural differences that we have to take into account. But when we’re talk-ing about communications, it’s not only about cultural el-ements, but more importantly it’s about the target group to whom you would like to deliver the message. So, while I was working in Venezuela, for instance, our target was national audiences, and also to convey our expansion plans – in the case of PDVSA, expansion in the region and in the United States. In the Middle East, I saw an excellent inter-nal communication campaign in the company I was work-ing for, which was a national oil company. Now, working at OFID – the OPEC Fund for International Development – our work is to reach all of our stakeholders. That’s much more diverse because we have to consider not only the sec-tors we’re working in, but also the regions, the countries, our members’ countries. So regional issues can not be disre-garded by any means, but the most important things are the stakeholder and target groups that you are dealing with.

You mentioned becoming an executive assistant to the Ven-ezuelan Minister of Energy and Mines between 1992 and 1994. Is communication at government level very different from communication work in the private sector? Yes, of course. Working for a government, you somehow have to craft messages in a way that they are understood in all sectors in society, including some sectors which may oppose what you’re doing and try to modify the messages to gain political advantage. Remember, you’re talking to the country as a whole when you work for the government. In some cases, actions related to the message you have to deliver may even have some social cost for the population. So you have to be very aware of how to craft the messages so that people can assimilate and understand them. On the other hand, when you are working in the private sec-tor, you are usually communicating with other objectives that, in many cases, do not have a broad impact, unless of course you’re dealing with crisis management issues that impact the whole society. Another important issue is that in government, the media follows you most of the time, since what you do may have great impact in communities, your country, region or the world. In the case of the pri-vate sector or the international development sector, where I am working today, the media is not always interested in your activities and you have to be much smarter and posi-

42

BORDER CROSSER


tion your message. In our case, there is a saying, “Good news doesn’t make news”.

Are there any similarities?I think one of the main things is that, working at the gov-ernment level, you are often involved in political leader-ship, which demands that you develop skills for managing a group. When you are working in the private sector you can apply those skills in order to get better results. Also when you are in government you have to be a bit more balanced in what you say. So these two factors – the diplo-matic dimension and the interaction with different people – are very useful to translate into the private sector.

You’ve also worked in the lobbying field. Did that in any way prepare you for your current role?Our company had a lobbying group in the US so my re-sponsibility was to coordinate the activities of the lobbyists, and in many cases that included meeting with high-level officials from the US, including Congress representatives, Senators and other governmental figures. In some cases not only did we have to deliver positive news, like investment opportunities, but in a couple of cases we had to deal with a crisis when we were being sued by foreign governments. Then we have to convey our position and explain why the actions that were being taken regarding our company were

not appropriate. Again, these types of activities help you to develop diplomatic skills, not only regarding the people you are dealing with but also regarding the issues.

Why did you make the considerable move from Venezuela to Kuwait? Did you anticipate a culture shock?Throughout my career I have moved several times within my own country to several cities, and also to other coun-tries for both study and work. So, rather than thinking about my expectations, I was also thinking about work-ing on something challenging, even in a different country. When I joined the Kuwait Oil Company, I worked as a consultant on strategy planning. This was an activity I had some experience from previously working in Venezuela’s national oil company and, after working in the industry sector, to go back to the oil industry in an area like stra-

tegic planning was really very chal-lenging and very important to me. Another important thing regarding this cultural issue is that the oil and gas business is very global by nature, so in most of the places – whether it’s the Kuwaiti oil industry or the Venezuelan oil industry – there is a business culture that helps a lot, because I was using the same jargon and I was talking to people who at-tended the same conferences and who knew the type of activity we were working on, so that helps a lot in trying to adapt to a new country and to work there effectively.

So, in your opinion, do global energy markets necessitate global careers?Yes, indeed. Energy is required eve-rywhere, so with the production of energy in different countries you will find the same players who at-tend probably the same education institutions, and it’s a very global business. Most of the companies post their people in different places in the world throughout their career in order to help them develop their knowledge and assimilate cultures and to exchange expertise. Moreo-ver, this business requires all disci-plines and it is very important that people are trained in a global sense.

You seem to have cherished change and new challenges in your career?Of course, yes. Linking it with our previous question, we have to re-alise that nowadays we are global citizens. We are no longer national citizens. So anyone who really wants to develop professionally and intel-lectually has to be exposed to other cultures and other countries around the world, whatever the sector you’re working in, in order to grow as a per-son and to grow professionally. And another thing is, at times in your ca-

We have to realise that nowadays we are global citizens. We are no longer national citizens. Anyone who wants to

develop has to be exposed to other cultures.

BORDER CROSSER

Phot

os: P

rivat

e

43

BORDER CROSSER


reer you become more equipped with skills and experiences that may be useful in new sectors where interna-tional or global experience may play an important role.

From Kuwait you joined OFID’s Austri-an headquarters in September 2009 as director of the department of in-formation. What made you decide to make the change from a career in the energy sector to international devel-opment?In this decision – which was a very significant one in my life – there were two aspects; one of them was a professional aspect and one was a family aspect. From the family point of view, at the time we found that our family of five were living in four different countries on different con-tinents, so to meet each other was becoming more complicated, as you can imagine. And so Europe was a central point for us. So that was par-tially the decision. But more impor-tantly, professionally it was not only about the responsibility of leading the information department, but it was also the challenge of being part of the team responsible for high-lighting the role of this institution, highlighting OFID’s achievements and also our noble mission, which is to say South-South cooperation. Also a very important factor was that our current director general, Suleiman J. Al-Herbish, has given a great priority to enhancing the visibility of the institution to cre-ate more awareness about one of our main objectives, which is supporting our partner countries in their efforts to achieve poverty eradication. So from the beginning I have a very strong ally in our boss, which is very important when you want to develop a new strategy or move to another position.

Superficially, your current field – international development – seems to be a world away from the global energy sector. Are there any commonalities between the two jobs?As a matter of fact, there are more commonalities than many people are aware of, and one of the most impor-tant challenges nowadays for both sectors is Sustainable Energy Access. You may recall that in the year 2000, the United Nations – supported by the world leaders – adopt-ed the UN Millennium Declaration, establishing eight millennium development goals with the specific target of the year 2015, mainly in order to advance the allevia-tion of poverty and to address other developmental issues, such as hunger, literacy, health and so on. Unfortunately,

expectations regarding meeting these goals are not very optimistic. On the other hand, OFID and other institu-tions have been indicating that energy poverty alleviation was the missing millennium development goal. You may ask why. Well, the answer is that modern energy services are enablers for the achievement of the millenium devel-opment goals. So, for example, you can not effectively improve education, health, food production and supply without energy access. Imagine when you are trying to address the health issue, but people do not have electricity to even keep medicine in the right conditions. So the con-

You can’t effectively improve education, health, food production and supply without energy access. Imagine try-ing to address the health issue when people do not have electricity to even keep medicine in the right conditions.

44

BORDER CROSSER


nection here is energy. You want to improve the literacy rate in many countries, but people can only stay in school for part of the day, because without modern energy serv-ices they can not attend for longer hours or even study at home. So there is a connection between the global energy industry and international development. The solution will require the participation of all players, not only interna-tional development players but also the private sector and the NGO sector. As a matter of fact, the United Nations has realised this situation, and the year 2012 has been designated the International Year of Sustainable Energy for All. On OFID’s side, energy poverty alleviation has been a priority for several years already and something we have been mandated to pursue by our member countries, who highlighted the link between energy access and pov-erty eradication at the Third OPEC Summit in Riyadh in 2007. We are glad to be working with other partners on what has become a global priority.

Could you briefly outline OFID’s mission for those of our readers who may be unfamiliar with it, and also explain your communication strategy?OFID is an institution that was started 35 years ago this year. What makes OFID very particular regarding inter-national development institutions is that our members are developing countries. This is what we call a “South-South cooperation institution” – we are developing countries as-sisting other developing countries. There are other South-South cooperation institutions, but we are one of the old-est. We aspire to a world where sustainable development is centred on human capacity building, so we believe that education is very important tool of international devel-opment in eradicating poverty, which is part of our mis-sion. Apart from the operational activities that we carry out – like offering assistance to countries via financial mechanisms – my responsibility here is to communicate to the different stakeholders what we’re doing. Because it’s not just a matter of working in the countries; we need partners, not only those countries that we work with, but other international institutions, like the World Bank, like the African Development Bank, and so on. We are in the process of implementing a new communication strategy to make our campaigns more effective. We are trying to get an adequate balance of the communications tools ac-cording to the different stakeholder interests and our ob-jectives and resources. The tools that we have been using for many years are printed materials, audiovisual, infor-mation communication technologies. We have introduced new social media tools such as media networking events

and stakeholder relations. Remem-ber, we operate in 130 countries, so among our stakeholders are not only those partner countries – we call them partner countries rather than beneficiary countries – but also our member countries, those who established OFID, the media, academia and our own staff. So the essence of this strategy is to balance the communication tools in an ade-quate manner that considers the in-terest of those stakeholders, so that we can reach them in an effec

Through its parent organisation, OPEC, OFID deals with high-finance, governments and industry leaders. Do you try and reach out to other, less high-level groups: the young, in-dividuals, schools, etc? If so, how?It’s embedded in our vision, which is – and I’m quoting directly here – “to aspire to a world where sustainable development centred on human ca-pacity building is a reality for all.” So that “centred on human capac-ity building” entails to work mostly with young people to make sustain-able development a reality. So OFID as an institution, apart from provid-ing resources through projects, as-sisting and cooperating in building schools, universities and facilities for the educational system, is also nowadays targeting young people. We support a lot of young people to attend important conferences in order for them to develop leadership skills. For instance, we are a partner of the Lindau Foundation, where young scholars are brought together at an annual meeting with Nobel

We aspire to a world where sustain-able development is centred on human capacity building.

BORDER CROSSER

45

BORDER CROSSER


In your current role, you manage a multicultural group. How did your career prepare you for managing such a group?At the beginning of my career, I was working in a na-tional environment. But later international exposure – through conferences, meetings, working in other countries – helped me to understand other cultures and other work values and attitudes that are really useful for managing the multicultural group I work with today. In my group there are nationals from 13 different countries from all the regions of the world. This experience and my exposure to work in different places and to interaction with different people, my skills in handling sensitive is-sues, have added a lot of value to the way I manage this group. And one of the most important things regarding this multicultural issue is not only the management ap-proach but is also the integration aspect. Because in some cases you come across different work and attitude values, and I am really glad to say at OFID we have managed to integrate a real spirit of teamwork.

Where do you see yourself moving onto in the future?I enjoy my current posi-tion and the team I am working with. However, I still feel there is a lot to be done to enhance the vis-ibility of our institution. Because, by promoting OFID, hopefully we will also be promoting the need for more cooperation and solidarity in addressing the poverty issue. In this regard, I do not foresee a move in the near future, because I regard our sta-tus as a work in progress. Hopefully with the sup-port of OFID’s staff we will be able to continue our achievements. Finally, to live in Europe and hav-ing the privilege to have Austria as a host country and to live in Vienna has been a great benefit to me and my family.

Prize winners in different areas to interact. We are very proud that we have been supporting that institu-tion for several years. By the same token, there is one initiative, One Young World – the last event was held in September and brought over 1,200 young people from 170 coun-tries – which we are very proud to be sponsoring. We have a scholarship programme. But apart from those specific projects, now we are target-ing them through social media. We started a campaign early this year, and have been successful in com-parison with other international development institutions. We want to receive feedback on what we are doing. This is very important for us. Hence, we’re working on Facebook, on Twitter, on YouTube and that’s something that connects us with this specific group of stakeholders, young people.

The range and variety of projects supported by OFID through loans and grants is impressive. Do these very different projects demand different communication styles?Well, the communication strategy is one, and we always keep in mind our ultimate mission, which is to help to eradicate poverty. In the variety of projects we deal with, we have to use different tactics and tools, and that’s why our new communication strat-egy is trying to encompass regional and sectoral media plans. So prob-ably next year we will introduce an-other regional plan in Latin Amer-ica or Asia. And also the different stakeholder groups have to be borne in mind. And we’re talking about three different things altogether – stakeholders, region, demographic target groups – and all that demands different tactics and different tools to be more effective in those groups. Ph

oto:

Priv

at

Mauro Hoyer

Director, Department of Information,

OFID

Mauro Hoyer has held his cur-rent position at the OPEC Fund for International Development (OFID) since September 2009. Throughout his 30-year career, he has worked extensively in the oil and gas sector, holding various technical and manage-rial positions in the areas of government affairs, external relations, strategic planning, e-business and downstream op-erations, during which he has accumulated over 10 years of direct experience in corporate communications. Hoyer was latterly a strategic planning consultant for the Kuwait Oil Company and international af-fairs manager for Petróleos de Venezuela.

� � � � � � � � � � � � �

� � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �

� � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � �

� � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � � ��

Join us in Amsterdam for a celebration of the best in European communications over the past year. Meet your peers from across the continent at the annual

European Excellence Awards Gala Ceremony at the Beurs van Berlage, and enjoy a memorable night with the cream of the European communications community.

48


STORY TELLERLooking at the important questions of communication

49

STORY TELLER


“What are words worth?” by Dafydd Phillipspage 50 - 53

“Making global sense” Interview with Ann-Marie Skovpage 54 - 57

“Learn to dig deeper with linguistics” by Judy Delin page 58 - 61

“Business English: a lingua franca?” by Marinel Gerritsen and Catherine Nickersonpage 62 - 65

“Bringing an end to boring press releases” by Brandon Mitchenerpage 66 - 69

“On crafting the perfect message” by Kossara Marchinkovapage 70 - 73

“Five steps to speechwriting success” by Fletcher Deanpage 74 - 77

“Piling on the rhetoric in corporate communications” by Magnus Fredrikssonpage 78 - 81

“This is my story, tell me yours” by David Willowspage 82 - 85

“The electronic evolution of the written word” by Philippe Borremanspage 86 - 89

COLOURING IN COMMUNICATIONSFinding the words that fit your communications

50

STORY TELLER


Choosing ‘the best words in the best order’ is more than just a question of style: good writing brings life to your organisation

by Dafydd Phillips

WHAT ARE WORDS WORTH?

I have seen the future and it is covered in la-tex”. This gem of corporate communications landed on the desk of Paul Abrahams many years ago when he worked as a journalist. To-day he is head of corporate communications, EMEA, at Nomura, and he still remembers

that phrase: a sign, surely, of successful communication? “I’ve never been able to top that”, he says, perhaps with tongue in cheek. On a more serious note, the example does contain several qualities that many would agree are the hallmarks of good writing. Short, sharp and to the point – with a dash of humour as well. But what constitutes good corporate writ-ing? As writers, corporate communicators are trapped in a half-way house, between the need to be eloquently informa-

tive on the one hand, and the business demands of the management team on the other. Communicating com-plicated business strategies in a way that does not tread on the toes of legal requirements, the bewildering choice of tools, platforms and channels that have developed with the growth of social media, and the difficulty of communicating across international borders: must the style of writing in corporate communications by neces-sity deviate from the kind of quality expected elsewhere?

51

STORY TELLER


ture the spirit of your organisation but also somehow stand apart from the competition. As House puts it, “In terms of tone, it’s a noisy ‘battle for attention’ out there. Flat and objective doesn’t do it any more. People remember effec-tive communicators with strong personal styles, like Steve Jobs, or Richard Branson, or even Jack Welch.” It is not easy to define tone of voice: it will change from strategy to strategy, from company to company, and from project to project. Factual or technical guides call for a neutral tone; an annual report might be best served with a lively, posi-tive style; and a press release should be phrased as simply and factually as possible, so that the press will not re-word your news. A good example of adapting your tone of voice for a specific audience is the acclaimed ‘One’ magazine, which is handed out to all employees at UniCredit, the Italian-based banking organisation with operations in 22 countries. The magazine features a range of texts, from news items and interviews to reports on roundtables and articles on sponsored events. Faced with this variety of content, Felix Göttler, UniCredit’s head of internal and online communication, has a basic rule and that is that “tone and writing style must always be appropriate to the various topics. This means that the style of articles with a strong human interest may be more informal than those with a strategic focus. After all, the style must suit the format deployed, whether it be a report, an interview, a

feature, a column or a commentary. As a rule, a consistent tone throughout all articles does not appeal to readers.” The tone of voice also determines or is determined by the attitude of the communications to the topic at hand, as Göttler explains: “Sometimes a neutral tone is correct, yet when talking about topics like working families, a more personal style is appropriate. At most, we see ourselves as cheerleaders when reporting on “soft” topics like major celebrations or sporting events; in our experience, readers do not appreciate the use of enthusiastic vocabulary in any other context.”

THE BEST WORDS IN THE BEST ORDER Judging these different tones of voice is a major challenge in cor-porate writing: how do you make sure that your different ‘voices’ don’t come across as insincere? “It is important

In terms of tone, it’s a noisy ‘battle for attention’ out there. Flat and objective doesn’t do it any more. People remember effective communicators with strong personal styles.

