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  1. 3d ago

    OTSP #9: The Uneven Introduction of AI to Employees

    Companies are urging employees to adopt AI—but a software rollout, training session, or announcement doesn’t necessarily prepare people for changes to their work. When expectations keep shifting, and the destination remains uncertain, how can organizations build trust and help employees move forward? In episode 9 of On the Same Page, Shel and Mark explore AI adoption as a change management challenge and the role internal communicators should play. They discuss listening to employees, challenging leadership assumptions, and building a flexible approach to change—along with the gap between recognizing the need for change management skills and developing them. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz: Hey, Mark, how’s your experience with AI these days? Mark Dollins: It’s never-ending. I keep getting both excited and frustrated with it, but it’s all about learning, right? Shel Holtz: It is. It’s about learning for a lot of employees as well. Many companies are still struggling to introduce AI and drive adoption in their organizations. I was reading about the Financial Times’ AI transformation program in 2024. They started by listening. They surveyed employees and received 725 responses. What they found was that the biggest obstacle was a lack of time, and that helped shape their approach. A lack of time isn’t resistance. When we’re asking people to adopt AI and integrate it into their workflows, we’re asking them to make a change. We tend to look for resistance, but not every challenge is resistance. How have you been thinking about change management and AI adoption, given your passion for change management and internal communications? Mark Dollins: Ironically, one thing communicators have increasingly been doing over the last several years is using AI to become more productive. It’s already saving us time. But I think professionals in this space increasingly understand that AI isn’t simply a technology rollout. It’s one of the biggest waves of change we need to step into, get in front of, and help manage. Shel Holtz: I guess the question starts with our role in managing this change. Are we taking the lead? Are we trying to get that coveted seat at the table so we can influence it? Are we waiting for the training and IT departments to say, “Here’s the program. Communicate this and drive the change”? What should we be doing? Mark Dollins: It’s a little of everything. In the research we’ve done—and we’ll talk more about this in another podcast—Jon Stemmle and I conduct an annual survey about communicators’ attitudes toward and uses of AI. We talk to a couple of hundred communicators around the world to understand what’s changing, what we’re working with, and what we’re struggling with. We’re finding that communicators are getting a bigger seat at the table. We’re having more influence in setting governance and policies, which is good. We’re using AI more, but we aren’t using it for more strategic purposes. The biggest thing we haven’t fully signed up for is treating AI as a change management initiative that we should help lead. We tend to view it as a technology rollout or a policy rollout connected to AI. But artificial intelligence is itself a massive change. We’re talking about seismic adjustments in how organizations work. That’s a space employee communicators should be stepping into, and some are beginning to do that. Shel Holtz: I absolutely agree. The question is whether we’re being asked to help design the change or simply sell decisions that have already been made. We should use the expertise we bring that others in the organization may not have to the same degree: identifying impacts on employees, testing leaders’ assumptions before a rollout, and listening. But responsibility requires authority. We can’t resolve workload, staffing, or incentive problems through messaging. What decisions must we be able to influence if we’re going to be held accountable, to any degree, for AI adoption? Mark Dollins: Even better, let’s not wait to be asked. Let’s step up and say, “We believe we can help this organization better manage this wave of change. Let’s figure out how.” Some numbers provide context for what I call moving upstream. In 2024, about 45% of communicators reported being involved in shaping AI usage in their organizations. That rose to 70% last year and 76% this year. That’s a good sign. We’re saying we’re shaping it, although I’m not exactly sure how that’s happening in every organization. Communicators aren’t just using new tools. We’re helping organizations explain, govern, and normalize new ways of working. That’s where change management comes in. We asked communicators whether they view change management as a competency they should have. That figure rose from 73% in 2024 to 81% last year and is at 79% this year. That tells us this isn’t being treated as a fad. It’s more of a structural expectation. We’re also seeing growing interest in training or certification to become more proficient at managing change through communications. Around 72–73% of this year’s respondents said AI requires significant change management communications. About 80% believe change management—which is different from change communications—is a competency they should acquire. And about 76% believe communicators should be involved in influencing AI use in their organizations. There’s clear evidence that, as a global community of employee communicators, we know what we should be doing. The real question is whether we’re doing what needs to be done. Shel Holtz: At some level, everything we communicate is change communication. We’re putting something out because we want something from people. We want them to do something new or different, stop doing something, do more of something, or think or believe something. All of that is change. But when it’s a software rollout, the scope may be more contained. We’re adopting Workday as our HR and payroll software, and everyone needs to start using it. I don’t know how much of that requires the full Prosci process or whatever change management protocols you follow. AI is different. What does the change look like at the end? One thing I learned when I began studying change communication—and I had a great mentor in Tudor Williams—was that you should be able to close your eyes and envision the outcome. I don’t think anybody can do that with AI yet. That presents an interesting challenge for a change program. Mark Dollins: AI can be a tool for some change management and communication tactics, but we still need to understand the disciplines themselves. The question we should ask is whether we really understand change management and how change communications works with it. Over the years, I’ve asked communicators that question, and I often hear, “Yes, I understand change communications. I put out organizational structure announcements, leadership changes, and executive updates.” Then I ask, “What else went with that?” Often, there’s silence. That doesn’t happen every time. Our community is getting better at this. But my experience is that many communicators don’t get into the specifics of the change management discipline. What do I mean by that? Understanding organizational readiness for change, for example. Is the organization ready to make this change? Who are the executive sponsors? Who are the champions who will help lead it? Do we understand the detractors and barriers? Do we have governance and processes for addressing barriers when the people involved can’t reach a resolution? Those are parts of change management that organizational communicators often aren’t taught when they learn how to communicate change. Whether the topic is digital transformation, cultural transformation, or AI adoption, it’s deeper than simply a technology change. These aren’t one-and-done activities. They require sustained, focused, strategic communications and an understanding of stakeholders’ individual needs. Not everybody experiences change in the same way, and that understanding should inform our communication. There’s far more to change management communications when it’s structured and aligned with the discipline of change management. Without that alignment, you can find yourself in a situation I’ve experienced: “Hey, Mark, we have a big change we want you to communicate.” I ask, “What’s the change management plan?” and get blank stares. Then someone says, “Why don’t you develop that?” That’s why, more than 10 or 15 years ago, I took the time to become certified as a change management professional. I chose Prosci, one of several options. It changed how I viewed the relationship between change communications and change management. The training took about four days and was tremendously helpful. I’m agnostic about which certification people choose. What matters is understanding the concepts we’ve discussed. That understanding helps us drive successful change through communications. How’s that for getting on my soapbox? Shel Holtz: That’s fine. I loved it. What we’ve seen in many organizations is almost the opposite of what you’re describing. Initially, companies asked communicators to tell employees to experiment with AI, without much clarity about the purpose. Then we told people to use AI a lot. We got into this whole “token maxing” thing, where people were using so much that they blew through a company’s annual budget in a month, and organizations had to dial it back. It’s hard to get people to buy into a change when you’re continually clawing back the messages you sent earlier. What are we asking employees to trust? What happens to the time they save? Will there be new expectations? Will roles change or disappear? Who gets development opportunities? We shouldn’t simply accept t

