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T h e B o o k o f

CSR & GReen PRS T r a T e g i e S & T a c T i c S

Chapter 3: Employee Communications and CSR

88 The Book of CSR & Green PR Strategies & Tactics © PR News

Finding an Effective Prescription For Employee Engagement in CSRBy Jill Vitiello

The remedy: Bottle the passion from employees in the Merck Fellowship for Global Health program by turning them into grassroots ambassadors. Then,

develop a toolkit for them to spread the word about the Fellowship’s value to the triple bot-tom line—global health, the fellows and the company—enabling them to share with col-leagues the spirit of corporate volunteerism.

Possible side effects: Employees selected as fellows put aside the comforts of home, step outside their regular jobs and many travel to a low-resourced country for 12 weeks. In some cases, that means limited access to clean water, electricity and transportation. After three years spent establishing a success-ful foundation for the Fellowship program, Merck wanted to engage a greater number of applicants from the enterprise representing its global footprint for its 2015 cohort.

Merck’s Office of Corporate Responsibil-ity and Global Communications engaged Vitiello Communications Group (VTLO) to resuscitate this crucial program. The plan included developing a robust communica-tions program combining proven communi-cations techniques plus a focus on equipping alumni to become the voice of the program. Says Theresa McCoy, associate director, cor-porate responsibility, who manages the Merck Fellowship for Global Health program, “We ignited a new passion in employees, identified 34 highly qualified fellows and exceeded our goal of filling all assignment positions.”

Call to ActionThe target audience included high-per-

forming employees who have skills relevant to the nonprofit project. In addition to inspiring this audience, the fellowship application pro-cess had to include managers of stellar em-ployees. Communications focused on a call to action—not only for applicants but also for managers and colleagues who would be called upon to fill the gap while the fellow was in the field. The campaign theme, Top Ten Reasons to Apply, highlighted the value to the fellow, the nonprofit and the company to underscore the business case for becoming a fellow.

Reprinted with permission from PR News, 2016, ©Access Intelligence, LLC

Chapter 3: Employee Communications and CSR

89© PR News The Book of CSR & Green PR Strategies & Tactics

Alumni AmbassadorsWith the Fellowship program under way

for several years, the team had an existing group of employee ambassadors—about 70 alumni fellows—who could speak directly to applicants and their co-workers, answer ques-tions and share first-hand experiences about the program. VTLO developed an online communications that included:

Lunch and Learn presentation and talk-■■

ing points for face-to-face meetings and webinars

Employee blogs■■

Customizable email templates■■

Email signature guidelines and template■■

Town hall talking points and presentations■■

One alumni fellow who volunteered in maternal health in Nairobi, Kenya, became an advocate and voice for the Fellowship program. She shared her life-changing expe-rience at a town hall using the customizable PowerPoint and wove in her personal story.

Another alum said, “I gave a Lunch and Learn with 30 employees participating in per-son and more than 40 dialed in. Since then, interested employees and their managers reach out to me on a daily basis. It is reward-ing that alumni fellows like me can continue to have a positive impact after our field as-signments are completed.”

In addition, the Vitiello team aligned closely with regional communicators to drive key messages about the benefits of the Fellow-ship across the organization, with a special emphasis on Asia Pacific, Canada, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

The Right Treatment, Great OutcomesWorking with Merck Global Communi-

cations, the team married these efforts with traditional communications methods such as

Healthy Program Secrets Picture success. Visualize what success looks like. Design a well-thought-out communications plan. For this organization, success was defined as greater online engagement and an increase in qualified applicants with a broader representa-tion of geography and business lines.

Ignite passion. Engage employees who have a personal connection with the program to inspire and excite others. Armed with the right tools, employee ambassadors can be the key ingre-dient to a healthy grassroots effort. With this Fellowship program, a willing group of alumni fellows was ready to serve as ambassadors and share first-hand experiences.

Build flexible tools. Create tools that can be adopted or adapted to specific audience needs. Train and empower your colleagues to know what must be achieved and give them the flex-ibility to determine how best to use these power-ful tools to succeed.

Collaborate and conquer. Partner with regional communications leaders. Through a consistent theme and messaging, you can ensure everyone is on point. Encourage regional and local profes-sionals to tailor and drive communications. With this organization, regional articles, e-newsletters and translated posters covered Latin America, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, Asia Pacific, Europe and Canada. To increase program aware-ness and make it easy for partners, 100+ inter-nal SharePoint community website managers received prewritten, shareable content to use on their sites.

Alumnus Nardi Odijk (center) of the Netherlands worked with a hospital in rural Nepal on a pharmaceu-tical supply chain strategy. Upon returning, he shared his experience with colleagues at in-person and virtual Lunch and Learns.

Reprinted with permission from PR News, 2016, ©Access Intelligence, LLC

Chapter 3: Employee Communications and CSR

90 The Book of CSR & Green PR Strategies & Tactics © PR News

posters, Intranet stories and videos. The collaboration with external communications ensured that the team con-veyed messages to external stakeholders through press releases, social media and the annual corporate responsibil-ity report. This further posi-tioned the Fellowship pro-gram as a premier employee development program. It also generated pride for Merck’s strong commitment to corpo-rate responsibility including charitable giving, volunteer-ism and leadership develop-ment among its employees.

This approach to revitaliz-ing the application campaign invigorated employee engage-ment. It captured the atten-tion of high performers who were motivated apply for a life-changing Fellowship. As a result, the 2015 campaign drew the highest number of appli-cations ever: 185 percent more than in 2014.

In this cohort, 11 countries and employ-ees from every part of the organization were represented, compared with only five coun-tries and four business units in 2014. Now, more employees than ever are working with nonprofit organizations to deliver innovative health solutions to patients and customers around the world.

By writing a prescription to engage em-ployee ambassadors and regional commu-nicators, an organization can bring together people who are passionate about a cause and professionals skilled at tailoring messages to key audiences. Growing a grassroots effort

takes time, care and flexibility. The results will be a healthy team of ambassadors that makes your program contagious. PRN

Jill Vitiello is president of Vitiello Communications Group.

Reprinted with permission from PR News, 2016, ©Access Intelligence, LLC