CLEAR AND CONCISE Paul Ab-rahams does not think so: “Good writing is good writing”, he says. As a young journalist, the Finan-cial Times sent him to journalism school, an experience he credits with setting standards for his writ-ing that he still sticks to. “It was very effective in making me write in short sentences, using shorter words. Clear, concise writing is im-portant, both in journalism and in communications.” Early on in his time at Nomura he wrote a style guide which to this day is given to new employees on their induction. His number one writing tip is to “use full stops as often as possible, rather than let sentences drift with multiple clauses which may make the author seem sophisticated and over-educated, but actually makes it more difficult to understand the meaning of the sentence”. Estab-lishing a style guide that asserts a commonly-accepted and consist-ent set of guidelines for things like spelling and syntax might strike you as the first step towards ensuring consistent quality in your compa-ny’s copy, but what do you include in the guide and what do you leave out? Let’s look at the essentials. Richard House is director of possi-bilities at Story fountain, an inter-national consultancy specialising in corporate stories. In his opinion, the basics of good writing are “Clarity, simplicity, brevity.” Beyond that, he believes that writing should some-how embody the persona of the company: “The persona (who is to be) projected in written or spoken communication does more to form opinions than either content (what to say) or form (how to say it).”

In the written word, ‘persona’ might be translated into ‘tone of voice’, which needs to not only cap-

52

STORY TELLER


Applying discourse analysis to corporate communications is a growing field of study. Dr Veroni-ka Köller of the University of Lancaster, UK, has researched the role of metaphor in corporate communications, for example in “Business women and war metaphors: possessive, jealous and pugnacious?”.The favouring of certain metaphors in relation to a particular sector or group (in this case, business women) is the result of a mixture of deliberate and unconscious choices by the writers, as Dr Köller told Communication Director: “The more conventional metaphoric expressions, e.g. “she joined the top brass”, are probably used unconsciously, as a cliché that is likely to be produced when journalists have little time to write an article.

But there are also more unusual, novel or creative expressions, e.g. “she is a fearsome fighter”, which journalists may use deliberately to make their texts interesting and entertaining. I found in my research that businesswomen sometimes use exaggerated war metaphors to re-fer to themselves, e.g. “I am ruthless in using every bullet I have”. By doing so, they may hope to capitalise on the positive value that an aggressive masculinity has in certain business contexts.” Dr Köller also argues that the preponderance of religions and political metaphors in corporate communications are meant to align the company along an established model of religious or political power-entity. Such metaphors helps to structure “the company as a community, and thereby foster stakeholder loyalty”.

Thus the use of language is just another tool for increasing productivity and profits. “It is no coincidence” she says, “that it is the areas of religion and politics that corporate writers are drawing on, even if they do so un- or semi-consciously. Because those used to have the social and cultural power that corporations have now.” In another paper, Köller quotes an interview in Fortune magazine in which the journalist asks “Should investors fear indigestions?” to which the corporate representative replies “We don’t digest (acquired companies), we integrate them”. Köller believes that it is very important for corporate communicators to monitor and if necessary refute metaphoric concepts about their work. “It’s a question of impression manage-ment — if journalists use certain metaphors often enough to write about the company, those can influence the way people think about the company. Metaphors with negative connotations can therefore damage the brand.”

A MATTER OF METAPHOR

communications,” she says. “Poetry is about being concise. It’s about attention to detail; it demands that you pay fanatical attention to every word you write. Poetry relies on the one thing every corporate writer needs to think about: when you write a poem you’re making something to give someone – in fact, to give the reader. No mat-ter how heartfelt your impressions are, or how compelling your story, if the reader can’t tell what you’re on about, the poem isn’t a success. It’s exactly the same result you’ll get with a corporate report no one wants to read. When I started get-ting really serious about my poetry-writing, I felt a definite improve-ment in my corporate writing. It really tightened up my thinking; it was a confidence boost.”

JILT THE JARGON Brevity, clarity, simplicity, the right tone of voice and the reader’s point of view: some of the basics, then, for successful writing. So why is so much of corporate speak so ugly? We have all endured bland reports, meaningless statements, and impenetrable prose. Perhaps recog-nising the ingredients of good writing is not enough: bad writing also has its recurring elements, and knowing them makes it easier to avoid them. Thanks to Paul Abraham’s style guide, staff at Nomura are constantly on the look-out for three-letter ac-ronyms, such as TLA (Three Letter Acro- oh, wait...): “There is a horrible tendency for people in business to use TLAs. They are banned at Nomura, although they do sometimes sneak through.” Then there are those key words that bedevil business writing, as if purposely designed to drive us up the wall. If Richard House could ban one word from corporate com-munications, it would be “jargon”;

to be genuine, and not faking a personality”, says Katy Evans-Bush, a London-based writer and editor in the fields of social media and communications. “Fakery al-ways shows, and false enthusiasm is a real turn-off for customers, clients and stakeholders alike.” She has put a great deal of thought into how and why we write – that much is clear from her excellent eponymous blog. Ac-cording to her, corporate communicators should always bear the reader’s point of view in mind. “You know what you want people to know,” she explains, “you also need to get into their heads and think: what do they want to know? Why do they want to know it? In short, what’s in it for them? We all consume enough goods, and use enough services, and attend enough meetings and con-ferences, to be able to imagine ourselves in the reader’s place. If you can do this it will take care of almost eve-rything else.” Evans-Bush is also a published poet and is the editor of the semi-annual online arts and literary magazine, Horizon Review. For her, poetry is an excel-lent formative influence for any successful writer. “Sam-uel Taylor Coleridge said that poetry is ‘the best words in the best order’, which makes it very similar to corporate

53

STORY TELLER


ness-speak because that’s what they hear in meetings. They want to impress people, so they mimic the official-sound-ing phrases they hear them use. As professional commu-nicators, we are there to write what our managers would write, if they only knew how. We’re the ones who know how to say it so the reader will get it.”

WRITING FOR THE WEB Another source often iden-tified as a corrosive influence on writing standards is our increasing reliance on social media and other techno-logical tools. If tools like the internet encourage direct, unmediated communication, does it follow that carefully choosing the right word is now a redundant task? “Entire-ly the opposite”, says Katy Evans-Bush. “Social media is driven by the written word. And not only that – the basis of social media communications is brevity. It takes skill to fit a message into, say, 140 characters, including a hash-tag, while also sounding like a ‘real person’” She believes that having a clear idea of what it is you want to get out of your social media channels will make using them more efficient. “Is it sales? More buy-in from an existing audi-ence? Are you hoping to gain insight into your users, or drive traffic to your website? Once you know what you’re looking for, you can tailor your posts towards that goal. In short, the new media are just as reliant on good writ-ing as the old media ever were.” Whether you are writing

for a printed internal brochure or crafting a post for the company intranet, the same degree of care and attention is required, as UniCredit’s Felix Göttler explains: “Printed texts cannot be modified once they have been published, and they can be consulted at any time. Therefore, it is im-portant to check them very carefully prior to publication. However, the same also applies to posts on the intranet. Although they can be deleted at any time, they have an enormously high rate of dissemination.”

Whether old or new media, internal or external, annu-al report or internal memo, surely it is worth taking the time to ensure that your communications are as eloquent as possible? As the year draws to a close, why not make 2012 the year your organisation makes a commitment to improving and refreshing its in-house writing style?

As professional communicators, we are there to write what our managers would write, if they only knew how. We’re the ones who know how to say it so the reader will get it.

Katy Evans-Bush’s business bête noir is ‘effectively’ (as she points out, “You either do it or you don’t”). Which is to say that corporate writing frequently faces criticism for its over-reliance on jargon and verbal padding. Whether it is technical jargon that blinds the reader with science, official-sounding though empty phrases and convolut-ed sentences, or words that have been stripped of their meaning by sheer repetition (‘passionate’, ‘excellence’, and ‘celebrate’ to name three exam-ples) – a lot of corporate writing is just plain bad. Richard House is clear about who to blame for today’s pre-ponderance of jargon. “Don’t blame the communicators, blame the busi-ness schools! Language follows func-tion – you have to wonder why, for 50 years, business schools have been generating a technical language as remote as Latin for an MBA ‘priest-hood’, whose functions can be as re-mote from daily life of employees as a medieval cleric’s was from his congre-gation. Business writers (who are of-ten not economists or trained manag-ers) just follow the lead given them by MBAs. There’s a lot of vested interest in ‘expertising’ the rules of business and pretending we understand them when we don’t – and there’s no rea-son why we should. So using business jargon unquestioningly simply pro-motes an ‘emperor with no clothes’ type situation for executives who should learn to be more clear and authentic.” Impressing the need for authentic and clear communications upon top management is something that Katy Evans-Bush agrees with. “My experience is that business peo-ple, managers and so on, often aren’t great communicators. They’re do-ers. They get things done, but they aren’t wordsmiths. They rely on technical language because it’s how they talk to the engineers. Or they rely on busi-

54

STORY TELLER


To help us set the scene, could you outline for us the organi-sational structure of Carlsberg?First and foremost, as an overall frame we have what we call a very ‘glocal’ structure.. We have divided Carlsberg into four regions – Northern Europe, Western Europe, Eastern Europe and Asia. Each of these regions has a number of countries and subsidiaries below them. And then we work in a matrix structure where we at headquar-ter level, have functions that go across regions, so we have group sales marketing, group supply chain, group com-munications and corporate social responsibility, group hu-man resources and so on. So it is a matrix structure with a glocal approach.

While Danish is a relatively small language group, Carlsberg has a global reach. Which language do you use in your inter-nal communications?We have decided that English is our corporate language, and that means that all our communications take place in English. But we are in many ways still very local-ori-ented, so we have many subsidiaries where, as soon as you go below the top management level, people do not speak any English. And we address this by having a lot of lan-guage training and people on the ground who can trans-late into the local language. And that goes whether in China, where we have 42 breweries, or in Germany or in France, or in Finland, where we have a number of people who don’t speak English. But on a corporate level the only solution we have found is that English is our corporate language.

Academic research uses the term ‘language node’ to describe someone based in a subsidiary with a good knowledge of an organisation’s ‘official’ language and who takes on the unof-ficial role of a translating mediator between headquarters and subsidiary. Does Carlsberg encourage ‘language nodes’

With operations around the globe, the Danish group Carlsberg has chosen English as its corporate language. Anne-Marie Skov, Carlsberg’s senior vice president group communications and corporate social responsiblity, explains


MAKING GLOBAL SENSE

When I talk about language skills it’s very important that they can do more than mechanical translation, that they have an understanding of the finesse.

working at their various international subsidiaries? Yes. We have employees, very often in communications functions, that have advanced language skills. You will rarely see that we have in-house employees doing nothing but trans-lating into local languages – we will often outsource the task if we need a fast translation. But most often we have anchored people in the com-munications department who have very strong English skills as well as skills in their native language. And when I talk about language skills it is also very important that they can do more than mechanical transla-tion, that they have an understand-ing of the finesse. You can not just automatically take what is being said in English and then translate

it into Chinese because there also cultural aspects, polite ways of say-ing things and different ways of ad-dressing certain challenging topics and so on. So we are very much aware that translation does not be-come mechanical if it’s really im-

55


portant pieces of communication, because then it goes very wrong.

So these employees working on trans-lation will most likely be employees in the communication department with good command of English? Yes. In practical terms what will happen very often is that they will send it out of the house for a transla-tion maybe to do a first cut but then it will be their responsibility to in-corporate the cultural dimension so they’re sure that we do not insult people. In Denmark, we are often very direct people, and sometimes you need to be more subtle and do it in more polite ways if you talk about other cultures.

And in your headquarters in Den-mark, are all internal communications in English? Yes, because I’m not even sure the majority of the people working at our headquarters are Danes. It’s a Ph

otos

: Car

lsber

g

truly international headquarters where you will find more or less a reflection of the regions we have. So we have Swedes, Russians – Russia is a big part of our company – eastern Europeans, Turks, English, Americans, all sorts of nationalities working at our headquarters.

And do you have a team of native English speakers working on your communications or is Danish English of sufficiently highs standard that you don’t need that? It’s a bit of a balance. Very often the English that we send out from people who do not have English as their mother tongue can have mistakes, just as I’ll make mis-takes when I speak English and when I write English. Because of pressures of time and resources, you will still be able to find a lot of English grammar mistakes and so on. But in many areas we can live with that. When it’s really, really important, we certainly have people with English as their native tongue to check it. But in the high-speed corporate world, I write maybe 50 emails a day and I could not have somebody check each one. And it works fine because the receiver on the other end will not have English as his or her mother tongue. But I do recognise that this is not ideal because we write in a lan-guage that is not our mother tongue, so the subtlety and the finesse will get lost many times. That is also why it’s important that we get as good as possible in our English

Government regulations in several countries ensure that advertising is translated into the local language

56

STORY TELLER


and we recognise that if you’re a leader in the country, the more you speak the local language, the better it is.

So top management at all your subsidiaries will communicate with you in English. Does this ever present any challenges? It will. I can give you a specific example. We were talking about a big change project that is taking place in the com-pany and we were going over what worked well and where there were still issues and problems, and the project lead related how the change team introduced all the changes in English to the local people who were supposed to know and understand English. But they found out after a while that it didn’t work simply because they didn’t have a native speaker on ground that could do the more subtle trans-lations. So people didn’t understand in depth what they were supposed to do as part of this change project, and it didn’t start working until they had actually this person on board. You mentioned ‘language node’ and this is ex-actly what we experienced, and when we implement this change project in the next country we will certainly make sure upfront that we have a translator present that can fol-low up in the native language.

So when Carlsberg hires employees are English language skills a must? For example, if Carlsberg Croatia hires for a position in their communications department, is competence in English a prerequisite?Yes, and you will often see that, even with very competent people, if their English is not good enough it will not work at a high level in an international company. I would say

that in the bigger communications departments, like we have in Russia, you will have people whose English skills when they start are not good enough but they can gradually learn, and they will be trained to learn.

Does this mean that international corporations inevitably favour those who are sufficiently fluent in English?I would definitely say so, yes. You cannot be a member of an interna-tional company like Carlsberg at the top levels of the organisation without having proper English skills. You can start out by not being very good and we will identify this as a competency gap and give language training.

And that’s offered throughout the company?It is throughout the company, but I will say still in some of our joint ven-tures, in Asia and so on, it’s still not totally implemented. So for example in Asia when we have top manage-ment meetings we will find it neces-sary to have translators participate in the international meetings.

You’ve mentioned a glocal approach. How do you balance this multi-lan-guage approach in engaging with different markets with an internal mono-language? For example, if you have created a new communications project, would that be designed at headquarters in English and then translated by the subsidiaries into the local language? Yes, that’s correct. And it is about finding the right balance. We are constantly challenged by our col-leagues in our various markets and countries to give them enough time to do a proper translation. Also rec-ognising it’s not just mechanical, it’s also about finding the right tone in that specific country. So if you look

57

STORY TELLER


Phot

os: C

arlsb

erg

We are constantly challenged by our colleagues in our various markets and countries to give them enough time to

do a proper translation.

where almost everybody, even kids, speak English – there you would keep “That calls for a Carlsberg”. Everybody would know and would like the international tone in it.

Do you ever come across resistance to the predominance of English as a business language?What I find is that people find it tough, but I have never met anybody who could come up with a better suggestion. So I think it’s more of a matter of resistance coming from not spending enough time on doing proper translations where it’s really necessary and giving them enough resources to do it. Because, as an international company with a lot of languages, I don’t think anybody has come up with a better solution. The critique is there: are we doing it as best as we can? Or is it just as good as it gets because we are busy and don’t have enough time? I think we at the top management level have a tendency to underestimate the importance of translation and of language. Because language is such a key part of our culture, if we want to drive cultural changes we need to take in the language consideration. But it is tough.

Finally, how long have Carlsberg been actively thinking and implementing these kind of issues? I would say in the past 10 years, but extremely intensi-fied the more glocal we be-came. To be concrete, it was when Carlsberg acquired a number of new companies in 2007 and 2008. We took over Scottish & Newcastle, went into full ownership in France, in Russia, in the Ukraine, and then it became extremely important to focus on these things. Also because we could see that we had a number of people even in top management who were not very good at English, so our way of communicating was being hindered by this. If we could look into the future our next focus area will very much be in Asia, and China especially.

Which opens up a whole oth-er set of questions Yes!

at the big important change projects, it’s so important that you get the messages right when you start big changes. So having enough time for a proper translation is always a ques-tion for debate.