  2. 4d ago

    FIR #530: Has AI Created a Demand for Human Ghostwriters?

    The volume of AI slop appearing as thought leadership on LinkedIn has, according to the Financial Times, led to a surge in interest in human ghostwriters. In this short midweek episode, Neville and Shel discuss whether this makes sense or if it’s just another case of people using AI poorly. Links from this episode: AI is creating ghostwriting jobs on LinkedIn Using AI to Write at Work Is Basically Fine — Unless You’re a Writer So AI helped write it. Who cares? FIR #526: Forget Anthropic’s AI Watermark. Can You Defend Every Sentence? The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR is tentatively scheduled to drop on Monday, October 26. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email fircomments@gmail.com. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz: Hi, everybody, and welcome to episode 530 of For Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz. Neville Hobson: And I’m Neville Hobson. AI was supposed to put ghostwriters out of business. Instead, according to the Financial Times, something rather different is happening. LinkedIn is awash with generic AI-generated posts, and the flood of polished but forgettable content is creating new demand for human ghostwriters who can help executives sound human again. There’s a nice irony in that, but it also raises a question I keep coming back to: If I use AI to help write a blog post, a LinkedIn update, or an article published under my name, is AI effectively my ghostwriter? Shel, you and I have touched on this territory before, most recently in FIR 526 in August, when we discussed Anthropic’s text watermarking. We argued that detecting whether AI was involved in writing something tells you remarkably little about who actually did the thinking. A more useful test is whether the author understands the argument, stands behind it, and can defend every sentence. I developed that argument afterward in a blog post titled “So AI Helped Write It. Who Cares?” My point wasn’t that authorship doesn’t matter. It does. But there’s an important distinction between asking AI to do your thinking for you and using it to help express thinking that is yours. Now, a Bloomberg Businessweek article adds another twist. It argues that, for many people at work, using AI to write is simply becoming normal. Writing isn’t necessarily their craft. It’s a means of communicating an idea, answering a customer, updating colleagues, or getting something done. The article introduces another tension. Some businesses actively expect employees to use AI for writing because it saves time. But it also describes the opposite problem at one company, where AI-generated documents became polished, lengthy, and difficult to read. The CEO concluded that AI was making writing quicker for the sender but slower for the recipient—a point we touched on in our last discussion—and asked employees for rougher versions containing their actual thinking instead. There’s a novel idea. That brings us back to ghostwriting. We accepted long ago that a CEO might put their name to words written by a communication professional, provided those words express what the CEO thinks. So, is AI-assisted writing fundamentally different? For me, this raises several questions. If the ideas, argument, and judgment are yours, does it matter whether you, a ghostwriter, or an AI produced the sentences? Where is the boundary between assistance and substitution—editing your thoughts versus generating thoughts for you? In an environment where producing polished prose is becoming almost effortless, will distinctive thinking become more valuable than distinctive writing? And would you feel differently upon discovering that someone’s LinkedIn post was written by a human ghostwriter rather than ChatGPT? If so, why? And perhaps more importantly, does it matter? Shel Holtz: Yes, it does matter. You have to consider the audience’s expectations. Those matter as much as the intentions of the person who drafted the speech, article, or whatever it might be. Think about the difference between an operational update, a CEO’s personal account of a career failure, and a condolence message to an employee. Those messages could be accurate, carefully reviewed, and approved. On the other hand, readers could reasonably expect a particular level of personal involvement from the person whose name appears on them. I think that makes a difference. But I’d like to step back for a minute and explore ghostwriting itself. I’ve known a couple of people who made their livings, or part of their livings, as ghostwriters. You knew the late Shel Israel, a very good friend of mine. Neville Hobson: Sure. Shel