Enterprise Communications Strategy has a nice ring to it. That is what I want to do.
So what is “Enterprise Communications” and how is it different from “Corporate Communications”? I think we all have a picture of Corp. Comms, the mouthpiece of the company. That is not what I am talking about. For me Enterprise Communications is about little “c” communications. It is about looking at the fundamentals and asking what is the purpose of communications, and what is the best way to communicate. It is about looking at the mission/vision/objectives of the enterprise and figuring out how to align the way an organization communicates with the M/V/O. It is more about listening than talking. It is about connecting with people, or as Scoble says, putting a human face on the organization.
In many cases the solutions will lie in social media, but not always. So ECS is not just another euphemism for social media, but social media may well be a tactic of a good Enterprise Communications Strategy.
I see ECS as dealing with communication both inside and outside the firewall. Doesn’t it make sense that an organization use the same principles of communications for employees and customers?
I like where this is going. More thoughts to come…
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tagged: communications strategy, enterprise 2.0, Enterprise Communications, social media |
Inside Conversation 
I remember working for a huge company and once a quarter sitting in the CEO’s staff meeting and brainstorming with him and an in-house PR person on what he should email the whole company to get them “on the same page.” The PR person would write a long email and a few of us would go back and forth working it until it was sufficiently boring.
It’s hard to imagine a reality like that today but I’m sure it still occurs. In the meantime, most enterprises simply don’t have a singular and focused way to openly communicate with each other. The idea of something like that is scary for a lot of companies. Particularly middle management–who have become experts at gating and controlling the flow of information. Pulling this shroud away, and revealing the visible enterprise ends up being a lot less horrifying then people think, though I do think it will challenge middle management (and some others) to learn some new management skills.
[…] objectives with how they are in fact communicating. As I have posted before, I am using the phrase Enterprise Communication Strategy to express what I am trying to […]