The same goes for external cam-paigns and slogans – some compa-nies choose to stick with one slogan in one language worldwide. What is Carlsberg’s approach? It’s a very important question. We discuss it and take it case by case. And I can give you an example: in the Spring this year we did a global re-launch of our Carlsberg beer brand, our crown jewel brand. And the slo-gan was “That calls for a Carlsberg”. And, because we have this glocal ap-proach, in each market we discussed whether it was right to keep it in-ternational or whether it should be translated. It was also very much up to the local subsidiaries to say “We

believe it will make sense to keep it in English because English gives the signal that when I drink this beer I drink an international beer ” and so on. So it makes a lot of sense in some countries. In other countries we had to translate, often because it’s gov-ernment regulations. So for example in France, you can not say “That calls for a Carlsberg” so you have to find a different solution. And in Russia, you had to translate into Russian. So it was a market-by-market approach and here again it was important to find what I would call the soul of the slogan. Take Denmark for example,

Anne-Marie Skov

Senior Vice President Group Communications and CSR, Carlsberg

Anne-Marie Skov is responsi-ble for Carlsberg’s corporate communication activities, in-cluding investor and media relations, and the corporate social responsibility unit. She is a member of the supervisory board of several organisations including WWF, Denmark Test, Møller Erik and Architects, and Nørrebro Teater. Prior to joining Carlsberg, Skov worked with the Novo Group and most recently as vice president and member of the executive management of Novozymes A/S.

58

STORY TELLER


U nderstanding something of the way language works can make a valuable contribution to com-municating effectively with all kinds of audiences. And the science of linguistics offers

many potential insights into how, and why, certain uses of language are likely to be more effective than others.

Getting to grips with linguistics – the scientific study of language – can shed light on what makes for successful corporate communications

by Judy Delin

LEARN TO DIG DEEPER WITH LINGUISTICS

It will be obvious to the casual ob-server that, as well as many differ-ent languages, there are many dif-ferent varieties of language. These can differ at every level – including in pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. The reason for all this variety is that we use language, and

59

STORY TELLER


As communicators, we can use language to indicate group and personal identity on behalf of our organisa-tions... and as a way of encoding personal qualities and characteristics.

our position of leadership in this growth market throughout Europe in general and in Germany in particular. Ladies and gentlemen, a difficult year lies behind us and, despite all optimistic forecasts at the present time, we cannot know how the world economy will develop in the future. Together with X Bank, we have set ourselves ambitious targets for the years to come. Please give us your continued trust. My colleagues and I have every confidence that we will earn this trust with reports on good entrepreneurial progress and significantly better results in a year’s time.

This text does not inspire confidence: it seems irresolute and uncertain. Despite some fairly human, conversation-al elements (we have come a long way, but we still have a lot to do, more than anything else), the relationship is one of social distance. First, the use of formal phrases (continued trust, at the present time and my colleagues and I have every confidence, Ladies and gentlemen) suggest a relationship between polite strangers. Secondly, and related, tech-nical vocabulary and ‘business-speak’ also removes us from everyday life: for example, appropriate profit-driven measures, accelerate growth in these segments, leverage, good entrepreneurial progress. One linguistic theory, Systemic Functional Grammar, sees these two sets of choices as coming from different linguistic ‘systems’: one system for indicating ‘tenor’ or social relationship, and the sec-

ond for indicating ‘field’ or what the text is about. Often, these choices overlap: for example, accelerate growth is a normal phrase for the field of business, but the formal tenor choice could have been less so – something like grow our company faster or speed up growth. So the field/

Table I: Actual usage

We will energetically pursue our efforts to integrate X Bank

We are making a concerted effort to accelerate growth

We intend to leverage

Stronger, more committed usage

We will integrate, complete our integration of X Bank

We will accelerate growth

We will leverage

languages, as a signalling system to indicate two basic things: status and solidarity. We can either move our speech patterns towards the norms of the group we want to belong to for status or solidarity reasons, or, conversely, diverge away. In this way, our speech patterns indicate to others something of our identity and something of who we want to be. As communicators, we can simi-larly use language to indicate group and personal identity on behalf of our organisations as a means of con-structing relationships with audi-ences, and as a way of encoding per-sonal qualities and characteristics.

HOW LANGUAGE CONSTRUCTS SOCIAL RELATIONSHIPS Here is an example from the CEO’s wel-coming statement at the front of a 2001 Annual Report. The company is a European insurer, and the con-text is immediately post-9/11.

In the year under review, we have come a long way […]. But we still have a lot to do. That is why the year 2002 will, more than anything else, be a year of consolidation. In this context, we will concentrate on three major projects. First of all, we will energetically pursue our efforts to integrate X Bank and take appropri-ate profit-driven measures to restruc-ture its operations. Secondly, we will continue to enhance the operational efficiency of our property and casu-alty insurance activities, especially in the area of industrial insurance, and the same applies to our asset man-agement business. We are making a concerted effort to accelerate growth in these segments. Thirdly, we intend to leverage our solid, broad-based platform in the areas of private re-tirement insurance and corporate pension plans to further strengthen

60

STORY TELLER


tenor choices made here contribute to social distance, and do not support the apparent friendliness elsewhere. This leads to an impression of the organisation as having a somewhat incoherent personality.

It is a good idea to have social distance if you want to claim authority, particularly for a financial institu-tion that wants to seem knowledgeable and in control of things in difficult times. One of the key things to com-municate, particularly in 2001, was a clear strategy for a

recovery. However, the grammar of the clauses involved does not confirm the company’s commitment, even to things that are under its control. In table 1 on the previ-ous page, you can see what the company did say – and what they could have said as an alternative to create a more committed and decisive effect.

Linguists would capture these different structures in terms of transitivity, which is the relationship between the processes indicated by verbs (pursue, integrate, ac-celerate, position) and the participants in those processes (principally the ‘doer’ or agent ‘we’, in this case). Share-holders are arguably interested in verbs that suggest measurable results – such as the action verbs integrate, accelerate, leverage. Here, the verbs that the company is actually grammatically connected to are behavioural verbs – pursue, make an effort, intend. So all it is commit-ted to is plans and intentions.

NEW AND IMPROVED Although one can never predict what next year’s results will be, the use of lan-guage that indicates that an effective strategy is in place, and that the organisation is acting coherently, is crucial. Happily, in 2010, the same company manages just this:

We are committed to a culture of change […] using the same proven toolkit that has served us so well for over 120 years to strengthen our business.– That’s why we have prescribed a fundamental transfor-

mation in [our] operating model, although this won’t be easy. But it will ensure that your company does a better job of listening to the customer, that the employees at their desk will be fully aware of the real market outside

– That’s why we acquired the asset manager [name] in

The linguistic framework of evaluation provides a set of tools for teasing out the ways in which we use

language to indicate our feelings.

2000. Although the price we paid has been criticised in the interim you can see from the 2010 Annual Report how much profit the [name] acquisition has created, proving that it was and will continue to be the right strategic decision.

– That’s why we strictly adhere to our risk and profit- oriented underwrit-ing and investment policy. We do not accept technical losses. We invested conservatively […] just one of the factors that enabled us, throughout the recent banking and global economic crisis, to be among the few global insurers to maintain […] one of the best ratings in the international insurance industry.

– That’s why we are continually im-proving our productivity and our distribution system. We are elimi-nating complexity – the enemy of efficiency and growth – and [have] set up a management company to simplify, standardise and implement IT, services and operating processes worldwide. In the future, this will lead to economies of scale and will en-sure that all the subsidiaries have the most appropriate technology. […]

These initiatives are having an im-pact and our business is flourishing, thanks to our marvelous, talented, committed and deeply dedicated employees and distribution part-ners. They’re smart, they’re moti-vated, they’re proud of [our com-pany] and they worked hard to ensure that the company enjoyed strong profitability in 2010.

This is actually a masterful text. The writer uses everyday language that is nevertheless authoritative. The text is structured in a way that presents the company’s actions as logical, seeming to follow naturally

61

STORY TELLER


provides a very effective set of tools for teasing out the ways in which we use language to indicate our feelings through point of view, evaluation, and strength of com-mitment to a statement.

Finally, the company is closely connected to many ‘committed-seeming’ verbs. Many of these are in the past tense, or are presented as continuing – which means they are not just vague plans: we are using, we have prescribed, we have acquired, we have set up, we strictly adhere, we are continuing, we are eliminating, and so on. Where the future is referred to, future statements are not about what the company will do, but about the results of current or completed actions: it will ensure, this will lead to economies of scale. These are the results of actions the company has already taken: the wheels are already in motion.

READ MORE In this brief article, a lot has necessar-ily been omitted. Linguistics provides a rich toolkit for understanding all kinds of human interaction: how we create social relationships of group membership, power and solidarity; how we choose between which regional or social language variants to use, and when; how, even in a packed meeting, speakers use turn-taking cues to take the floor or offer it to others (or not); how we encode so-cial signals such as politeness in our own and across cul-tures; how individuals and organisations can and do use characteristic language styles to indicate their personality; how clearer expression can be achieved through an un-derstanding of how language is processed in the brain. An excellent introduction to the variety of topics that falls within the remit of linguis-tics is David Crystal’s very accessible Crystal Encyclo-pedia of Linguistics (2010), and, if you’re interested in English in particular, his Encyclopedia of the English Language (2003). I recom-mend them both.

from a prudent position. And the writer uses markers of his own view and opinion, not only to further hu-manise his content but to give the impression that the hand on the tiller is a strong one.

TRICKS OF THE TRADE So how has this been achieved linguisti-cally? Firstly, through everyday lan-guage: for example, that’s why rath-er than for this reason, they’re smart rather than they are clever, do a better job rather than do [something] more effectively. There is reference to the ‘humanness’ of the company, too: employees at their desk, they’ve worked hard. This is a much more human face than the language of 2001.

The overall structure of this piece is rhetorically sophisticated, using a repeated “that’s why…” structure that, instead of referring to future plans, reports the past and existing actions of the company as not only ongoing, but leading from its orien-tating statement. This level of text organisation creates an impression of controlled, planned action, pre-senting each point as leading jointly, logically and uncontroversially from the starting statement. This pattern-ing is also reinforced within clause structures, such as they’re smart, they’re motivated… which serves to amplify the sense of planning.

There are also many markers of speaker authority, where the point of view of the writer is emphasised through the use of words that give explicit judgments: marvelous, prov-en, this won’t be easy, a better job, thanks to, the enemy of and it was and will continue to be the right strategic decision. This shows the personality of the speaker (and the company, since the speaker is at its helm) as opinionated and decisive. The lin-guistic framework of evaluation Ph

oto:

Priv

ate

Judy Delin

Corporate Language and Communication Specialist

Judy Delin is an expert in cor-porate language and commu-nication. She was a professor of language and communica-tion at the University of Leeds between 2005 and 2007, and at the University of Reading between 2008 and 2010. She is now a partner at Roe De-lin, providing consultancy and training for major companies on the language they use. She is a co-founder of The Lan-guage Consultancy Association, a new organisation for people interested in applying linguistic ideas to brand and corporate communication problems

62

STORY TELLER


The use of English as a shared language in the world of international business is not without its complications

by Marinel Gerritsen and Catherine Nickerson

BUSINESS ENGLISH: A LINGUA FRANCA?

STORY TELLER

I n the course of the past decade, communica-tion between speakers of different languages has increased exponentially in the business world. More and more business organisations are now characterised by a multi-cultural, multi-lingual workforce, and numerous or-

ganisations now communicate with stakeholders in differ-ent countries. In such situations in international business communication, whenever person A with first language A, speaks to person B with first language B, then there are four options available in terms of the language that they will opt for.

1. Both speakers use language A.2. Both speakers use language B. 3. Person A uses his or her first language A, and Person B

uses his or her first language B. 4. Person A and Person B opt for a lingua franca, a third

language, language C, that both parties are able to speak and understand well enough to communicate.

The choice made depends on many different factors. The foreign language proficiency of the interactants plays an important role, as does the business relationship between them. For instance, if one of the interactants is in the role of a seller then he or she is less likely to use their own language and will opt either for the potential buyer’s first language or for a lingua franca. Although research sug-gests that organisations are more likely to complete a sales transaction successfully by following a strategy of accom-modation (examples 1 and 2) rather than using a lingua franca (example 4), the latter remains the norm in most international business communication. French, German,

Spanish and Scandinavian have all been used as ‘lingua francas’, but English now plays an increasingly dominant role in business transac-tions around the globe and its role as an international business lingua franca is beyond dispute.

Non-native English is used in two different situations. It is used in situ-ations between two speakers, neither of whom speak English as a first lan-guage. In this case English is used as a lingua franca, which in business settings has been referred to as ‘Busi-ness English as a Lingua Franca’ or BELF. English is also used in situ-ations where one of the speakers is a first language speaker of English and the other an ‘English as a Foreign Language’ (EFL) speaker. In this case English is used as an interna-tional business language and has been referred to as ‘International Business English’ (IBE). Recent research has reported that as much of 80 per cent of business communication in Eng-lish takes place in non-native Eng-lish. These encounters may lead to communication breakdowns due to the differing linguistic and cultural background of the participants.

63

STORY TELLER


BREAKDOWNS IN IBE AND BELF SITUATIONS In this section we briefly outline causes of com-munication breakdowns in IBE and BELF situations. These can be at-tributed to one or more of three dif-ferent causes, which can occur singly or in combination: lack of compre-hensibility, cultural differences and stereotyped associations:

I. LACK OF COMPREHENSIBIL-ITY Comprehensibility means that the message is understood by the re-ceiver of the message in the way the sender intended. A complicated set of factors contribute to this. A ma-jor category of miscommunication caused by comprehensibility prob-lems is those that occur at a lexical and grammatical level.

1.) IBE: An EFL speaker fails to under-stand a Native Speaker of English (NSE). A recent study showed, for example, that highly educated Ger-man women described the meaning

of “contemporary Italian jeweller’s” as “seductive Italian jewels” or “cooperative Italian jewellers”, and “the new fragrance for women” as “the new feeling for women” or “the new refresher for women”.

2.) IBE: An NSE fails to understand an EFL speaker. For ex-ample, the difference in the past tense in English and the past tense in many other European languages may cause a great deal of miscommunication if the EFL speaker uses a direct translation from their own language into English, e.g. the English construction “have worked”, for instance, may sound finite for an EFL speaker, whereas its meaning is an on-going situation for an NSE speaker.

3.) BELF: An EFL speaker fails to understand another EFL speaker. In the worst accident ever in aviation history, the crash between two Boeing 747 Jumbo Jets in Tenerife in 1977, there was a communication breakdown in a BELF situation. The Dutch captain said in English “We are now at takeoff”, a phrase that was interpreted by the Span-ish controller as “We are now at the takeoff position” whereas the Dutch captain meant “We are now actually taking off”. The English sentence the captain uttered was an unusual phrase in English aviation terminology and was due to interference from Dutch. II. CULTURAL DIFFERENCES A breakdown in com-

munication can also be the result of cultural differences. Most speakers communicate from the perspective of their

64

STORY TELLER


own cultural background, regardless of whether they are communicating in a language other than their own. The following provides examples of both spoken and written language where this occurs:

1.) IBE: An EFL speaker incorrectly interprets an NSE, e.g. the use of indirect language by British NSEs, which can be difficult to interpret for speakers from more direct cultures. An indirect utterance such as “You might like to look at the report again” is typical of a British NSE and is intended as an order or instruction for the hearer. For an EFL speaker from a more direct culture, such as a German-English speaker, this may be interpreted as a suggestion which leaves the hearer with a choice.

2.) IBE: An NSE incorrectly interprets an EFL speaker. Recent research has looked at the communication breakdowns that are due to differences in communicative conventions between customer service representatives in the Philip-pines and their US customers. The non-linear organisation of the Asian spoken discourse causes the NSE customer to feel that the representative “is either incompetent or ‘beating around the bush’”. In addition, confrontation and conflict are avoided in the Philippines, and the representa-tives become silent as a result of the customer losing their temper, causing more miscommunication and conflict in the process.

3.)BELF: An EFL speaker incorrectly interprets an EFL speaker with a different native language. In BELF email correspond-ence, for instance, people from cultures with a high power distance such as France use more formal salutations and closes (“Dear Madam”, “Yours respectfully”) than people from low power distance cultures such as Denmark (“Hi”, “Cheers”). The high power distance cultures experience the informal expressions used by the low power distance cul-tures as impolite and too personal and the latter experience the high power distance cultures as too standoffish.

III. STEREOTYPED ASSOCIATIONS This type of com-munication breakdown is caused by the way in which words are spoken, i.e. the accent used. This is because peo-ple may have particular stereotyped associations with cer-tain accents which they then transfer to any speaker with that same accent in terms of their judgement of their soci-etal status, profession, IQ etc. In a study in the US which looked at the relationship between salesperson accents and consumer purchase intentions, the respondents had higher purchase intentions when the salesperson had a US NSE accent than when he or she had a Spanish-English accent. The following examples illustrate this further:

Business English as a lingua franca

The use of English as the international language of business is fraught with the potential for misunderstanding

Speakers are often stereotyped based on their accent and their use of Eng-lish

Regardless of the shared language used, speakers communicate from a context of their own cultural background

However, research suggests that busi-ness people work harder to establish rapport because of these differences

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

i) The English produced by an EFL speaker reflects the speaker’s first language, and this may often have a negative influence on what is associated with that speaker. British NSEs, for instance, per-ceive speakers of German English and Asian English as less pres-tigious and less socially attractive than speakers of French English, but they rate all these varieties of English less positively than they do British NSE. Even a very slight ac-cent can make a difference. In the

onset of a telephone sales talk for a Dutch asset management business, for instance, NSE speakers attrib-uted a much lower status to speak-ers of Dutch-English with a slight accent than they did to other NSE speakers.