Holtz: He was a ghostwriter. He wrote books for people who didn’t know how to write, but he didn’t spend most of his time writing. His clients hired him because they liked his writing and his approach to getting to know them and their styles, so what he wrote sounded like them. How did he do that? Through a lot of interviews—hours and hours, dozens of hours, on the phone and in person. He challenged the generalities he heard from clients and drew out experiences they might not have thought mattered. As an experienced ghostwriter, he understood which experiences would lend color to the manuscript and what readers would care about. The Financial Times story opens up a more interesting possibility than simply saying humans write better. Perhaps the valuable service of ghostwriting was never just sitting there typing sentences. One person featured in the article said in a public response that AI remains integral to his business, but people still handle the conversations and relationships. Another person I know ghostwrites for an online service. Someone signs up and says, “I want to write a memoir. It’s only going to go to 10 people in my family, but I want somebody to write it.” The service matches that person with a writer. There’s a prescribed number of meetings, but they talk for hours. The writer takes notes and produces a first draft. If I take all those notes and everything I’ve learned about the subject, understand their writing or speaking style, and incorporate that into what I ask AI to produce or help me produce, am I still doing the lion’s share of the work as a ghostwriter? I think I am, especially if the person tasked with doing this isn’t a writer in the first place. We’ve talked before about people in organizations who might be assigned this work but can’t write their way out of a paper bag. Writing wasn’t what they studied, and it isn’t their area of expertise. If AI can help them use the material they’ve gathered by doing the work of a ghostwriter, I have less of a problem with it. Neville Hobson: I have a similar view. The FT article includes a good quote from Bernie Hogan, an associate professor at the Oxford Internet Institute. The journalist asked whether LinkedIn ghostwriters could help cut through AI slop. The part that caught my attention was his point that the message behind a post can still be sincere, even if you didn’t write it. He compares it to buying a greeting card: Someone else wrote the words, but the sentiment can still reflect what you mean. I agree with that. His further point is where the rubber meets the road. Because we can’t tell when a LinkedIn post is ghostwritten, is it authentic in readers’ eyes, even if it broadly reflects what the person posting it believes? That sums up the situation we’re in. I don’t think there will ever be agreement on the broad question of whether it’s wrong for someone else—or an AI—to write something you publish under your name. We’ve discussed the details many times: Is it your thinking? Did you contribute to it? Or did you give AI some material, ask it to write something, and post the result without further involvement? It isn’t a simple question. I keep coming back to this: Would you feel differently if you discovered that someone’s LinkedIn post was written by a human ghostwriter rather than ChatGPT? If so, why? I’d particularly like critics of AI-assisted writing to answer that. Shel Holtz: It would be interesting. I like the greeting-card analogy. The greeting was written by a copywriter at Hallmark, American Greetings, or somewhere else, but you don’t just grab the first card off the rack. People spend 15 or 20 minutes looking. Neville Hobson: You might. Shel Holtz: You might, but I’ve never seen anybody in the greeting-card aisle just grab a card and go. They pull one off the shelf, open it, read it, put it back, and try another. They’re looking for the one that expresses the sentiment they have. Then, when they get home, they write a little more. I would consider that the human in the loop. Human ghostwriting deserves the same scrutiny as AI ghostwriting. Someone assigned to write a LinkedIn post can manufacture the persona of the person they’re writing for. They can avoid the hard work, fabricate a profound message, or give someone credit for expertise they don’t have. An AI-assisted post grounded in a leader’s actual experience, with that experience shared as part of the process, could represent the person more faithfully than a human ghostwriter does. So, are we defending authentic communication, or are we defending an outsourcing arrangement we’re already familiar with? Neville Hobson: I think we’re defending authentic communication, but the definition of “authent

