Subject: INTERNAL COMMUNICATION STRATEGY From: HEAD OF CORPORATE .

Communication aimed at external audiences in this regard should be communicated to internal audiences in advance or at the same time. Employees should have the opportunity to feed back views and concerns to team leaders and managers and mechanisms should be embedded within services to facilitate this. Careful attention to the organisational values of respect and listening and learning is essential. Managers and employees have a duty to treat each other with respect and the tone of communication should be appropriate at all times. Communication across Effective communication between staff in different services is not only important for operational delivery of services. It also helps to improve organisational awareness, which can help to reduce duplication and improve efficient service delivery. A practical example of this is where an enquiry from a service user or elected member is directed to an employee who does not have the specific information required as part of their remit. Good organisational awareness should assist that employee in being able to quickly point the person making the enquiry to the correct service or person. Managers have a specific responsibility to help embed good internal communication. They are expected to share information and knowledge both formally and informally. Formal opportunities to do this include regular senior manager briefings. Communication with elected members As detailed in the Chief Officers’ Code of Conduct, councillors should be afforded the respect of their office. They should be addressed as Provost, Convener, Chair or Councillor as appropriate, although it is accepted that on a one-to-one basis in private other forms of address may be used depending on how long and how well the officer and councillor have known each other. Mutual respect between councillors and officers is essential to the proper conduct of the council. Close personal familiarity between individual officers and councillors can damage both this relationship and the belief that officers give objective and professional advice and commitment to the council. Where general matters relating to a specific ward require to be communicated, they should be communicated with all elected members for that ward. As also detailed within the Chief Officers’ Code of Conduct, elected members should be afforded a response to an enquiry within five working days. Partner organisations and contractorslsuppliers The council has a number of key strategic and service delivery partners. Strategic partners include, although are by no means limited to, Strathclyde Police, NHS Lanarkshire and Strathclyde Fire and Rescue. Other partners, contractors and suppliers are directly engaged in day-to-day service delivery on behalf of the council. The most prominent of these are Amey PSI Morrison Scotland, North Lanarkshire Leisure Ltd, and Saltire, along with partners in the voluntary sector. 5 44

In some cases, employees of these partner organisations would benefit from being included in any council internal communication activity, particularly where these employees are either permanently or temporarily based in council offices. Managers should take care to include these employees in internal communication activity as appropriate. Corporate Communications will ensure that relevant material (e.g. Inside NL, the staff magazine) is copied to appropriate senior managers within partner organisations for information as appropriate. 6 45

4. Methods of communication Team meetings Verbal, face to face communication is always more valuable than written communication as it allows for effective exchange of information and feedback. The most important regular method of communication is team meetings. Managers should ensure that team meetings are held on a regular consistent basis and that these are a forum for effective two-way exchange of information. Ideally, notes should be taken. Actions should be communicated to those present and members of the team who are not present. It is recognised that some groups of employees do not have access to team meetings because of the nature of their work. Where this is the case, managers should ensure that mechanisms are in place to relay important information to those employees. Team briefing system The council operates a team briefing system. Team briefings are an effective way of sharing information among employees on a face-to-face basis, giving employees the opportunity to ask questions and provide feedback. Their purpose is to ensure information flows up, down and across the organisation in a consistent and accurate way. A core brief will be issued to senior managers on a quarterly basis. It will cover strategic items of importance to the council, for example: 0 New or changing council policy 0 Corporate developments 0 Performance progress 0 Key appointments Senior managers within services will then add items of service importance, preferably within five days of receiving the core brief, while team leaders and managers will add items of local importance. This entire brief should then be shared with individual teams, preferablyface-to-face at a team meeting. The team briefing system is not designed to replace existing team meetings but to supplement them. Where employees are unable to attend team meetings it is the responsibilityof managers to ensure the team briefing is distributed to those employees. It is essential that employees have the opportunity to feed back on items in the team briefing and are also able to contribute items of service and local importance for potential inclusion. Managers should ensure that appropriate mechanisms are in place to achieve this. This could include, for example, a part of the team meeting agenda dedicated to feedback or an email address where employees can send suggestions for improvement. Figure 1 details how a team briefing cycle operates. 7 46