Most speakers communicate from the perspective of their own cultural back-ground, regardless of whether they are communicating in a language other than their own.

65

STORY TELLER


Far from being the minefield of potential misunderstand-ing and communication breakdown that this might sug-gest, Professor Spencer-Oatey claims that business people in fact actively participate in rapport management and try to make sense of the interaction in order to facilitate do-ing business. Likewise, not all communication breakdowns are of equal seriousness, and in many cases the cause of the breakdown will be clear to the speakers. For instance, although a British NSE will perhaps smile at the utterance “I thank you from the bottom of my heart and also from my wife’s bottom” it is very un-likely that this utterance will derail the entire communica-tion process. In other cases, however, if the underlying cause is unclear, then this may adversely affect the relation-ship between the interactants, through no fault of their own. Again, as we have suggested above, even highly experi-enced intercultural interact-ants may be caught off guard by a “hidden” difference be-tween two cultures, particu-larly in situations where an EFL speaker may otherwise have near native proficiency in English.

CONCLUSION The burgeon-ing of cross-border business interactions and the increase in the diverse nature of the workforce in multi-national corporations, as well as in lo-cal business environments, suggests that it is becoming increasingly important to gain an insight into the potential communication breakdowns in BELF and IBE encoun-ters and in their underlying causes.

ii) BELF. Despite the fact that interactions between EFL speakers with different first languages are a common feature of business organi-sations in the twenty-first century, very little is known about the atti-tude EFL speakers have towards the accents used by EFL speakers with different first languages.

RAPPORT MANAGEMENT The examples given above are only three out of an almost unlimited set of possible factors that can influence the success or failure of an IBE or BELF interaction. Helen Spencer-Oatey, from Warwick University in the UK, has suggested that intercul-tural communication involves a set of five different factors, all of which play a role in managing rapport be-tween the interlocutors. These are:

a) Action, which refers to the com-municative event and whether this event is acceptable within a given culture or not, e.g. Can I ask the CEO to do something for me?

b) Content, e.g. Can I talk about my health during a business lunch, as is the case in Japan but not in Germa-ny; Do I start with social talk (as in India) or get straight down to busi-ness (as in the US)?

c) Participation, which involves the or-ganisation of the talk itself, such as how to take turns in a conversation (no overlap in Japan, but parallel talk tolerated in Italy)

d) Style, which means the tone and formality used between peers in a business interaction, e.g. the rela-tively informal style used in the US compared to the more formal style used in Germany

e) Non-verbal interaction, which in-clude the gestures that are under-stood and the amount of eye con-tact made etc.Ph

otos

: Rad

boud

Uni

vers

ity N

ijmen

gen;

Priv

ate

Marinel Gerritsen

Radboud University Nijmegen

Professor Marinel Gerritsen works in the Department of Business Communication Stud-ies at Radboud University Ni-jmegen. Prior to this she worked for the government and for several multinationals in the Netherlands, France, Italy and Germany, and has also held po-sitions at a number of universi-ties and the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Catherine Nickerson

Zayed University, College of Business

Catherine Nickerson is an as-sociate professor of business communication in the College of Business Sciences at Za-yed University in the United Arab Emirates. She has held senior positions in India and in the Netherlands, and has also worked in the US and the UK. She has won two awards from the Association for Business Communication.

66

STORY TELLER


I f there is an art to writing a press release, it may, like any other art, ultimately be in the eye of the beholder. Something that is news-worthy to one journalist may bore another to death. Something that ends in one journal-ist’s trash can become another’s banner head-

line. That said, having received thousands of press releases in 15 years as a journalist, and written a fair share since making the switch to public relations, I think it is safe to say that there are at least some basic principles that distin-guish better-written press releases from real dogs.

1: WRITE FOR JOURNALISTS This may sound obvi-ous, but there are a surprising number of press releases out there that seem to have been written to flatter the ego of the author’s boss. I once confronted ETUC, a Brussels-based labour organisation, about the fact that they kept spamming me with press releases about all the semi-fa-mous people that the head of the organisation kept meet-ing. The problem with all of them was that they said abso-lutely nothing about the meeting other than the fact that a meeting had taken place. Nothing on content, no colour. I eventually instructed my Outlook to declare them a Junk E-mail Sender and from then on was spared their spam (A quick look at ETUC’s press room suggests that they have since mended their ways and are now writing press releases that look nominally interesting). The moral of this story is that press releases are ultimately intended not just to get the media’s attention, but ideally to generate cover-age that results in some sort of action. If you are going to send one out, make sure that it is at least interesting to journalists and ideally also to their readers, listeners or viewers. The best simple test for this that I ever en-

BRINGING AN END TO BORING PRESS RELEASES

Press releases are ultimately intended not just to get the media’s attention, but ideally to generate coverage that results in some sort of action.

countered was a question a BBC re-porter in Brussels once asked me as I struggled through an (admittedly hopeless) pitch: “What impact will this have on my editor’s mother?” If you can answer that question, you’re home free. If you can’t, find the an-swer before you start writing or call-ing anyone!

2: STORY What do journal-ists and their audiences want? In a word, they want a story, not just key messages or a random collection of quotes. They want a plot, with a vil-lain and a hero, some drama, a be-ginning, middle, end and context. Evelyn Waugh’s amazingly insight-

ful comic novel, Scoop captures this well. The novel parodies the story of a gardening correspondent who ends up being sent to cover a war because of a case of a mistaken identity. This is how the reporter’s boss, the edi-tor of The Beast, explains what the

Communicators who were journalists in their former lives are well-placed to offer tips on how to get your press release the attention it deserves

by Brandon Mitchener

67

STORY TELLER


newspaper’s readers want from his coverage of the war:

“What the British public wants, first last and all the time is News. Re-member that the Patriots are in the right and are going to win. The Beast stands by them four-square. But they must win quickly. The Brit-ish public has no interest in a war which drags on indecisively. A few sharp victories, some conspicuous acts of personal bravery on the Patriot side and a colourful entry into the capital. That is The Beast’s policy for the war.”

Sure, this is fiction. People in corporate communications may well despair trying to coax victories and bravery from raw material that consists largely of numbers, prod-uct names and some questionably Unique Selling Points. But just imagine you were a journalist and you received a press release that included not just some legitimate, cred-ible news, but also some righteousness (“We continue to defy the skeptics”), a victory of some sort (milestones?), bravery (an investment that paid off?) and colour (back-ground, perspective, human interest and/or a powerful, memorable quote). Wouldn’t you be happy to learn more and write that story? Wouldn’t you want to read it?

3: THE FIVE ‘W’S If you accept that you are writing for journalists, and are aware that journalists are over-worked, underpaid and often under-appreciated, you

68

STORY TELLER


should start by trying to make things really simple. Your press release should read like something that you could ac-tually imagine seeing – and reading – in print. Start with a lead that includes the Five Ws: who, where, when, what and why. And make sure the first paragraph is just one sentence and has 25 words or less—the fewer the better! Within the first couple of paragraphs, make sure to clearly identify who is talking: the narrator. Do not just give a name, such as Acme, Inc. Describe it. For example, Acme, Wile E. Coyote’s Roadrunner-trapping supplier of choice. Journalists are always surprised at the number of releases they receive that do not contain this kind of basic infor-mation anywhere in the release, despite the best efforts of PR Newswire and BusinessWire to enforce some mini-mum global standards. Also make sure to avoid acronyms and give people’s full names and titles.

4: THE KISS RULE Keep it Short and Simple. There may well be times that require a long press release or bro-chure, and we are all tempted to want to explain every-thing and pre-empt every conceivable question. There is a place for this. It is called the Frequently Asked Questions, either on your corporate website or stuffed in the back of a press kit. But do not try to cram everything into the press release. At best you will annoy your intended audience of journalists, and at worst you could raise more issues than you address. The shorter the press release or statement, the more control you have over the message, and the more likely it is to be read and used. The simpler the press re-lease – no mysterious acronyms, no technical jargon, no secret codes – the more likely your key messages will be correctly understood and conveyed. This is particularly true when translations are involved! The average transla-tor can well understand and translate simple vocabulary and terminology, but the more complicated it becomes, the greater the chance that the translation says something else entirely than what you intended.

5: POETRY There are some lessons that we can all learn from great poetry. No, your sentences do not have to rhyme (It would probably be suspicious if they did, un-less you were writing about a new poetry collection). But even if you are writing about electricity it does not hurt if you use a bit of alliteration – the repetition of a par-ticular sound, usually a consonant, in several words in a row. Examples: laughing llamas, yelling yaks or just plain major market moves or big benefits. You do not want to over-do this, but it does not hurt, and can help transform the language of your press release or other writing from

legalese to something more quot-able and memorable. Other lessons you can learn from poetry include repeating key words or phrases (just not in the same sentence), alternat-ing long and short sentences to cre-ate rhythm and using as many short, monosyllabic words as you can. I confess to being obsessed by sylla-

bles, or at least by monosyllables. It is infinitely more pleasurable to read a press release or pamphlet that uses simple, powerful terms native to the language in which you are writ-ing than to impress (or more likely confuse) people with acronyms or long words borrowed from dead languages. To get a sense of what I mean, read Robert Frost’s Mending Wall or Percy Bysshe Shelley’s Ozy-mandias. Read them out loud. The average word in each is one to two syllables, and the maximum is three syllables (with the exception of the

Remember why you are writing a press release. Ultimately, it is to sell a product, a service or an idea.

The recipe for successful releases

Keep your audience in mind

Press releases should be like short stories

Remember the Five Ws: who, where, when, what and why

KISS: keep it short and simple

Borrow techniques of poetry

Fight apathy with relevancy

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

69

STORY TELLER


not make it into news reports afterwards, it reinforces the credibility of your release and helps build trust between you and the journalist.

7: EMBRACE THE APPROVAL LOOPS If you have come to public relations from journalism, chances are you are accustomed to writing things with little outside inter-ference, sometimes straight into a desktop publishing sys-tem that drops your prose into columns exactly as they will appear in the newspaper or magazine. You might have a boneheaded editor or two to worry about, but it is increas-ingly rare that they have time to do much line editing. One rule that you learn quickly in corporate communications is that you are not the boss, or the person who has the final say on anything sensitive. That’s probably the legal, finance or investor relations department, or the CEO, or all of the above. Together with the rest of the executive staff, they probably know things that you do not, and often add value to the press release during the approval process, either by insisting that a nuance be respected, or that a number that looks good to you but reveals too much about the company’s business strategy be removed. The first rule is not “Get the journalist’s attention”, but “Do no harm”. Once you pass that hurdle, you can worry about the KISS rule, poetry and the rest of it. To be sure, you can and should resist when the con-cerns of the legal department are not strictly legal in nature, or when so many people want to insert a key thought into a press release that it becomes a treaty, loses focus and risks running up ridiculous bills for translation and distribution. But is far better to have fol-lowed a process and consulted everyone internally on a public statement before sending it out with content that will result in irate customers, shareholders or regulators.

Just remember that even novelists have editors and publishers, and the people who read the novel never know how much pain when into getting it published. Ph

oto:

Piv

ate

proper name Ozymandias, which does not count). Yet they both ex-plain complex ideas and invoke vivid images and have the advantage that you can read them aloud without taking deep breaths or making awk-ward pauses. People in communica-tions are usually focused on gener-ating print coverage, which is easy to monitor, but imagine that you’re

writing everything for radio and television and that your prose needs to be read out loud. I guarantee you that your press releases will be better press releases if they sound good.

6: ANTICIPATE AND COUNTER-ACT APATHY Remember why you are writing a press release. Ultimately, it is to sell a product, a service or an idea. To sell something successfully, it needs unique selling points, some-thing that differentiates your widget or argument from everyone else’s. The simplest way to communicate unique selling points is through the use of su-perlatives such as first, best, biggest, boldest, highest, strongest, cleanest, safest, only, foremost, funniest, most efficient, etc. If you absolutely have to write a ‘me too’ press release about a product that your competitors have already brought to market, make sure to provide something that your competitors did not – an additional fact, some extra background, better pictures or graphics or at least better quotes. Sometimes providing context can be as important as providing the basic facts. Even if the context does

Brandon Mitchener

Director of Corporate Communications EMEA, First Solar

Before taking up his current role at First Solar, Inc. (a com-mercial solar energy solutions company), Brandon Mitchener worked as a consultant for a variety of blue-chip compa-nies, business associations, non-profit organisations and governments on relations with the EU, the media and other stakeholders. He began his ca-reer as a foreign correspond-ent for The Wall Street Journal, International Herald Tribune and Dow Jones Newswires. Germany and Brussels.

Do not try to cram everything into a press release. At best you will annoy your

intended audience of journalists, and at worst you could raise more issues than

you address.

70

STORY TELLER


Effectively communicating any corporate message, no matter how small, can be difficult: different skills are required when writing a press release, an internal memo, or a blog post. Developing these skills takes time and effort, but it is worth it

by Kossara Marchinkova

ON CRAFTING THE PERFECT MESSAGE

STORY TELLER

T here are many variables to consid-er when one sets out to best com-municate a message. Of course, we all know the focus should be the target group that the mes-sage is designed to reach, but one

also has to consider the global picture. And it all starts with strategy. Before sitting down and writing up your message, consider the following questions: what is the company’s overall goal? What is its strategy? What is the

message designed to achieve? What image does your company want to portray? What is the style already in place? Are there any changes you want to make? What medium will best suit the delivery of the message and the audience? And of course, assume people know nothing: it is better to over-communicate than not communicate enough.

71

STORY TELLER


Example 1 (Enel press release)

ENEL GREEN POWER STARTS CONSTRUCTION OF A 150 MW WIND FARM IN OKLAHOMA, USA

• The Rocky Ridge wind farm is expected to supply enough power to meet the energy needs of approximately 55,000 US households, therefore avoiding the emission of over 470,000 tons of CO2 per year;

• Project investment to total approximately 250 million US dollars.

Rome, October 11th, 2011 - Enel Green Power North America Inc. (EGP NA) and its devel-opment partner TradeWind Energy started construction activities of the Rocky Ridge wind project, 51% owned by EGP NA, located in Kiowa County and Washita County, Oklahoma. The new wind farm’s installed capacity will total approximately 150 MW and consist of 93 wind turbines of 1.6 MW each. Once fully operational, the plant will generate approximately 630 million kWh annually, supplying power to approximately 55,000 US households and avoiding the annual emission of over 470,000 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere.

The wind farm has a power purchase agreement with the Western Farmers Electric Coop-erative.

The overall investment in this project amounts to, approximately, 250 million US dollars. This amount, which is fully financed by Enel Green Power, is part of the 2011-2015 investment program already disclosed to the market back in March this year. The plant is expected to become operational in the summer of 2012.The Rocky Ridge project spreads across 18,000 acres of land, leased from 75 landowners. The wind farm will generate approximately 150 jobs during construction as well as approxi-mately 10 operation, maintenance and administration jobs once the plant will be up and running.

“We are thrilled to witness the start of construction of Enel Green Power’s first project in Oklahoma. Over time, our cooperation with TradeWind Energy proved to be an opportu-nity to develop renewable energy as well as creating value among local communities through job and income generation.” commented Francesco Starace, Chief Executive Officer of Enel Green Power.

Rocky Ridge is the fourth wind project that EGP NA and TradeWind Energy have worked on together through the partnership launched by the two companies back in 2006. Follow-ing the entry in operation of the Caney River and Rocky Ridge projects, the partnership will have commissioned 600 MW in new wind power projects - the already operational Smoky Hills 1 and 2 (totaling around 250 MW), the Caney River wind farm, currently under construction (200 MW) and the Rocky Ridge wind farm (150 MW) presently beginning construction.

internal image differs too much from the external, it be-comes difficult for people to reconcile the two. Of course, these examples are stereotypical and I would underline that there are no one-size-fits-all solutions. Each one of us as communicators should make their analysis and make a decision on how to proceed.

As a general rule, simple language is better received than elaborately-worded messages. Why should this be so? Because (at least in my experience) the different lev-els of knowledge shared by everyone means that simplic-ity pays off in the end. Be conscious, consistent, sincere, and respectful. Use non-discriminatory language, be true to yourself and let your style show. What is more, in a world depending increasingly on sophisticated technol-

Conveying the same message to different audiences – internal and external – is clearly an important communications challenge, and the choice of wording is critical. It is essential, however, to be consistent with your messages to all audiences. Wording can differ, the medium can differ, but the message should be the same, otherwise this small matter of reputation that we are all trying to keep high and dry will soon become waterlogged and drown. And think about your audience as if it is your customer: what would they be inter-ested in, what would benefit them? The content of your message will not reach its audience if it is not relevant for the target audience.