  3. Sep 28

    ALP 316: Agency owners need to manage AI like employees

    AI has evolved enough now that one-shotting entire deliverables is tempting, and many people online claim to be doing just that. In this episode, Chip and Gini discuss why that’s a bad idea, and how you can train your AI tool to give you less slop-like content. Chip is fed up with receiving one too many pieces of material with no human thought applied to them, not in preparation, not in editing, not even in the decision to hit send. His take on the broader one-shotting trend is that when the result is actually good, it’s rarely a true one-shot. The person usually spent months feeding their AI tool context first, the same way a good off-the-cuff article draws on years of accumulated expertise. Gini suggests treating AI like a capable intern. You wouldn’t send an intern’s first draft straight to a client, so don’t do that with AI either. She describes going back and forth with her tools so much that Claude once asked her to batch her edits instead of making them one at a time. Chip pushes back on the intern comparison, arguing that with enough context and consistent feedback, AI has moved closer to a capable mid-level colleague. That feedback loop is also the focus of Gini’s internal training program, Slack sessions where the team is currently learning to push back, reject, and refine AI output instead of just accepting it. However, don’t make the mistake of thinking that because it needs your guidance, AI isn’t worth using. Being the human in the loop doesn’t make you the savior of your business. Owners who rely solely on humans without using AI are making as grave of a mistake as people who think they can replace themselves entirely with AI. [read the transcript] The post ALP 316: Agency owners need to manage AI like employees appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

