Change Communication Planning

Change communication planning: getting the right message to the right people at the right time

Change communication planning is something change managers do every single day, often without noticing it. Yet poor communication is one of the biggest reasons change initiatives fail. In this mini masterclass, Liam Casey guides us through what communication planning really is, why it matters so much, and how to build a plan that reaches every audience in a way they will actually hear.

Liam is an operations manager with over 10 years of experience leading customer service, sales and operational teams, and an active volunteer with the Ireland chapter of the Change Management Institute. He is passionate and practical about change management, focused on helping individuals and organisations apply simple, effective approaches, and he brings extensive experience coaching team leaders and frontline teams to improve performance, communication and accountability. He is joined by Mary Geoghegan, who hosts the session.

What communication planning actually is

Communication planning ensures that the right people receive the right message at the right time.

A strong communication approach should:

• Create clarity and reduce uncertainty
• Support stakeholder engagement and increase trust
• Help leaders communicate consistently
• Build understanding, readiness and adoption
• Create opportunities for two way dialogue

That last point cannot be understated. When you send out communications or updates there should always be a two way street. If somebody wants to reply, raise a question or ask for clarification, they should never hit a brick wall. Communication is not just about sending information. It is about helping people understand, engage, and then adopt the change in the future. A lot of this is straightforward, but it is often missed or its importance underestimated.

Why communication planning is so important

Poor communication is one of the biggest reasons why change initiatives fail. A Prosci report from the end of last year set out six reasons change management fails, and the first reason was communication flaws.

So why does it matter this much? A few reasons stand out:

• People fill gaps with assumptions. Once people start adding their own assumptions it becomes like Chinese whispers. Legs get added here, there and everywhere, and people begin sharing incorrect information. We need to fill any gaps in communication as much as possible.
• Different groups need different information. The message needs to be tailored to individual stakeholder groups.
• Consistency builds confidence. Consistent communication improves confidence and alignment within the teams and departments where the change is happening.
• Regular updates. reduce uncertainty, build trust, and increase buy-in.
• Research consistently identifies poor communication as one of the most common contributors to failed change initiatives.

The key questions to ask before you communicate

Before any communication goes out, and before a communication plan is put in place, there are key questions to work through. In big organisations with globally dispersed teams, and even in small organisations where everyone is in the same place, you should never assume that someone will simply hear about the change.

• Who needs to know about the change?
• What do they need to know?
• When should they hear it?
• Who is best to deliver that message?
• What communication channel works best?
• What action do we want people to take?

Do not rely on one message from the top

It should not just be one general communication from a director or the change manager. The message should reach individual teams through their team leaders, line managers or department heads, who can then disperse it further down the line. The trust people have in their line managers is far greater than the trust they place in the name on an email, so they will more than likely go to their direct manager first. Equipping those managers to carry the message is often the way to go.

Match the channel to the audience

Not everybody uses email. Coming from a contact centre background, Liam points out that sales agents and customer service staff taking 50 to 60 calls in an eight hour shift cannot be expected to read lengthy emails between calls. In that environment, team leaders were equipped with the full plan and given a communication they could share individually with their teams, then worked through it in one to one coaching sessions and team meetings. Every organisation is different, so be specific about the channels the teams you are trying to reach actually use.

Create a psychologically safe space for questions

Providing a safe space for people to ask questions is essential. It is common to finish a presentation, ask for questions, hear silence, and then have team leaders approach afterwards to relay what their people wanted to ask. This can also be cultural. Working with call centre agents in the Philippines, questions were initially taken to team leaders rather than raised directly, because the operations manager was seen as the big boss who should not be questioned. Once that was broken down, people felt comfortable asking directly, much like colleagues in the Ireland and US offices who would simply raise a hand and ask on the spot.

Communication is a life cycle, not a one off

Communication planning does not end when a message is sent. Success comes from continuously engaging with stakeholders, listening to feedback and adapting communication to drive adoption. The cycle runs through:

• Stakeholders – who needs to know?
• Message – what do they need to hear?
• Channel – how will they hear it?
• Delivery – the communication activities
• Feedback – what are we hearing?
• Adoption – what behaviours have changed?
• Owner of communication
• Desired outcome or action

Then you keep going around. It is a life cycle, not one and done.

Channels, change champions and reaching everyone

The channels available include town halls and leadership briefings, email updates and newsletters, workshops, focus groups, one to one coaching, team meetings and internal platforms such as Microsoft Teams.

Change champions

They are a huge part of most change initiatives. One of the biggest challenges is ensuring messages are understood, trusted and discussed at the local level, and change champions bridge the gap between the central project team and the frontline. They:

• Reinforce key messages within teams
• Translate change into local contexts and team specific language
• Provide a trusted source of information
• Gather questions, concerns and feedback
• Identify communication gaps early
• Increase awareness and understanding

Because they sit closer to the local level, people around them tend to feel far more comfortable raising concerns or issues about an upcoming change, which makes champions a valuable route for honest feedback.

The right message at the right time

Effective communication is not about repeating the same message over and over. It is about delivering the right message to the right audience at the right time. Messages should move with the stages of change:

Objective                    —>                   How Champions help

• Build Awareness  —>       Reinforce key messages locally
• Improve Understanding —>    Explain impacts in team-specific language
• Encourage engagement  —> Create opportunities for discussion
• Gather feedback —>   Surface concerns and questions
• Support adoption —>     Reinforce new behaviours and ways of working

At each stage, consider what people are thinking and what the communication focus should be, and answer those questions before the plan goes out, because nine times out of ten someone is about to ask them.

Communication principles every change leader should follow

Explain the why before the what. One useful habit is to ask why five times before putting a communication together: why am I sending it, why do people need to know, why is it important to them, how will it help, and why will they care enough to read it?
The wider principles are:

• Communication is a dialogue, not a broadcast
• Direct managers are the most trusted source of information
• Communicate what is known and be honest about what is still unknown
• Over communicate during uncertainty
• Consistency matters more than perfection, and people need to hear key messages multiple times
• Feedback loops are essential

A closing thought

Communication planning is not a box to tick or a broadcast to fire off and forget. It is a continuous, two way, human process of reaching people where they are, being honest with them, and checking that the message has genuinely landed rather than just been sent.

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