STARTING WITH INTERNAL In most companies, internal communi-cations reflect a desire to develop a sense of belonging to a team, even something close to a family feel-ing. After all, we spend most of our waking hours at work with our col-leagues. This creates a certain vocab-ulary that includes the frequent use of ‘we’, ‘us‘, and ‘our’. People involved in internal communication are the ones to steer the company commu-nication style in a certain direction. And unless the top management is aligned with it, the endeavour to set a certain style of communication is doomed to fail, since the company’s internal tone of voice is a key strate-gic decision.

Let us say that you are working in a small but highly creative event management company. The lan-guage you would use for your in-ternal messages will most probably require a lot of this ‘us’ vocabulary in addition to lots of fun language. In comparison, a law firm would prob-ably want to portray a more serious image, even internally, because if the Ph

oto:

ww

w.p

hoto

case

.com

72

STORY TELLER


ogy, a world where the internet becomes the norm and the use of 140 characters threatens to become the standard of communication, I am inclined to say that we should all be looking into developing excellent headline-writing skills.

According to www.internal-communications.info, “the headline on any article needs to sum up the contents with real impact.” For example: “‘Technical support network is up and running’ can become ‘Tech support network up and running’, or, even better, ‘Tech network raring to go’, with-out losing any meaning and actually gaining impact.”

Experts say that communication is composed of dif-ferent methods: words, voice, tone and non-verbal clues. Some are more effective in delivering a message than oth-ers. Albert Mehrabian, Professor Emeritus of Psychology at UCLA, is internationally acknowledged for his work on the relative importance of verbal and non-verbal messages. According to his findings, in communication:

Words are 7 per cent effective Tone of voice is 38 per cent effective Non-verbal clues are 55 per cent effective.

In other words, what you say is not nearly as important as how you say it. It is the underlying tones of your mes-sage that make a difference. They will allow you to convey your message much more strongly. I can recollect when making presentations at certain times in my career when, even though I drafted narratives by carefully choosing my wording, I still received questions from the audience that focused on less important sub-messages than on the main point I was trying to make. On these occasions, I could

Example II (internal memo)

Example of the same message for internal audience (fictitious example)

We are happy to announce the start of construction activities at our Oklahoma based Rocky Ridge wind project, 51% owned by our company and 495 by TradeWind Energy. The overall investment in this project amounts to, approximately, 250 million US dollars and is fully financed by our mother company Enel Green Power. The plant is expected to become operational in the summer of 2012 and to generate approximately 150 jobs during construction as well as approxi-mately 10 operation, maintenance and administration jobs once the plant will be up and running.

The new wind farm’s installed capacity will total approximately 150 MW and consist of 93 wind turbines of 1.6 MW each. Once fully operational, the plant will generate approximately 630 million kWh annually, supplying power to approximately 55,000 US households and avoid-ing the annual emission of over 470,000 tons of CO2 into the atmosphere.

“We are thrilled to witness the start of construction of Enel Green Power’s first project in Oklahoma. Over time, our cooperation with TradeWind Energy proved to be an opportunity to develop renewable energy as well as creating value among local communities through job and in-come generation.” commented Francesco Starace, Chief Executive Officer of Enel Green Power.

not attribute this to anything else but my inability to deliver my mes-sage appropriately. I failed in not the what but in the how.

Another important point is that we live in an increasingly smaller world where we meet people from all kinds of diverse backgrounds – culturally, educationally, ethnically, gender-wise, generationally, eco-nomically, etc. This leads to a whole different set of issues that has to do with knowing our audience and ad-just our wording accordingly.

CHOOSE YOUR MEDIUM When approaching internal and external audiences, we should also have a relevant choice of medium. For example, when a power plant I was working for had to change its name, we chose a strategy incor-porating – among other steps – the following:

• A press release to the media – e-mail

• Letters to all our partners/contrac-tors/suppliers – postal mail

• Billboards in the local community – outdoor advertising

• Posters in the plant – indoor BTL• Message to all employees sent by

the Plant Director – e-mail

When writing for external audienc-es, communicators should always

Example III (social media)

Example of the same message for social media, e.g. Twitter (fictitious example)

EGP’s USA 150MW Rocky Ridge wind farm ($250mln) starts construction; will power 55,000 families & avoid 470,000 tons of CO2 emissions/year

73

STORY TELLER


ple are able to recognise when something is fake. Rather than doing this, I would suggest trying to change the strategy; perhaps this could be an important topic for us as communications specials to explore further. How much are we willing to give up our so well guarded ‘control’ over the messaging in our company? Are we really ‘in control’ in today’s internet world?

WRITE FROM EXPERIENCE When I first started my career as a radio journalist, the only thing I cared about was being able to answer the famous ‘Five Ws’ – and the H (what, where, when, who, why and how). Developing a career in human resources allowed me to see the value of introducing the human touch, the personal message, and more emotion-based writing into my work. Working as a psychologist gave me the ability to see that the shortest way to persuade people change their behaviours was through appealing to their emotions. Later on, when I started my path to being an integrated communicator, I realised that no individual way is perfect and that each day we need to make decisions having the global picture in mind and trying to do our best. It is our everyday experience that allows us to further develop ourselves as communicators. If there is something I learned in my career, it is that we should be taking risks and not be afraid to make mistakes in order to develop, allowing ourselves to grow and become better at what we do.

Clearly, the choice of words is important wherever we com-municate – whether to new markets or responding to me-dia attention. The words that reflect something of Enel’s cor-porate culture lie in the themes that are so important to us, and which we explore with all our different audiences – namely, bringing value to all our stake-holders, safety, operational ex-cellence, and corporate social responsibility. A leading value for us is respect – in all areas of our work and the ways that we approach our stakeholders. I truly believe that respect is the key to successful commu-nication.

The ins and outs of messages

The desire to foster team spirit leads to lots of ‘we’, ‘us’ and ‘our’

Simple language is better received than elaborately-worded messages, and press releases should have substance

Headlines should sum up content with impact

The diversity of the modern world means that you need to know your audience

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Phot

os: P

rivat

e

Kossara Marchinkova

Director External Relations and Communications, Enel Green Power North America

Prior to her current position, Kossara Marchinkova was head of communications at Enel in Bulgaria, a position she held from March 2005. Be-fore joining Enel, Marchinkova worked at Travel StoreMaker as the human resources man-ager, at Nexcom as the human resources director, and as an adjunct professor in Psychology at the American University in Bulgaria.

ensure that the information is news-worthy and that the first 10 words of your release are effective, as they are the most important. Avoid ex-cessive use of adjectives and ‘fancy’ language; instead address the facts. And don’t just create a piece of news; rather ensure you wait until you have something with enough substance to issue a release.

TONE OF VOICE I have already discussed writing for a press release and the internal audience message but we also need to explore the messaging that goes through social media. Search engine optimisa-tion copywriting is the art of writ-ing web page copy that appeals to human readers, as well as ensuring a high ranking for specific search terms that people look for in search engines. In this case, you really do need to get to the point, be conver-sational, use a strong headline and if possible combine it with visuals.

It is true that some companies do try to carefully plan a light-hearted tone on an internal social media platform. However, I believe that this is counterproductive since peo-

Example III (social media)

74

STORY TELLER


Whether you’re writing a speech for yourself or your CEO, finding the right words is just the start; you must also learn to connect with the audience

by Fletcher Dean

FIVE STEPS TO SPEECH-WRITING SUCCESS

STORY TELLER

I t can strike fear into the heart of even the most seasoned communications professional. You’ve been asked to write a speech. The first reaction is usually flattery that some-one thinks so highly of your writing skills. Then there is panic. Then mind-numbing,

blank-page introspection. How do I start? Should I try for humour? Does my speaker need to sound like President Obama? Or should he just try to be himself? Is it too late to find another job? Why me?

Never fear. What to others may seem like a mysterious, arcane endeavour can actually be a very straight-forward and successful task. So what is the secret to writing a suc-cessful speech? It is quite simple: a successful speech is one the audience will listen and react to. Yes, there are entire shelves of books on speechwriting. And yes, people go to conferences and get training to become better speechwrit-ers. But all of the books and all of the training essentially land on this single point: will the audience listen and will it react the way you want it to? So here are five must-do tips for ensuring the next speech you write is must-listen-to material.

ONE The first tip is to begin every speech by focusing on the audience itself. If this is the only tip you follow, the next speech you write will be better than most. When I first began writing speeches, an older and wiser speech-writer took me aside and explained this very bluntly. Like a lot of younger writers, I wanted the speeches I wrote to sound grandiose and soaring. I wanted the language to be lyrical and every speech to get a standing ovation. “Lis-ten,” he said, “all audiences are the same. They just want to

know how to be healthier, wealthier or happier. If you can give them even one of those, you’ll do just fine.” In fact, every audience member is ask-ing the same thing when your speak-er stands at the podium: what is this speaker going to say that is going to make my life better? Answer that first before you begin to draft your own messages.

Too many writers turn the speak-er/audience paradigm around and begin with what they want to say. The result is that speakers seem out of touch and boring because they have not identified a common prob-lem. So tip number one is to focus on the audience and solve their needs. If you write a speech that could make them healthier, wealthier or happier,

75

STORY TELLER


they will be interested in what your speaker says and you have got the be-ginnings of a great speech.

TWO The second big tip for a suc-cessful speech is to rely more on emo-tions and less on logic. I was listen-ing to a radio programme last week about an effort by photographers in the United States to show the new face of poverty in the country. The interviewer asked why it was impor-tant to get these photographs in front of everyday people rather than simply giving them the data about poverty. The photographer being interviewed said something every speechwriter should hear. “The fact of the matter is,” he said, “anecdote trumps facts every time.”

All of us are creatures of emotions. It is why television commercials ask-ing for aid money to feed the hungry or help those injured in natural dis-asters use images of destruction and despair. Unfortunately, too many speakers believe if they just explain the situation in a cool and reasoned way, the audience will get it. But if you really want to connect with an audience, use emotional devices. And the best way to do that is by telling stories. More than any other device, stories can deliver the emotional ap-peal that audiences respond to. Stories can actually bring material to life and

are often more believable than facts alone. Why? Because they do two things very well. Stories let audience mem-bers place themselves inside the story, relate it to events in their own lives, and compare it with something personal to them. They also allow the listeners reach their own conclu-sions about the facts by putting abstract, logical data into context. I encourage speakers to include stories about who they are or how they learned what they know to be true. Teaching stories – where they learned a greater truth – are especially powerful and emotional.

THREE The third big tip is to give your speech a rec-ognisable structure. This is incredibly important from the audience’s perspective. Here is why. Imagine someone you have never met asks you to take a trip with them. They won’t tell you where you are going, how long you will be gone, what you will see along the way or even when you will be back. Would you go? You probably would not. And yet every day hundreds of speakers stand in front of audiences all around the world and do essentially the same thing. They begin talking without giving the audience any clues about where they are headed or when they’ll be fin-ished. Yet, listeners need those structural clues much like travelers need road signs. Knowing where they are, where they are headed and what to expect along the way will increase their attention span and engagement. They will become active listeners instead of passive passengers in this speech journey. There are lots of structures you can use. Here are a few favourites:

• Chronological – This is a simple structure often used to explain what has happened and why. Dates become sign-posts and listeners understand the progression.

• Geographic – You can use geography to break down the sections of your talk. Explaining what is happening in the North, South, East and West, for example, gives the audi-ence a comfortable sense of control and anticipation.

76

STORY TELLER


• Numbered lists – This is one of the most useful and, frank-ly, my favourite. After identifying a common problem, the speaker can easily tell the audience something like: I’d like to discuss three ways we can address this problem. This allows the audience to follow along, understand the journey and anticipate an ending.

The secret to using any structure is in letting the audi-ence know what the structure is. If you tell them you will make three important points, for example, you will see people pull out notebooks and write down the number “1.” They are now actively engaged and paying attention.

FOUR The fourth tip is for all of those corporate types out there who belong to the PowerPoint brigade. The tip is this: Work on the words first and PowerPoint slides second (if at all.) Too many speakers today rely on PowerPoint slides for their presentations. As a result, they forfeit a good deal of leadership potential. Here is the most important thing to remember about PowerPoint. It is NOT your presentation. The speaker – along with the words they deliver – is the presentation. Least important is the slide deck.

PowerPoint can actually undermine a speaker’s poten-tial to lead. After all, the point of any speech is to put your speaker/leader in front of an audience in an effort to persuade listeners to take some action. That requires a certain amount of logic, a certain amount of emotion and a certain amount of character; the three essential com-ponents of persuasive communications. When speakers rely too heavily on slides, they lose two of those compo-nents: emotion and character. PowerPoint is the coldest and most passionless speech tool available. It encourages passive learning and, importantly, takes the audience’s eyes away from the speaker where the essence of character lives. PowerPoint also asks the audience to do too much. When we use PowerPoint, we expect an audience to hear the speaker’s words, watch the speaker at the podium, and

Writing a winning speech

Focus on the audience – make your speech relevant to them

Rely on emotion, not logic – anecdotes are easier to relate to than numbers

Use a logical structure – this makes it easier for the audience to follow

Words are more important than slides – do not let PowerPoint kill the speech

Add a little style – make the speaker seem warm and approachable

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

read the words on the slides. They simply can’t do all of that at one time. My mantra is fewer slides, not more. And while you are at it, try to use fewer images and fewer words on each slide, too.

If your speaker insists on using PowerPoint, ease them off their ad-diction by first explaining that the audience wants to hear them, not read slides. Then encourage them to at least open their speech with five minutes of pure talking (to help es-tablish character and credibility), followed by a few slides and ending

with talking (again to reinforce those important leadership attributes.) Re-member that listening alone is hard work. And we do a disservice to the audience when we introduce material that makes it even more difficult.

The point of any speech is to persuade listeners to take some action. That re-quires a certain amount of logic, a certain amount of emotion and a certain amount of character; the three essential compo-nents of persuasive communications.

77

STORY TELLER


most speechwriting is more expansive than other types of writing because you must give audiences time to catch up to what the speaker is saying. If the goal is to create understanding, you often have to repeat your key messages, repeat and restate statistics and use examples and anecdotes to amplify your points.

At the same time, the language should be fun and ex-citing to hear. That means deliberately editing in a few of the most useful rhetorical devices. Inserting a rhetorical question, for instance, not only breaks up the speaker’s delivery patterns, it makes the audience think. You will also want to make sure to vary the length of your sen-tences. Follow a longer sentence with a few short, stac-cato ones and make sure none of the sentences are too long for your speaker to deliver without gasping for air.

CONCLUSION On top of these five tips, you should strive to make sure your speaker seems warm and per-sonal. No one wants to hear someone who is all business all the time. So make an effort to make your speaker seem real and approachable. The best way is to have them share personal anecdotes with the audience; if the anecdotes include some soft, self-deprecating humor, even better. You can also use short, humorous quota-tions to great effect. These allow the speaker to be funny even if they normally aren’t. These do not have to be from Greek philosophers or business gurus, by the way. The speaker could quote one of their own children, a spouse, a funny headline from the newspaper or even an ad from television.Also, make sure the word “you” is used a lot. Rewriting sentences to include “you” ensures the speakers talk di-rectly to the audience. It is a subtle device that audience members appreciate and will respond to.

This simple exercise is one of the last editing steps I take because I find it helps me – as a writer – remember who I am really writing for. I am writing for an audience and the speech has to be interest-ing for them above all else.

FIVE That is why the last of my five big tips to make your speech something the audience will actu-ally listen to and hear is to add a lit-tle style into your writing. No, this is not where you make your speaker sound like Kofi Annan or Winston Churchill. It is where you edit the words toward three specific goals. You want to 1) make the words sim-ple and clear; 2) make the language exciting and fresh; 3) make your speaker sound warm and person-able (even if they are not).

Too many writers approach speeches thinking they have to sound dramatic and grand. As a result, their speakers appear to the audience as pretentious and pomp-ous. The objective should not be toward elevated language; the ob-jective should be audience under-standing.

Small words are better than long ones. Familiar words are better than unfamiliar one. Sentences, too, should be simplified for the au-dience and the speaker. This is es-pecially true if you are writing for a non-native speaker. Audiences need time to process unfamiliar accents and speakers need to be comfort-able delivering the words. Simplic-ity helps on both counts. Simplicity does not mean making the speech as lean as you can, however. In fact, Ph

otos

: Priv

ate

Fletcher Dean

Director, Leadership Com-munications, Dow Chemical

Fletcher Dean is an award-win-ning speechwriter, author and teacher. He won the Cicero Speechwriting Awards Grand Prize for the best speech of the year in 2008 as well as three additional golden Cicero Awards. He is an adjunct fac-ulty member at Western Con-necticut State University, and is the author of 10 Steps to Writ-ing a Vital Speech. He blogs at TheSpeechwriter.com.

78

STORY TELLER


G lobal warming, biological diver-sity and the distribution of toxins are just three examples of issues in the limelight raising questions about corporations’ environmen-tal responsibilities. As a result, an

increasing number of actors ascribe corporations greater liability when it comes to environmental issues, but also when it comes to human rights, poverty and other social matters. More and more corporations choose to incorpo-rate environmental aspects into their business models. The environmental dimension has become a part of product development, production, distribution and service, and to-day it seems to go without saying that corporations strive for energy efficiency, limitation of effluents, reduction of harmful materials and so forth.