  4. Sep 28

    FIR #529: Fake Quotes from Fake Experts Find Their Way Into Top-Tier Media

    A Press-Gazette investigation found that dozens of experts quoted in the mainstream media don’t actually exist, and PR agencies are unwittingly sharing them with the press. This poses a credibility issue for the agencies and the media. It requires a layer of verification unlike anything we’ve faced before. Also in this episode, crisis communication has long been housed in the PR or communications department. Should it be a governance responsibility of the C-suite? That’s the case made in a new report from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations and the Institute of Directors. In his Tech Report, Dan York covers an initiative to close the AI language gap, including video moves by YouTube and Bluesky, smart glasses, and enhancements to Threads’ podcast toolkit. Links from this episode: Chartered Institute of Public Relations and Institute of Directors publish Crisis Communication Handbook for Boards Executive Reputation: Priced, Prized and Easily Lost Kate Winick: This Is a Bad Brand Clapback Converse Ad Sparks Controversy Over Racist Imagery Virtual Reality: The Widely Quoted Media Experts Who Are Not What They Seem Qwoted Bans AI-Generated Expert Profiles as PR Spam Floods Reporters’ Inboxes Prominent Art Therapist Quoted by Vice, Forbes and Others Is AI-Generated The Rise of Fake AI Experts: A Wake-Up Call for the Community The Rise of the Fake Expert: How to Remain Authentic in an Inbox of Fakes Links from Dan York’s Tech Report: Closing AI’s Language Gap: Why the Internet Society Is Joining a Global Commitment Bluesky Now Lets You Upload 10-Minute-Long Videos What’s New at Made on YouTube 2026? New YouTube Live Tools for Fan Funding, Dubbing and More Everything Announced at Meta Connect 2026 Snap Launches $2,195 Specs Smart Glasses Threads Expands Podcast Toolkit for Creators and Listeners The next monthly, long-form episode of FIR is tentatively scheduled to drop on Monday, October 26. We host a Communicators Zoom Chat most Thursdays at 1 p.m. ET. To obtain the credentials needed to participate, contact Shel or Neville directly, request them in our Facebook group, or email fircomments@gmail.com. Special thanks to Jay Moonah for the opening and closing music. You can find the stories from which Shel’s FIR content is selected at Shel’s Link Blog. You can catch up with both co-hosts on Neville’s blog and Shel’s blog. Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this podcast are Shel’s and Neville’s and do not reflect the views of their employers and/or clients. Raw Transcript: Shel Holtz: Hi, everybody, and welcome to episode 529 of For Immediate Release. I’m Shel Holtz in Concord, California. Neville Hobson: And I’m Neville Hobson in Somerset in the UK. Shel Holtz: Neville, it is wonderful to be back together with you again. Neville Hobson: It’s been a bit of a strange few weeks because of some health issues I’m working through. They’ve affected my availability to record our midweek shows. I was particularly keen to make sure we could record the topics we’re discussing today. Hopefully, by the time our next monthly episode comes around, I’ll be close to normal again. Shel Holtz: My fingers are certainly crossed. To accommodate all of this, we’re recording a shortened version of our monthly episode: two topics plus Dan York’s report. We’ll also have a quick recap of the two episodes since our last monthly show. Neville Hobson: Episode 527 was a particularly interesting long-form show with six topics. Our lead story was about a senior manager who discovered that AI was rejecting job applications within seconds of their arrival. One reason was that applicants had graduated from college before 2010, even though the instruction was to surface candidates who displayed “youthful energy.” What’s worse, the talent acquisition manager saw no liability issue because AI had made the decision. If I recall correctly, she said, “We’re okay. We have no liability because the AI made the decision.” If it weren’t so serious, it would be hilarious. We also discussed an expert witness who used ChatGPT to prepare a report for a legal case. The prompts he used—not just the AI’s output—were uncovered during discovery and entered into evidence. You have to check these things. Then, in episode 528, we talked about fandom. We explored the differences among fans, audiences, and communities. A fan’s identity can become tied to a team, artist, product, or other object of passion. It’s no surprise that marketers want their brands to inspire that kind of excitement, but not everything has the potential to develop a fan base. We received a couple of comments about that episode. Shel Holtz: Brian Kilgore in Toronto wrote, “Good show. In my life, I’ve worn Roy Rogers, Gene Autry, and Hopalong Cassidy clothes, an MG T-shirt, and a sweatshirt I designed using ASCII code as the hook for CNCP