Figure 1 8 47

The intranet The council intranet, to be relaunched in 2012, is a crucial delivery mechanism for internal communication. It allows effective sharing of information across the organisation. The relaunched intranet will make sharing of information easier than before, and will use the same technical platform as the council’s corporate website at www.northlanarkshire.gov.uk. The intranet will also allow collaboration between individuals and teams through blogs and wikis and through the ability to share and edit documents. As part of the rollout of the new intranet key users will be fully trained in its functionality and capabilities. The intranet can be used for day-to-day announcements and for accessing employee information. It can also be used to access essential services such as the IT helpdesk. The intranet does not replace other methods of communication as it is available only to those with day-to-day electronic access. Managers should therefore ensure that employees who do not have such access are fully appraised of informationwhich is important to them. inside NL Inside NL is the staff magazine. It is produced three times a year by corporate communications and contains a variety of corporate information as well as news and features from across the council. It is distributedto services who then distribute it to staff and is one of the very few communication mechanisms to reach every employee. Payslip advertising Payslip advertising is an excellent way to ensure awareness about corporate initiatives. A line of text can be inserted into payslips, or adverts can be included. The responsibility for payslip advertising lies with revenue services. As payslip advertising is extremely popular it is essential that campaigns using this method are planned and booked in as far ahead as possible. Chief executive’s monthly update The chief executive issues a personal newsletter on a monthly basis to senior officers and elected members and is available on the council intranet. This update rounds up some of the key new from across the council. Suggestions for items for inclusion in the monthly update should be passed, via executive directors or heads of service, to the chief executive’s office or corporate communications. Notice boards Well-managed notice boards can reach a wide audience with a minimum of effort. However, employees need to have confidence that the content will be relevant, wellorganised and up to date. This can only truly be achieved if an individual or section is given responsibilityfor the maintenance of notice boards. Notice boards should also carry contact details of the person responsible for that maintenance. All-user emails and electronic pop-ups Items which require fast and wide-ranging communication can be considered for alluser emails, which go to all employees with a council email address. The responsibility for these lies with corporate communications and they must be approved by the media and public affairs manager. 9 48

Electronic pop-ups appear when a user logs in and are generally used as part of a wider campaign, for example on energy awareness. Responsibilityfor pop-ups lies with corporate communications. As with all means of electronic information it is the responsibility of managers to ensure that employees without access to electronic media have access to the messages distributed via these channels. Other mechanisms Other communication methods include poster campaigns, employee bulletins, letters, induction and information packs and staff handbooks. Future developments The council uses social media channels like Twitter and Facebook to communicate with residents, businesses and visitors to North Lanarkshire. As part of the action plan a dedicated social media site for employees will be considered. 10 49

5. Measurina success Table 3 below shows responses about employees’ perceptions of working for the council. Overall, there has been improvement in these areas since 2007. Table 3 As part of the action plan, targets for improvements will be set and measured against the results from the employee survey to take place in 2014. 11 50

6. Action plan The action plan sets out key milestones to execute the strategy. Individual actions will be added during the life of the strategy. communications sections of employee survey 7. 9. I Senior management brief focus on internal I communications networklinformation & I Senior managers communication 10. Further focus groups on organisational culture and communications sections of employee survey Develop and deliver employee survey for 2014 11. Review internal communication strategy communications Corporate communications Information & research/Corporate communications Corporate communications network I I Spring I 2013 2013 March 2014 Summer 2014 August 2014 12 51

The purpose of this report is to advise the committee of the development of a new internal communication strategy for the Council and to seek endorsement of the strategy. Bac kg round The Council implemented an internal communication strategy in 2005. The strategy and an internal communication toolkit have not been updated since then.