Environmental communication is essential in this devel-opment and it has become a vital part of the corporate story. It is an argument used in product advertising, a dimension frequently cited as part of the core values, and a key ingredi-ent on websites and in annual reports. In one way, it could be seen as part of an identity construction. For many cor-porations, the shift in mindset, as well as practice, has been testing and, like a child who has to tell everybody when she has done a good deed, corporations want to tell their

Measuring the informativeness of a text – in other words, rating its quality – can help us to understand the use and abuse of rhetoric in corporate communications, in particular on the subject of environmental responsibility

by Magnus Fredriksson

PILING ON THE RHETORIC IN CORPORATECOMMUNICATIONS

STORY TELLER

stakeholders and others about their progress. But it is also communica-tion with an informative function. Increasing demands and expecta-tions on corporate environmental work mean an increased need for information about performance and results, as well as reason inducements and future directions. In some cases, the degree of sincerity and honesty has been questioned, and a recurring argument is that corporate environ-mental communications tend to be more about self-assertion and are not much more than empty rhetoric com-pensating for the lack of real action.

CORPORATE COMMUNICA-TION AS RHETORIC Let us first point out that most corporate com-munication is rhetoric, if by rhetoric we mean “the art of using language to help people to narrow their choic-es among specifiable, if not specified, policy options” (to quote R.P. Hart

79

STORY TELLER


in Modern Rhetorical Criticism). However, this is not to say that cor-porations lie when they use language (as the expression “empty rhetoric” suggests); rather, it is simply to point out that corporations use language to achieve certain goals, whether it is trust, reputation or increased sales. In this respect, we could also say that certain types of rhetoric are good while other types are bad.

Good rhetoric could be defined as communication that helps people make decisions relying on the infor-mation provided by the corporation. In everyday life this is, of course, an impossible outcome to reach, as every-body has their own ways of making use of information. But if we use a rational model of decision making, it is pos-sible to single out one comprehensive norm for rhetoric: it has to be informa-tive. Low informativeness could thus be defined as disclosures with limited substance and with little relevance for the receiver’s decision making proc-esses. Whereas, high informativeness describes disclosures with real sub-stance and with answers to relevant questions, enabling the receiver to make independent decisions about a corporation’s environmental work.

LIMITATIONS OF CORPORATE ENVIRONMENTAL RHETORIC Several studies have researched cor-porate environmental communica-tion. In my own studies, I have found that, out of the 255 corporations listed on the Stockholm Stock Ex-change, 87 per cent include environ-mental issues in their reporting. This makes environmental issues the most important non-financial issue (if by importance we mean the scope an is-sue is given). However this is not to say that all corporations give environ-mental issues the same significance or that it is an important issue compared Ph

oto:

dre

amst

ime.

com

80

STORY TELLER


to financial matters. In most cases environmental issues are tucked away in an odd corner. We should bear in mind that the amount of information gives no indication about the text’s informativeness. Phrases like ‘As a member of society, we are responsible for its continuing development’ give us no information about results, motivations or anything else one needs to know if we are to evaluate the environmental work of corporations. This is not to say that the amount of information is insignificant; rather it is to point out that high informativeness is reached by quantity in com-bination with frequency (the environmental presentations must be frequent compared with other issues) and range (an extensive frequency could be reached by the repetition of one aspect. To avoid this, the presentation must cover a wide range of aspects of the issue) and contextualisation (the presentation cannot be limited to actions and results, it must also provide information about background, motives and other preconditions for the work).

It should be noted that a limited number of corporations provide disclosures with high informativeness. In general the informativeness is low due to the fact that the disclo-sures provided are:

• Limited in frequency. Many corporations fill their disclo-sures with general descriptions and statements rather than specific information about their environmental work. In other cases, the frequency is acceptable but mostly due to the fact that the same information is presented a number of times.

• One-sided accounts of positive results. Environmental dis-closures are first and foremost success stories with little or no discussion about shortcomings or failures. In addition to this, very few corporations communicate actions they have chosen not to take.

• Rarely contextualised. The disclosures mainly focus on ac-tions, performance and results. Motives, explanations or background information is uncommon.

THE DRIVERS FOR EMPTY RHETORIC The results presented above support many of the arguments put for-ward when corporations are accused of greenwashing or of empty rhetoric. In many cases the disclosures provided by corporations contain little substance or relevant informa-tion, and it becomes clear that corporate environmental communications tend to be hyperbolic rather than realistic. In a number of cases the information provided fails to en-able stakeholders to evaluate the environmental work done (or not done) by corporations. The information does not say much about the work in itself; rather, it is communication

aimed towards polishing a tarnished reputation. To a large extent this is paradoxical, because many would argue for the engagement of corpo-rations in environmental issues by underlining the need for trust and support from society at large. When the production and distribution of prosperity become interlinked with the production and distribution of environmental risks, then the risks become a structural factor of society, the economy and politics. Corporations are then expected to communicate their attitude and so-lutions in a manner that is guided by the public interest and rests on rea-soning rather than self-interest and conceit. However corporate repre-sentatives tend to neglect the differ-ences between the logic of markets and the logic of norms, and instead of information they focus on self-

The article draws on content analyses of three annual reports conducted by the au-thor. The first covers all corporations listed on the 2005 Stockholm Stock Exchange and focuses on the motives stated by cor-porations in relation to their corporate so-cial responsibility. The results are presented in Företags ansvar/Marknadens retorik: En analys av företags strategiska kommu-nikationsarbete (Corporate Responsibil-ity/Marketplace Rhetoric: An Analysis of Corporate Communication). The second covers 20 large-cap corporations on the Stockholm Stock Exchange using a con-ceptualisation of informativity as an analyti-cal framework. The results are presented in Folksams rapport om miljöredovisning 2007 (Folksam’s report on corporate en-vironmental reporting 2007), published in 2008, as well as in Fredriksson and Olsson’s Green informativity: A model for assessing the quality of corporate environmental communication (2010). The third study us-es the same framework as the second, but covers all corporations listed on the 2009 Stockholm Stock Exchange. The results are yet to be published.

INFO

81

STORY TELLER


Vague communication then becomes a way to say some-thing without saying anything, or to make promises in re-lationship to one group (i.e. shareholders) that will irritate others (i.e. employees or NGOs).

FOUR Competition. When corporations communicate they often compare themselves with others and strive for superiority. Therefore the frame of reference becomes oth-er corporations and their rhetoric, instead of the corpora-tions’ own work.

FIVE The issues’ complexity. Global warming, biological diversity and the distribution of toxins are complex mat-ters that are only fully understood by a select few. Com-plicated matters are difficult to communicate. The aim of communication is therefore transferred from knowledge to security. Rather than informing people about achieve-ments, the aim is to create a story one can rely on in situ-ations of uncertainty.

ENVIRONMENTAL COMMUNICATION – A CHAL-LENGE FOR COMMUNICATORS Corporations’ envi-ronmental communications raise a number of questions and point out the complexity in the interaction between society, organisation and communication. For com-municators this is a challenge one has to accept and there is a need for reflection about what line one is to take in the matter. For now, it seems that most communicators treat en-vironmental communication as rhetoric in its most simple form. However the issue’s magnitude and complexity points out a number of partic-ular properties. The ability to handle these particularities is a question about morals – about doing the right thing – but it is also a question of success. Corporations who are able to be self-reflexive and who give communication a central po-sition within that process will be better equipped to meet the demands of an ever-growing number of stakeholders.

Rhetoric in corporate communications

Rhetoric is “the art of using language to help people to narrow their choices among specifiable, if not specified, pol-icy options” (R.P. Hart)

In general companies rarely provide disclosures with high informativeness

Disclosures are usually low in inform-ativeness as due to their lack of fre-quency, their one-sided coverage and their lack of context

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Phot

o: P

rivat

e

Magnus Fredriksson

University of Gothenburg

Dr Magnus Fredriksson lectures in media and communication studies at the Department of Journalism, Media and Com-munication at the University of Gothenburg. His research focuses on communication in organisational contexts with a specific focus on corporate identity, as well as on corporate social responsibility and the ideas and norms that dominate the practice. He also works as a communication consultant specialising in analyses, evalu-ations and advising.

assertion. The reasons for this may vary but here I would like to point out five drivers for empty environ-mental rhetoric:

ONE The idea of communication as magic. Communication is often seen as something ‘magical’, some-thing one could use when there is a lack of possibilities or interest in solving a problem. Communication is much easier to produce than so-lutions on global warming and such solutions would need extensive fi-nancial as well as psychological re-sources.

TWO The disintegration of com-munication. In many corporations communication is separated from other activities. As a result, com-munication is seen as something one does in the end when everything else has been completed. Therefore oth-ers create the setting for communi-cation, limiting the possibilities for adoption to external needs.

THREE The incompatibility of interests. A number of environmen-tal issues underline the tensions be-tween different interests in society.

82

STORY TELLER


A key role for corporate commu-nicators is organisational engage-ment – helping audiences to find their place in the story of the organisation. The art of story-telling can help communicators with this task

by David Willows

THIS IS MY STORY,TELL ME YOURS

STORY TELLER

I am not sure precisely where or when this particular story be-gan; but, looking back, I would say that it was just around my

tenth birthday when I first stumbled upon the writings of C.S. Lewis and his imagination-absorbing tales of Narnia. The fascination continued when, as a young theology and phi-losophy undergraduate, I learned of a world where Truth could no longer be reduced to a series of objective facts, but captured in the meta-nar-ratives that define and guide our reading of the way things are. Then I started reading the work of peo-ple like Stephen Denning and his ground-breaking work on storytell-ing and organisational change. De-spite the fact that at that time I knew nothing about the world of corporate communications, what he had to say still had a ring of truth about it. To-day, more than a decade later, nar-

83

STORY TELLER


Phot

o: w

ww

.flic

kr.c

om

lustrate your point, contribute an idea, raise an issue or make a connection with somebody.

STORYTELLER In short, it is all about stories. In fact, these days, notwithstanding the complexity of our art, we are in the end nothing more and nothing less than a band of storytellers: telling the story of our organisation and helping other people find their place in that story. It really is that simple. Everything else – our plans, budgeting, annual tar-gets, policies, and protocols – is just white noise.

Now this does not mean that we have left reality and plunged into a realm of fantasy and make-believe. On the contrary, as Michael Margolis explains in Believe Me: Why Your Vision, Brand, and Leadership Need A Bigger Story, for those of us who communicate on behalf of our compa-nies or organisations, it is high time we faced up to the fact that “people don’t really buy your product, solution, or idea, they buy the stories that are attached to it.”

So what does a storytelling approach to corporate com-munications look like? The good news is that today there are people out there, like Margolis and Denning, who are redefining and bringing the narrative dimension of what we do into sharp relief. Rather than simply tell you what they already know, I will therefore stick to what I know best: my practitioner’s tale, which turns upon three story-focused questions we happened to ask along the way, and some pointers for further discussion.

1. IS OUR STORY COHERENT AT EVERY STAGE? Have you ever sat down at your desk only to stumble upon a lack of coherence in the story that you were trying to tell. It is the moment you first notice that, despite the best laid plans and awe-inspiring publications, inconsistencies have appeared like bubbles on a freshly painted wall. Of course, at my organisation – the International School of Brussels, which has 1,500 students from 70 countries and 300 em-ployees – inconsistencies are everywhere. So where to start?

Our approach began by recognising that – just as epic tales conjure up characters, each one of which may happen to be on some kind of journey – everyone connected with our organisation is also on a journey and could literally be mapped on a continuum between first ‘attraction’ and ‘re-lease’ (See Figure 1). Of course, each one of my colleagues focuses upon different aspects of this life-cycle depending upon their prescribed roles within the team. From a story-telling point of view, however, it was critical that we came to a common understanding that it really is all part of the same process: telling the story and helping people – students, par-ents, donors, partners – find their place in that story. Hav-

rative approaches to what we do are everywhere, and Denning is arguably responsible for a brand new school of thinking.

In his book King Arthur’s Round Table: How Collaborative Conver-sations Create Smart Organisa-tions, David Perkins argues that all organisations are really only about conversations and that, notwith-standing the particular line of busi-ness we are in, effective leadership is always about helping people to have better, smarter conversations. And if you talk about conversations in one breath, you surely have to mention stories in the next. After all, stories are the ‘stuff ’ of most conversations and unique in their ability to bring meaning, pattern and order to the otherwise discon-nected fragments of our lives. Not convinced? Well just try and think of any recent, meaningful conver-sation, at work or in the office, in which you did not tell a story to il-

84

STORY TELLER


ing seen ourselves connected in this way, we went on to ask whether there was sufficient coherence between each of these ‘staging posts’. Concretely, was the experience of ‘in-clusion, challenge and success’ that is so much a part of our brand proposition in Stage 1 so keenly felt as students and their families journeyed through the school? After all, it is one thing to have a story. It is quite another to see it lived out in every aspect of who we are and what we do. Finally, a few questions you may want to ask yourself about this life-cycle approach to corporate engagement: what would this approach look like in your organisation? How coher-ent is your story along this path, and how are you measur-ing this? Who is responsible for identifying and reduced anomalies when they arise?

2. DOES OUR STORY MAKE SENSE? As John Stein-beck wrote in East of Eden, “if a story is not about the hearer he [or she] will not listen … A great lasting story is about everyone or it will not last. The strange and for-eign is not interesting – only the deeply personal and fa-miliar.” From a storytelling point of view, the idea that a story is as much about the listener as the narrator is hardly new. Yet it was only a few years that we all sat reading The Cluetrain Manifesto, transfixed by the suggestion that this truly was the end of business-as-usual; pondering that au-dacious proposal that markets are now conversations and that “in just a few more years, the current homogenised voice of business—the sound of mission statements and brochures—will seem as contrived and artificial as the lan-guage of the 18th century French court.”

A little more than 10 years on, sitting in our commu-nications offices, it is all too apparent how prophetic this manifesto was. The internet, to say nothing of Web 2.0 and social media, has changed everything – forever. Even at

Communication is telling stories

Communications is the art of tellling sto-ries about an organisation and helping people to find their place in that story

Stories should be coherent at every stage

Stories should relate to the audience

Communicators have to be playful – by avoiding predictability, stories take on a life of their own, evolving over time

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

school, we have become accustomed to a world of daily Google alerts and moderated Facebook or YouTube comments. Via our website and other online platforms, we have got used to the fact that we can no long-er get away with the digital equiva-lent of our dusty, old brochures, but instead are required to offer a space where conversations about learning take place; a dynamic environment in which people feel that their ques-tions are pondered, opinions heard, and values, well, valued. Personally, I do not believe that we are there yet. That said, we keep coming back to this question with two simple ob-servations.

First, in story terms, our school website is slowly becoming as much a narrative about the organisation we want to be as the organisation we already are. Again, to Margolis’ point, it is not the product (even if that ‘product’ is an education) that is driving effective conversations with our prospective customers or future employees. No: it is the sto-ries behind that product – the val-ues, aspirations, struggles, ideas and customer feedback – that capture the imagination and inspire people

Figure I A Life-cycle approach to organisational engagement

Telling the story of our school and helping others find their

place in that story

1. Attraction

4. Engagement

2. Recruitment

3. Induction

6. Release

5. Retention

85

STORY TELLER


Phot

o: In

tern

atio

nal S

choo

l of B

russ

els

David Willows

Director, External Relations, International School of Brussels

A former member of the EACD Board and the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education Commission for Marketing and Communica-tions, Dr David Willows is a regular contributor and blog-ger on the role of storytelling in school branding, marketing and communications. His lat-est book is entitled Fragments: Stories and Reflections on Modern Family Life (Cre-atespace 2010). He blogs at www.davidwillows.com.

It is clear that sooner or later we will all have to give up the myth that we can control what people are saying about us,

our companies or organisations.

sential, irreducible elements – ‘plays’ – which together make up a lexicon, a lingua franca, by which we can talk about, strategise, organise and predict the impact of the conversations we are having out there. As he argues in The Elements of Influence: Introducing The Playmaker’s Standard, communication is thus akin to a game of chess: a game with rules, strategies and, if not predictable out-comes, predictable moves.

However, as we reflect upon our roles within the or-ganisation, it may be that predictability is not the first word that comes to mind. We may consider ourselves playful, but more along the lines of the Shakespearean fool who pops up at key points in the narrative to sim-plify things, summarise, explain or simply bring a differ-ent perspective to the conversation – always looking for new ways and new opportunities to engage those around us. The key to change, in this sense, is innovation. So we can never forget that ours is also the task of understand-ing, communicating, criticising and reinventing the story almost on a daily basis – like a child rearranging Lego™ bricks to mirror constantly the imaginations of his or her mind. There is a chance, of course, that under the pres-sure of re-invention the story will shatter into a thousand fragments. At the same time, as C.S. Lewis once wrote, it is only by playing that we can break the story and begin to tell a truer tale.