telecommunications. One cap that I’ve lost says ‘Nikon Most Excellent.’” Brian has been a fan of quite a few things. We also received an audio comment from our tech reporter, Dan York. Dan York: Hey, Shel and Neville. I had a comment on episode 528. I found myself cringing when I heard marketers talking about how to grow a fandom. You have fans, and marketers should find where those fans are and engage with them. They shouldn’t be trying to build a fandom. You were right that fandom can be part of someone’s identity. My neighbors across the street are big Mazda Miata owners. They each have one, and they go on rallies and tours with other owners. It’s a community and a group, but being Miata owners is also part of who they are. To its credit, the local Mazda dealership supports that community. There’s a lot of fandom on Reddit, too. I own a Hyundai Santa Cruz, a little vehicle that’s rather like an SUV with a truck bed on the back. Its subreddit has people sharing photos, asking questions, and talking about what they’re doing with their vehicles. Some are passionate about these little trucks. I’ve seen that with other vehicles as well. Marketers and communicators, please don’t talk about trying to create a fandom. Find the fans where they are. Shel Holtz: Thanks, Dan. I couldn’t agree more. If there’s a fan base around something you make or represent, by all means, see how you can support it and become more visible to it. Trying to build a fan base around something that doesn’t naturally inspire one can feel artificial. I hadn’t thought to look for those communities on Reddit. I have a Ford Mustang Mach-E, and as soon as we’re done recording, I’m going to look for a Mach-E subreddit. I have to believe there is one. I appreciate the comment. I also want to mention Circle of Fellows. Episode 133, part two of our conversation on AI and the leadership moment for the communication profession, should be available by the time you hear this. Adrian Cropley returned, and we were joined by Mary Hills, Cyrus Mavalwala, and Robin McCasland. Our next episode is Thursday, October 29, at 6 p.m. Eastern. That hour accommodates Zora Artis, who will be joining us for a discussion of connection and leadership. Three other Fellows will join us as well. You’ll find details on the FIR Podcast Network website. Neville Hobson: Let’s talk about crisis communication—or, more precisely, governance. When we talk about crisis communication, many of us picture what happens once a crisis is underway: the holding statement, the spokesperson, media response, frantic internal calls, whether the CEO should go public, and how quickly the organization says something. But a new handbook from the Chartered Institute of Public Relations’ Crisis Communications Network, published with the UK’s Institute of Directors, argues that this way of thinking starts far too late. The handbook, Crisis Communication for Boards: A Handbook for Good Governance, argues that crisis communication belongs within governance, risk management, and organizational resilience. By the time a crisis breaks, many factors that determine how well an organization responds have already been decided. Has the board understood the risks? Has it treated reputation as a strategic risk? Are escalation routes in place? Can uncomfortable information move quickly from the front line to senior management and the board? Have stakeholder relationships been built before they’re urgently needed? Has anyone rehearsed making decisions quickly under scrutiny with incomplete or conflicting information? The handbook’s point is that crisis management begins long before a crisis hits, and boards should own it as part of their responsibility for organizational resilience. Communication runs through crisis management because it shapes how events are understood, how decisions are interpreted, and whether trust is maintained or lost. One line early in the handbook captures the argument: “You cannot communicate your way out of a crisis that you behaved your way into.” That shifts the communicator’s role. If communications is brought in only after management has made its decisions, when the organization is already under pressure, the communicator starts at a disadvantage. Senior communicators should be involved earlier to help boards understand how decisions may be perceived, where stakeholder concerns are emerging, which assumptions may be wrong, and where the organization’s behavior may be creating reputational risk. That means treating communications as an intelligence function as well as a messaging function. The handbook emphasizes horizon scanning, stakeholder relationships, and the flow of information throughout the organization. Emerging risks increasingly cross legal, regulatory, HR, operations, technology, and communications boundaries. Communicators can help boards understand what’s happening and what it may mean for trust, legitimacy, and reputation. The handbook i

  5. Sep 26

    Circle of Fellows #133: AI and the Communication Leadership Moment, Part 2

    Last month, a panel of IABC Fellows shared their observations on the results of a recent AI-focused survey conducted by the Global Alliance for Public Relations and Communication Management (Global Alliance). This month, a fresh panel (with Adrian Cropley returning) will pick up the conversation where the August panel left off, exploring various aspects of the role communication professionals will play as AI continues to evolve, along with the challenges and opportunities it presents to organizations of all kinds. Joining Adrian and moderator Shel Holtz are Mary Hills, Robin McCasland, and Cyrus Mavalwala. Catch Part 1 of the discussion. About the Panel Adrian Cropley is the founder and director of the Centre for Strategic Communication Excellence, a global training and development organization. For over thirty years, Adrian has worked with clients worldwide, including Fortune 500 companies, on major change communication initiatives, internal communication reviews and strategies, professional development programs, and executive leadership and coaching. He is a non-executive director on several boards and advises some of the top CEOs and executives globally. Adrian is a past global chair of the International Association of Business Communicators (IABC), where he implemented the IABC Career Road Map, kick-started a global ISO certification for the profession, and developed the IABC Academy. Adrian pioneered the Melcrum Internal Communication Black Belt program in Asia Pacific and is a sought-after facilitator, speaker, and thought leader. He has been a keynote speaker and workshop leader on strategic and change communication at international conferences in Canada, the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, Malaysia, Singapore, China, India, Hong Kong, Thailand, New Zealand, and Australia. He has received numerous awards, including IABC Gold Quill Awards for communication excellence, and his Agency received Boutique Agency of the Year 6 years running. Adrian is the Chair of the Industry Advisory Committee for the RMIT School of Media and Communication and a Fellow of the IABC and RSA. In 2017, he was awarded the Medal of Order of Australia for his contribution to the field of communication. Mary Hills, ABC, IABC Fellow, Six Sigma, FCSCE serves as MBA Faculty in Benedictine University’s Goodwin College of Business, teaching brand and marketing management. Her work in marketing, finance and organizational structure and management naturally brings an interdisciplinary perspective to her students. Mary’s professional career includes work at large, publicly traded corporations in the financial sector and at closely held, middle-market companies.  Her work includes time at Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, Whiteco Advertising, NiSource, Northern Trust, Unilever, and Zebra Technologies. As a member of strategic management teams, her work includes research, risk analysis, and strategic planning for product launches, market expansion, and change and crisis management Mary’s AI work began in 2012 supporting a start-up’s AI product development at Purdue Technology Center and Research Park of NWI. Most recently, she completed AI Usage and Guidelines in Marketing Research for MBA students in her brand and marketing class. Robin McCasland, IABC Fellow, SCMP, is Senior Director of Corporate Communications for Health Care Service Corporation (HCSC). She leads her department’s CommTech initiative, using AI and emerging technologies to deliver productivity gains and build differentiated communication capabilities that shape business decisions and outcomes. Robin also leads the internal communications team and the employee listening program, demonstrating to senior leaders how employee and executive communication add value to the business’s bottom line. Previously, Robin excelled in leadership roles in communication for Texas Instruments, Dell, Tenet Healthcare, and Burlington Northern Santa Fe. Robin is a past IABC chairman and has served in numerous association leadership roles for more than 30 years. She was honored in 2023 and 2021 by Ragan Communications/PR Daily as one of the Top Women Leaders in Communication. She’s also received IABC Southern Region and IABC Dallas Communicator of the Year honors. Robin is a frequent presenter at communication and HR conferences. She is a graduate of The University of Texas at Austin and a Leadership Texas alumnus. Robin resides in Dallas. Cyrus Mavalwala, ABC, MC, IABC Fellow, is a sought-after communication strategist who leads a team of trusted advisors that executives rely on to capture, own, and sustain mindshare with the people that matter most. After senior roles at global PR agencies, Cyrus founded Advantis Communications in 2002. Advantis’ proprietary frameworks operationalize AI, elevate social media, and integrate video to advance thought leadership and earn relevance, influence, and trust. These frameworks have been cited in news media, industry, and academia. Cyrus helps communication teams apply AI responsibly to improve workflows, increase effectiveness, and amplify impact. Through Act Like an Agency™, Cyrus leads ALA faculty to elevate communication teams from tacticians to trusted advisors. An operating system for the modern communication function, Act Like an Agency enables in-house teams to operate with the confidence, discipline, and influence of strategic business partners. A co-creator of the Digital Strategy and Communications Management Certificate at the University of Toronto, Cyrus brings his strategic perspective and practical frameworks to classrooms, boardrooms, and stages across North America. Cyrus brings deep governance experience through his service with IABC at the local, regional, and international levels. He has judged industry awards and received more than 30 honors for communication excellence across local, national, and international programs. The post Circle of Fellows #133: AI and the Communication Leadership Moment, Part 2 appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

  6. Sep 17

    OTSP #8: Employee Engagement Matters. It Is Not the Goal.