CONCLUSION Talking of truth, you may well ask, is any of this true? Well like a good communications plan (or any other good story for that mat-ter), to ask the question is to miss the point entirely. After all, stories – even corporate stories – are always personal and can never be reduced to matters of fact. Are the tales of Narnia true? Of course they are! Like all effective commu-nication, they are sealed with a ‘ring of truth’ and spoken with an authentic voice. In the end, even as communi-cations professionals, that is surely as much as we can ever hope for.

to believe that we really could become the school we desire to be. So, rather than being narrators of a static script, everything today is more fluid. It is less about giving information, more about sending out invitations to join the discussion.

Second, there is the issue of losing control versus losing the plot. As so-cial media inevitably and relentlessly pushes us to become more flexible in relation to our ‘customers’, it is clear that sooner or later we will all have to give up the myth that we can control what people are saying about us, our companies or organisations. The fact

is, they always did talk about us: the only difference now is that we can lis-ten in more easily and maybe meas-ure what people are saying out there. However, even if we have lost control a lot of our customers are enjoying a great deal of airtime right now and it is time to ask ourselves whether we are really ready to throw up our hands in despair and give ourselves up to the winds of common opinion? Or is there another way of champi-oning the story, holding on to the vi-sion, and guiding people in the right direction.

3. CAN WE PLAY WITH THE STORY? If effective communications is all about storytelling, then it fol-lows that there must also be an in-nate playfulness to our art. This as-sociation is not new. Alan Kelly has spent his career analysing the com-munications role and come up with what he believes to be a series of es-

86

STORY TELLER


O ver the past 10 years, the world as we once knew it has changed dras-tically. We now live and work in an environment where social media provide a platform for the sharing of experiences, ideas and knowl-

edge. The dynamics of marketing, communications and customer relations have changed forever thanks to social media and a network of connected devices in a global en-vironment.

Information now has the ability to travel worldwide at a velocity never seen before. Vast online communities, professional networks, SMS and instant messaging are among the tools that enable this multi-channel environ-ment to give access to employees, individuals and busi-nesses so that they may communicate with greater ease. Interactions with multiple networks allow people to col-laborate anywhere at any time through out the world. Fur-thermore, whether written in email format or expressed on social networks, our mind-set has drastically altered. The relationship that corporate communication and public relations professionals have with their audiences is now influenced by their social media proximity.

Professional networks and online communities make virtual collaboration and idea sharing easy. Decision makers connect and collaborate with colleagues and ex-perts around the world, keeping them up to date about the issues at hand. The ability to reach businesses, suppliers and consumers to discuss and share experiences with each

The rise of social media and other web-based forms of communication have had a dramatic impact on the way we write in our daily business lives

by Philippe Borremans

THE ELECTRONIC EVOLUTION OF THE WRITTEN WORD

The dynamics of marketing, com-munications and customer relations have changed forever thanks to social media and a network of connected devices in a global environment.

other has increased the levels of reli-ance and trust through professional networks. On the flip side, compa-nies seem to be losing the ability to control messages and need to get back to the human relationship part of their business, remembering that customers and constituents would like to speak to a human being and

thus form a personal relationship with the company.

The ability to learn from custom-ers and to connect socially online is becoming a serious competitive advantage in business. The laggards who do not get on board will ulti-mately lose a vast number of cus-tomers and their competitive edge. The key to success for any business is public relations and having an ef-

87


Phot

os: w

ww

.dre

amst

ime.

com

fective customer relationship in or-der to increase revenue and to meet and exceed customer expectations. Online communities can build a very effective customer relationship and deliver the right services to the company’s customers. This is a way to become more intimate and to un-derstand the customers’ behaviour, as well as their expectations. It is a cost-efficient way to serve clients faster and better using what is to-day called social customer relations management.

LANGUAGE AND COMMUNICATIONS In the old days, letters were written, phone calls were made and the way interaction was performed was very different. In this brave new world, we communicate via email, instant mes-saging and other online tools. But what repercussions do these new tools have on the way we as professional com-municators write? For example, take the rise of texting: using our phones to write a brief message and send it to the recipient in a matter of seconds. The language used is shorter, condensed and inaccurate. Condensed terms of communication seem to lend themselves to every tech-nological type of platform. Presentations, smartboards, iPads and so many new innovative devices are optimised with the potential to deliver messages in the form and

88

STORY TELLER


format the audience requires there and then. Often, this means that many of our most dearly-held rules of gram-mar and syntax are left by the wayside.

Social media have redesigned writing as we once knew it, making it both more personal and more extrovert – because you are not only writing for an audience but also writing in a way that helps search engines to locate you. A new art form has emerged: communication on social media sites and on the web in general. There are principles of online writ-ing and several differences in writing for search engines: for example, stronger headlines ensure more page ‘hits’ and thus more engaged customers. Whether you are writing a blog post or writing an article for the web, readers need to be captivated if they are to keep on reading. An interactive writing environment creating an informal type of conversa-tion will make the readers – and customers – feel at ease.

LEARN THE LINGO Readers appreciate writers who speak in a simple and direct language. No one wants to fetch a a dictionary from the shelf to look up the big words, so how your message is written is a key factor in successful communication. Use a passive type of voice when speaking and writing for your audience and make them feel welcome so they will engage themselves in the conversation and not feel left out (this is harder than it sounds: there is a line be-tween easy informality and striking the wrong note). When communicating online, remember that if you do not know what you are talking about and cannot back it up with some type of reference, the reader will quickly realise that you are making it up and they will not be shy in telling you. Be aware of just how you come across and make it clear

that you actually do know what you are talking about. Also, avoid the temptation to get hasty or aggressive while writ-ing for blogs or social media sites.

Of course, some rules for successful social media writ-ing apply to writing in general. Aim for clarity and pre-cision in your writing and keep your objectives in mind. Articulate your words accurately and know your audience. Also, as the audience changes, you should also adapt your writing. Each website is different from the next, and the style of writing suited to, say, Facebook will differ from specialist blogs, and so on. Get to know the different so-

cial media platforms and communi-ties that you would like to engage with before putting pen to paper – or rather, finger to keyboard – and in-teract with the customers and audi-ences. Keeping to shorter sentences will encourage the audience to read on. Of course, the speed in which customers are able to read varies; capturing their interest is the goal.

Investigate social media plat-forms and learn the lingo. That is the first step towards reliability in social communities. Always speak in a positive and passive way and do not let yourself be discouraged by or dissatisfied with your readers: if an attempt at conversation does not pan out, try it from another angle. Engage with your audience and learn what is on their minds. Ask questions. Let the public cri-tique and comment on your work and your company, offering their thoughts and suggestions: you will be surprised at the end results. Al-ways be ethical and have a focus on information that adds value. If you do not know the answer just be truthful and let them know that you will research the answer and then post it. The average reader

Social media have redesigned writing, because you are not only writing for an audience but also in a way

that helps search engines to locate you.

Social media’s effect on language

Decision makers connect with col-leagues, experts and customers across the globe

Messages, and replies, are now composed and received in an instant

The language used is becoming shorter, condensed and more inaccurate

It is important to aim for clarity and pre-cision in all communications, and keep your objectives in mind at all times

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

89

STORY TELLER


Phot

o: v

an M

arck

e G

roup

all in the same social network. The demographics for con-versations are not of importance. Online socialites talk about everything they have in common via different types of media and language. Even though there are different languages spoken online, people seem to be able to relate to each other whether through their interests, books they have read, television, products and just about everything else. The substance is what matters and the social media lingo just falls in to place.

HYBRID APPROACH Communicating via social me-dia occupies a unique middle ground between the spoken and written word. Speech is traditionally time bound and dynamic and forms parts of an interaction, whereas writ-ing is traditionally space bound, permanent and static. There is no time lag in speech between expressions and reception, and, for the most part speech is short and fast. Speech exchanges are usually spontaneous and fast in re-sponse. The act of writing allows the writer to edit and rephrase the information, consider a variety of expressions and the needs of the reader. Social media, however, blur these distinctions.

CONTENT IS KING Modern communication tech-nology has had an impact on our language and literacy skills. However, the extent to which these effects are beneficial or even specific is still relatively unclear. Social media play such a huge role in the way language as we knew it has changed: con-densed sentences written in short bursts of energy makes for a quicker conversation and quicker responses.

Social media will enhance your value as you continue to communicate globally with your audiences. It does not matter what country you are in or whether you speak each other’s language. What mat-ters is content and the inter-ests of the online communi-ty. Social media are amazing sources of information and a fabulous way to interact with the world.

Philippe Borremans

Chief Social Media Officer, Van Marcke Group

Philippe Borremans has been responsible for internal and external social media communi-cation and collaboration for the different worldwide companies of the Van Marcke Group since 2009. Prior to this, he was re-sponsible for social media com-munications at IBM, a managing director at Blackline, and a Eu-ropean new media lead at IBM. He blogs on social media issues at www.conversationblog.com.

will scan a page prior to reading. If something catches their eye, they then will read further. This is the key to engaging with your online audiences. When a sentence just keeps going on and on the reader will lose interest and leave. Strong social media communication fea-tures short sentences, bullet points and large spaces in between arti-cles. This format, augmented with images, infographics and video, allows the audience to zoom in and scan through until they hit on something that draws them in. Key points, images or diagrams break up the monotony of the text. Graphics are the key to instantly drawing the reader into your story.

STYLE AND SUBSTANCE The tools determine the style of writing, so know your tools well! Blogs are journal-style websites that are fre-quently updated with information. The public share their lives openly through blogs – it is basically like keeping a journal. Then there are micro blogging sites like Twitter, where a mini journal is kept online. The content is usually a short burst of

information and major news events. All online social media sites use a new and different type of slang or lingo. Learning the lingo will take a ‘newbie’ some time before he or she grasps the content and how to use it correctly and, above all, naturally. The social media culture is a whole new world of interactions with com-munities, readers, businesses, cus-tomers and international countries

Strong social media communication features short sentences, bullet points

and large spaces in between articles.

90


BOOKSCommunications Reader

A n impressive array of experts feature in the Handbook of Communication and Corporate Social Responsibili-ty. Readers of this magazine might be familiar with the names of Craig Carroll, Peggy Simcic Bronn and

Howard Nothhaft – who are all previous contributors; the other authors represent a range of disciplines and coun-tries, underlining the editors’ attempts to fill a gap in the market with a comprehensive account of the subject, or, as the book’s cover blurb boasts, “the definitive research collection for CSR communication”. Among the several aspects of this sprawling subject, the particular paradox of corporate social responsibility – public distrust of corpo-rate do-gooders – is acknowledged by Sandra Waddock and Bradley K Googins, while Juliana Rapp provides a re-view of literature about stakeholder theory. At the end of the book, the editors helpfully point out key topics related to corporate social responsibility underrepresented in the preceding pages, as well as direction for future research. If the publication of a handbook represents both the crystal-lisation of research into a movement or field as well as ser-ving as a platform for future studies, then this handsome and thorough title certainly serves both purposes well.

ON PRACTISING POSTMODERN PR The past 10 to 15 years have seen the emergence of a substantial body of scholarly literature on the application of postmodern perspectives to the field of public relations. One of the more visible names in this field is Derina Holtzhausen, and her new book, Public Relations As Activism: Post-modern Approaches to Theory & Practice, serves to both encapsulate current thinking and moves the conversation forward, in particular by looking at the use of public re-lations through the years as a means of activism. With a clear and accessible approach, she discusses the appli-cation of postmodern theories and perspectives in the context of some bracingly diverse topics, ranging from ethics, history and organisations to power, knowledge and research. Under headers such as “The Emancipato-ry Potential Of Postmodern Public Relations History”, Holtzhausen calls on Habermas, Foucault, Deleuze and Derrida to support her call for a “public relations activist” to align themselves with disenfranchised groups. The book makes a very good job of persuading us to think of public relations in a whole new, oppositional relationship with the wider culture. Furthermore, she wins a bonus point for re-dubbing “case studies” as “vignettes” – much more elegant, no?

THE HANDBOOK OF COMMUNICATION & CORPORATE

SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITYOYVIND IHLEN/JENNIFER L.

BARTLETT/STEVE MAY (EDS.)WILEY-BLACKWELL AUGUST 2011

PUBLIC RELATIONS AS

ACTIVISM DERINA HOLTZHAUSEN ROUTLEDGE, 2012

91

BOOKS


TALKING TO THE TOP The things you learn when reviewing corporate communication books: when dogs and other service animals disobey their owner’s wishes in an effort to make a better decision, apparently it is called “intelligent disobedience”. This little nugget of in-formation comes to us via Bob McGannon’s chapter on “The art of saying ‘no’ to senior managers’’, just one of the excellent contributions to Advising Upwards, edited by Dr Lynda Bourne. As she writes in her introduction, while stakeholder groups come in all shapes and sizes, it is the senior stakeholders that are the most critical: they are the ones with the most to lose and often have a dif-ferent perspective than others within the organisational hierarchy, a perspective that can lead to very tough set of expectations. Understanding, managing and communi-cating these expectations is the gist of Advising Upwards, a book that offers considerable benefits to both your or-ganisation’s success and, not to put too fine a point on it, your own career advancement. Job advancement through the ranks of management usually depends on leadership abilities – the better you become at commanding teams, the more responsibility you are given. However, once the executive level has been reached, then managers must de-velop a more cooperative approach. Read this informative – and overdue – book to find out more.

WINNING VOTES WITH PR Public relations practices in the field of political communication are widespread, yet this state of affairs has not until now been reflected in any substantial literature theorising the role of public relations in political communication. That is why Political Public Relations, edited by Jesper Strömbäck and Spiro Kiousis, is such a welcome addition to the shelf. Acknowledging the relative paucity of titles on the same theme, the edi-tors’ introductory chapter clearly defines and maps out an “emerging field”. The essays that follow each seek to build a bridge between the two disciplines, with each chapter focussing on different perspectives, such as relationship theory, contingency theory, situational theory of publics and agenda-building theory. Stand-out chapters include Paul Baines on election campaigning (which also tou-ches on the role of positive and negative persuasiveness) and Juan-Carlos Molleda on public diplomacy. Digital communications and the rise of e-government is a thread that runs through the book, as are issues of framing and agenda setting – two public relations specialities that lend themselves to the political arena. As a thought-provoking starting point for further investigation, Political Public Relations is an essential read.

ADVISING UPWARDSLYNDA BOURNEGOWERSEPTEMBER 2011

POLITICAL PUBLIC RELATIONSJESPER STRÖMBÄCK/SPIRO KIOUSISROUTLEDGEMARCH 2011

92


ASSOCIATIONEuropean Association of Communication Directors

priorities shift from dealing with the present to dealing with what could happen in the near future and how to better prepare for any issue. This has led to an entirely new methodology for communication practices, which has consequently led to the reorganisation of commu-nication departments and the creation of new roles and responsibilities. Our panellists will come together to discuss the impact of our rapidly changing economy on the communications profession. The speakers will in-clude: Bernard Valero, director of communications and spokesman at the French Ministry of Foreign and Eu-ropean Affairs, Pierre Bayle, head of corporate commu-nication at EADS France, and Jean-Pierre Beaudoin, associate professor at the Paris Sorbonne University. The panel discussion will be moderated by Prof Dr Arne Westermann, professor of communication management at Quadriga University Berlin.

This year, for the first time in its history, the EACD will move its anniversary celebrations from Brussels to the French capital

UPCOMING PANEL DISCUSSION IN PARIS ON CRISIS

T he EACD recently decided that its annual anniversary festivities should be held in a different city each year, thereby reflecting the association’s regional diversity. Therefore, on November 24 this

year, the celebration will take place in Paris, at Alcatel-Lucent, close to the Eiffel Tower. The programme will start with an exclusive guided tour and discussion at the famous Musée du Quai Branly, followed by Work-ing Group activities in the afternoon, a keynote speech and a panel discussion in the evening, and a networking reception. The theme of this year’s anniversary will be “Never-Ending Crises: Risk and Crisis-Preparedness in a Rapidly Changing World.” With the rapid expansion of Web 2.0, as well as the emergence of previously un-thought-of crises, communicators have seen their main

93

ASSOCIATION


Phot

os: la

ncep

hoto

.com

(2)

, IBM

SPG

I, M

oritz

Ven

nem

ann

Would you say that there has been an actual increase in the number of crises in recent years, or are the me-dia becoming more prone to depict-ing events as crises? More warnings are brought to the attention of the public, this does not mean that

there are more crises, but that more whistleblowers are active, pointing at a greater diversity of potential risks. Also, the public is more sensitive to any kind of alert on risks, and therefore the media tend to ‘sell’ more risks. This is mainly true in Western, developed countries, where, with most risks having been removed and daily life being mostly safe, the residual risks are considered all the more unacceptable. Finally, companies and pub-lic authorities alike are more exposed to a diversity of ‘watchdogs’ whose orientations (health, environment, diversity, ethics, etc.) they must take into account. Such orientations are, moreover, often contradictory between one another. In such a context, one of the main sources of ‘crises’ is corporate behaviour, not hard facts. What kind of effective crisis communication practice measures would you recommend for most companies? Understanding what ‘appropriate behaviour’ would be in the eyes of the relevant stakeholders in a sensi-

Jean Pierre Beaudoin has been managing director of Groupe i&e since 1984. He is also an associate professorat Paris Sorbonne University School for Communication.

JEAN-PIERRE BEAUDOIN

TWO TAKES ON CRISIS tive situation is probably the field in which the most progress remains to be achieved by management to-day. Most managers understand that you need to have your facts in order, and third parties must be able to check their veracity, otherwise anyone’s assumptions will be as good as your facts. But facing a crisis also requires management to adopt the ‘good’ behaviour. Among many other recommendations, you must ad-mit to your mistakes and show what corrective action you plan to take, apply your professional competence to explaining the cause of the crisis and to remedy-ing its consequences for third parties, never embark on self-justification attempts – instead, show a sense of responsibility which, paradoxically, will often help to alleviate the legal liability, listen to whoever feels that they are victims, show cooperation in establishing the facts of the crisis and give attention to the ways to restore the rights of those affected. Do not necessarily admit to any legal responsibility, but do show human consideration.

How should companies persuade employees not to discuss internal crisis events with the outside world? First of all, it is crucial to make employees aware of the commu-nicative power of social media and its role in accelerating the

spread of information. Additionally, it is imperative for companies to establish a clear code of conduct for their employees regarding communicating via social networks and other digital media.If your communications department suddenly finds it-self swamped with media attention about an event that your management assures you is not a crisis, how do you react? You should make sure that this alleged crisis is genuinely not a crisis, because the way manage-ment perceives a situation might differ from how other stakeholders interpret the situation. A crisis is

Prof Dr Arne Westermann is professor of Communication Management at Quadriga University Berlin.

ARNE WESTERMAN

a crisis whenever a stakeholder perceives it to be one, not just when management deem it to be one. The so-called Thomas theorem formulated in 1928 by American sociologist William I. Thomas puts it quite nicely: “If men define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.” A ‘phantom’ crisis – one that emanates from media being provided with errone-ous or false information – presents the communicator with a precarious balancing act. On the one hand, standard crisis communication strategies are neces-sary, on the other hand, these strategies should be used in moderation so as to avoid escalating the ex-ternal perception of the situation further.

94

ASSOCIATION


WORKING GROUPS TOCONVENE IN PARISThe following EACD Working Groups will organise meetings and workshops on the occasion of the EACD Anniversary in Paris on 24 November

Working Group CSR: CSR Practitioner – A Communication Director’s JobThis CSR Working Group workshop focuses on the need for companies to have a concrete CSR policy in place and reveal their commitment to sustainability through their actions. Through presentations by Yves Garenne, a consultant and sociologist at Ecophanie, and Misha Pinkhasov, principal at Nair-Safir, partici-pants will learn effective ways of communicating CSR

practices externally in ways that align with the overall philosophy of the company, rather than as an attempt to gain media attention.

Working Group Energy: Relaunch meeting As Europe looks to its energy future, diversity and inte-gration of energy resources – while taking into account environmental impact and the needs of society – will be crucial to long-term energy security. Communicators will play an important role in supporting policy makers and businesses in mapping-out this future. The EACD Energy Working Group, with its multi-sector and pan-European representation, is ideally placed to debate is-sues and offer recommendations for a shared agenda for Europe’s energy future. Andrew Hogg, vice president of communication, exploration and production at Total SA, and the new Coordinator of the Working Group, will lead a re-launched Energy Working Group meet-ing in order to help define the group’s mission and a programme for the year ahead.

Working Group Evaluation: Best Case PresentationsAt this session, hosted by Louis de Schorlemer, evalua-tion models with insights into the practical implementa-tion of evaluation methods in the European Institutions and companies will be featured. A presentation will be given by George Ellis Ruano, director of Gellis Com-

munication, giving participants the opportunity to learn from colleagues with vast knowledge in this essential aspect of communications. Attendees will also be able to share experiences and discuss the most effective ways to measure and evaluate their hard work.

Working Group Social Media: Workshop – Online Monitoring on a ShoestringPhilippe Borremans, Coordinator of the Working Group Social Media will hold an interactive workshop on how to monitor what is being said about your company or organ-isation online through the use of free tools. The workshop will also provide an overview of enterprise-grade online monitoring tools. All participants will need to bring their own laptops for this interactive workshop.

FURTHER INFORMATION

Date: 24 November, 16:00 – 18:30Alcatel-Lucent, 3 Avenue Octave Grèard, 75007 Paris, France

Please note that all Working Group events will take place simulta-neously at the same venue, and you can register for the one you wish to attend online at: www.eacd-online.eu

Misha Pinkhasov,Nair-Safir

Yves Garenne,Ecophanie

George Ellis Ruano, Gellis Communications

Phot

os: P

rivat

e

95

ASSOCIATION


REGIONAL ACTIVITIESBelow you will find some recent information about the upcoming regional activities in the second semester

Coaching Days: Practical Workshops for EACD Members

The EACD proudly announces the launch of the EACD’s Coaching Days, a new initiative which, along with the Regional Debates, will offer even more opportunities to the association’s members to benefit from presentations on communications topics in more depth. A Coaching Day is a two- or three-hour workshop for EACD mem-bers interested in learning in depth about a particular aspect of communications. The workshops have a strong

London – Thursday November 17Reputation Management

Moscow – November 17Crisis Communications

Budapest – Tuesday November 29B2B Communications in the Social Media Landscape

Almere – Tuesday December 6Utilising Creative Strategy to Reduce Costs

London – Thursday December 8Effective Storytelling

COACHING DAYS

Zoetermeer – November 9 Accountability in Communications: Are We Making Progress? Host: KPN Zoetermeer

Lisbon – November 9 Financial Communications: Rebuilding Trust and ConfidenceHost: Optimus and Hotel Altis

Athens – November 11 Communicating Successfully in the Digital Age Host: OTE academy

Vienna – November 29 Giving a Voice to the Voiceless using Social MediaHost:The OPEC Fund of International Development

interactive element, which includes practical knowledge that participants can take away. Attendees will be ex-posed to concrete strategies and ideas that they can im-plement in their own professional lives. The first series of Coaching Days has already been planned in the Nether-lands for November and December, and the table below shows the exact dates and topics. More Coaching Days are being planned in cities all over Europe.

Brussels – Thursday December 8Effective Stakeholder Mapping and Proactive Scenario Planning to Help You Steer Your Way Out of a Crisis

Rotterdam – Thursday December 8What it Takes to be Successful in the Corporate Communications Arena

Rotterdam – Thursday December 8Change Communications, Storytelling and Corporate Narrative

Amsterdam – Friday December 9 Best Practice in Brand Implementation Management

REGIONAL DEBATES

96

ASSOCIATION


ASSOCIATION NEWSPlease see below some recent developments in the EACD commmunity

EACD New Regional Coordinators

New EACD Service Brochure

The EACD is about to unveil ‘Digital Public Affairs’, issue number eight of the association’s popular Service Brochure series. Created by Steffen Thejll-Moller of Fleish-man-Hillard and the EACD, the brochure pro-vides practical recommen-dations for integrating digital engagement into an organisation’s com-munications strategy. In addition to pointing out the advantages unique to

using digital channels to address an audience, The-jil-Moller lays out helpful guidelines for communicators with little or no experience in digital public affairs.

EACD Supports New Research Project: The European Communication Professional Skills and Innovation Programme

A consortium of European universities and organisa-tions, under the lead of Ralph Tench from the UK’s Leeds Business School, has won a major EU research bid to evaluate and develop European communicators’ professional skills and competencies. The major ambition of this project is to build a European theory of commu-nication management, as well as a framework to support the professionalisation and ethical development of the practice.In order to be able to reach out to all the different regions in Europe, the project is base on a qualitative and quan-titative research programme across Europe with part-ners in the Netherlands, Germany, Spain, Slovenia and Turkey. The EACD will function as one of the project’s partners, as one of the association’s major aims is to en-hance and support the profile of the profession across the continent.

The EACD is happy to welcome several new Regional Coordinators. Médard Schoenmaeckers, head of ex-ternal communications at Syngenta International, has joined Axel Schafmeister in the coordination of the Regional Group Switzerland. The Regional Group Ukraine welcomes its first Regional Coordinator, Kon-stantin Golovynsky, head of corporate communications at Renaissance Capital LLC. In addition, Caroline Kamerbeek, global head of marketing and communica-tions at KEMA, has joined Hans Koeleman and Koen-raad van Hasselt in the coordination of the Regional Group Netherlands. The appointment of these coordi-nators facilitates the EACD’s goal to be even more ac-tive on the regional level.

Médard Schoenmaeckers, Head of External Communications, Syngenta International

Konstantin Golovynsky, Head of Corporate Communications, Renaissance Capital LLC

Caroline Kamer-beek, Global Head of Marketing & Communications, KEMA

Phot

os: S

trel

itski

, Priv

ate

97

ASSOCIATION


Rufat Abbasov, Director of Communications, The Central Bank of the Republic of AzerbaijanValery Aksenov, Director, External Relations and Communications, Black Sea Trade & Development BankCatherine Alexandre, Senior Vice President Communication and Marketing, Delhaize Belgium BrusselsAndreea Bostan, Commnunication Director, Bostico International Poole, DorsetMarina Burazer, Substitute Director of PR Sector , INA – Industrija nafte d.d.Ana Busto, Group Internal Communication Director, Sodexo SA Paris cedex 18Catharina Byström, Head of internal Communication, Försäkrings-kassanJason Cooke, Head of Communications, Airtricity / SSE Ireland DublinLena Coquerand-Werner, Communications Manager, BTG Eclepens S.A.Mafalda Correia, Head of Communication & PR, CIMPOR - Cimen-tos de Portugal, SGPS, SABéla Dajka, Event Organiser, Committee of the RegionsMarie Dangles, Global head of communications, Crédit Agricole (Suisse) SAJasmin Dearnell, Director Internal Communications, Sanofi Aventis GroupEleni Didaskalou-Papadimitriou, Manager Communications and Mar-keting Department, MEGARON-THE ATHENS CONCERT HALLRachel Dodd, Head of Communications IT Services, Capita Keele, Newcastle under LymeOlivier Dubois, Corporate Communication Senior Manager, Fiat Group Automobiles TorinoRichard Eames, Media Relations Officer, IMD InternationalVirginie Ferre, Communication Manager, Société Générale ParisLucas Ferreira Hernández, Communications Director, MaxamCorp Holding, S.L. MadridŽana Goic, Director of Corporate Communications Sector , INA – Industrija nafte d.d.Karin Greve-Isdahl, Communications Director, SN Power OsloAnne Günnewig, Manager Corporate Communications Europe, Panasonic Marketing Europe GmbH WiesbadenJessica Hartenberger, Communication Consultant, Det Norske Veritas HøvikThomas Hartmann, Head of Communication, Region VästerbottenLasse Høgfeldt, Director of Communications / editor-in-chief, Jyske Bank A/S SilkeborgVasia Klapsi, Communication Manager, Shell Hellas AEWillem Koolhaas, Director of Corporate Marketing and Communi-cation, Rotterdam School of Management RotterdamKevin Lang, Director of Communications, Law Society of ScotlandMarjo Loisa, Communications Director, Lappeenranta University of Technology

Meylin Loo, Communications Manager, SkanskaVeerle van Mierlo, Head of Communications , SNCB Logistics Brus-selsRubén Mohedano-Brèthes, Communication Senior Manager, Euro-pean CommissionJacques Moisse, Inspector General of the Communications Depart-ment, Publice Service of the Wallonie Namur (Jambes)Jörg Nitschke, Vice President Corporate Communications and Spokesperson, Carl Zeiss AGIsabel Paeme, Head of Communications, Gent University GhentViola Peulen, Coporate Director Communications & Marketing, Wageningen University, Faculty of Environmental Sciences Wage-ningenFrancesco Polsinelli, Corporate Communications Europe, Internal Communications Manager, Case New Holland Italia S.p.A. ModenaJörg Polzer, Associate Dirctor, Corporate Communications, Infront Sports & Media AG ZugAdriana Popescu , Corporate Communications Manager , URSUS Breweries BucharestElena Pravilschikova, Communication Manager, OAO Alfa Laval PotokNádia Reis, Director of Public Relations and Brand activation, Mod-elo Continente Hipermercados, S.A. Senhora da Hora MatosinhosSofie Reutercrona, Head of Internal Communications, SPP Livförsäkring AB StockholmNiina Riihelä, Vice President of Marketing and Communications, Mandatum Life Insurance Company Limited HelsinkiSirpa Rinne, Communications Director, Finish Food and Drink Industries FederationLuis Roberto, Communications & External Affairs Manager, BP Por-tugal - Comercio de Combustiveis e Lubrific Christine Roger, Director Media & Communications, General Secre-tariat of the CouncilOswald Schröder, Spokesperson, European Patent OfficeMarion Schumacher, Vice President PR & Communications, Möven-pick Hotels & Resorts Management AGAnastasiya Sobotyuk, Head of IR department, MHPMinna Sundelin, Communications Project Manager Finland, Nord Stream AG ZugJane Swift, Internal Communications Manager, European Science Foundation Strasbourg CedexTellervo Taipale, Director, External Relations and Members Services, FORATOMValerie Verstappen, Communications Coordinator, SETAC Europe BrusselsValerie Warland, Marketing and Communications Director , Alter Domus S.à r.l. LuxembourgElaine West , Director, Internet, ALSTOMVictoria Zavyalova, Director of Communications, Association of European Businesses in the Russian Federation

WELCOME!The following communicators have recently joined the EACD

98


QUESTIONS TO...The personal side of communication directors

MILVA KARADZHOVA

How do you explain your job to your friends?Most often my explanation is that I work for my clients’ causes – telling their stories, mak-ing them popular and winning new support-ers. It is then easier to explain that gaining media interest is just the visible part of the whole job of advice and groundwork. I also like Barniz’s explanation that public relations experts are practitioners in sociology – they say what actions can make people support you, thus making an organisation be alive. This is most probably because I have a master’s degree in sociology.

A masterpiece of corporate communication was…?In recent years we have witnessed a lot of suc-cessful cases. The economic crisis has made communication really important, bringing a lot of creative and memorable projects. We can say a public relations project is a really good one if we know the idea behind it and its efficiency. I can name a few projects from the FMCG sector in Bulgaria and I am happy that some of them are Bella Bulgaria’s.

If heads of corporate communications didn’t exist, what would be your profession?Definitely a writer. I do not exclude the op-portunity to make this happen in the future and tell my story.

What personal object decorates your desk?Tiny figures gathered at different events – usually created by children on differ-ent charity occasions.

Who are your present-day heroes?People that drive and manage change – with vision for the future and active leaders, regardless of their occupation, who challenge the status quo.

What has been the most emotional mo-ment in your career?I had the great opportunity to start my career in political circles during a period of elections. I had the chance to make my first steps in the profession and to learn from practice. It was the period of the first years of the profession in Bulgaria and everybody was learning. Years later I received specialised, theoretical knowl-edge in public relations. From then on I know that it is most important for a pub-lic relations practitioner is to be capable of making quick decisions.

Which natural talent would you like to possess? I would like to be much better at sing-ing.

Phot

o: B

ella

Bul

garia

Editors: Neil Cranswick, Grit Fiedler,

Dafydd Phillips,

Graphical Concept:

Steffi Butter, Franziska Söhner

Layout: Steffi Butter, Sarah Schlingmeyer

Illustrations: Burkhard Piller

Photo Editor: Stephan Baumann

Advertising: Norman Wittig

([email protected])

Web design: Dennis Otto

([email protected])

Publishers: Rudolf Hetzel, Marc-Oliver Voigt

Contact: Square de Meeûs 37

B-1000 Brussels, Belgium

Tel +32 (0)2 219 22 90

Fax +32 (0)2 219 22 92

[email protected]

www.communication-director.eu

Helios Media

Square de Meeûs 37, B-1000 Brussels, Belgium

Price: 120 euro yearly: 4 editions of the

magazine, access to the website, regular

newsletter. For members of the EACD, a

yearly subscription to the magazine is includ-

ed in the membership fee.

Print: Offsetdruckerei Holga Wende

Meeraner Straße 19, 12681 Berlin

Imprint

Milva Karadzhova

Head of Corporate Com-munications, Bella Bulgaria

Milva Karadzhova is head of corporate communica-tions at Bella Bulgaria. Before joining the company, she was managing director at a full service communi-cation agency. She has al-most 15 years in corporate communications and public relations. She has a wide range of past experience in the public and private sectors, and has worked on campaigns for KBC, Vivatel, BTC, Actavis and Ministries, as well as on projects in the realms of culture, civil society and media. She received a master’s degree in sociology and journalism from the University of Sofia and also holds a diploma in public relations from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations.

Head of Corporate Communications, Bella Bulgaria

magazin communication director 04 2011

Documents

t e c o

t i o n s

z i n e f o r c o r

i c r e

u n i c

words worth

corporate communicators

meaningless business