    Employee engagement is often treated as a goal — or worse, as a standalone annual survey score that needs to be nudged upward to placate the CEO. But engagement is not an end in itself. It is a condition that makes employees more likely to flag problems, share knowledge, question bad instructions, help colleagues, and contribute discretionary effort. Measuring it can be valuable, but only if an organization asks the right questions, receives honest answers, and acts on what it learns. In this episode of “On The Same Page,” Shel Holtz and Mark Dollins examine what employee engagement really means, the limitations of standardized surveys, and why disengagement is a leading indicator while turnover is a lagging one. They also explore the role communicators can play — without assuming responsibility for factors they cannot control — and why equipping managers to listen, provide feedback, and translate organizational messages for their teams may be one of Communication’s most effective contributions. Links from this episode: The Big Shift — A Pivot from “Engaged” to “Effective” Employee Engagement Is Not Dead. It Has A Messaging Problem Employee Engagement is Toast. What’s Next? Raw Transcript: Mark Dollins: Hey, Shel, how are you doing? Shel Holtz: I am doing great. I’m heading out on vacation tomorrow, and I’m ready for it. Mark Dollins: I’m right behind you next week, so it’s good that we were able to connect. Something interesting happened in my family that got me thinking about a topic we could cover today. I have a family member who is seriously thinking about getting engaged, and my wife and I are coming up on 40 years since we got engaged. So, let’s talk about engagement, right? But you and I have a very different orientation to engagement in the world of employee communication, and I thought we could talk about that. I’m going to start with something fundamental that a lot of people struggle with: defining it. There’s a big-picture version of engagement, but for employee communicators, what we need to consider can be very specific to an organization or even to a person within that organization. What is your 30,000-foot view? Shel Holtz: I have heard so many definitions of engagement. I’ve heard that engagement is what enables employees to bring their whole selves to work. I’ve also heard pushback on that: Who would want to bring their whole self to work? There are parts of yourself you don’t necessarily want people to see at work. I’ve also heard that engagement means bringing discretionary effort to the job—going above and beyond. Of all the definitions I’ve heard, one I like is the analogy to a car. If the transmission is engaged, the car is moving. If the transmission is disengaged, it’s idling. How do you want your organization to be moving? You want it going forward, not standing still. Before we jump into this discussion in more detail, I want to invite everybody watching or listening to share your comments with us. You can do that in the show notes, where there’s a field for comments, or wherever we post updates announcing a new episode. We would love to discuss your comments in an upcoming episode. Mark Dollins: That’s how we learn, too, right, Shel? We enjoy talking, but we also enjoy learning from others, so please share your comments. Moving on to the broader topic of engagement, I think about some of the studies that have been done. Gallup, obviously, spends a lot of time focusing on the details of employee engagement. This year, it released a report saying that about 20% of the global workforce was engaged at work last year. In 2022, its comparison point, the figure was 23%. So it’s starting to fall again toward almost COVID-level territory. Gallup is quite confident in its reporting and says the margin of error is less than 0.1%. The report makes some interesting points about the value of paying attention to engagement. It says engaged people are 69% less likely to burn out at work, half as likely to be job hunting and 69% more likely to be “thriving” in life, even beyond work. Gallup takes a very holistic approach. As you noted earlier, Shel, it measures many factors in determining what it means to be engaged: whether employees know what’s expected of them, whether they have the right materials and equipment, whether they are allowed to do what they do best and whether they receive recognition. The list goes on and on. As you think about this big-picture world of capital-E Engagement, what are you finding with your clients and in your own organization? Shel Holtz: We conduct an engagement survey every year. We don’t use one of the canned engagement surveys; we have a bespoke survey. After we get the results, we can easily reconfigure the data, batch questions into categories and see where we stand on broader areas that matter to the organization’s leadership. More importantly, we can identify opportunities to improve and come back to employees to say, “These are the things we’re going to change as a result.” We can also narrow the results down. There may be a very low score in one part of the organization and a much better score elsewhere. That enables us to take action locally and work with the leaders of those groups to make improvements that will lift the rest of the organization. Mark Dollins: You’re raising a critical point about how employee communicators should think about engagement: Understand what’s important to your organization. Just as there are different definitions of engagement, what management and executives value will differ from one organization to another. In my experience working with many organizations, an organizational-health or pulse survey typically has a finite set of perhaps eight to 10 questions that someone—usually the chief people officer—has decided matter most and represent what the organization cares about for engagement. Here’s where it gets interesting for employee communicators. We want to help, be accountable and deliver results that help employees feel engaged. But then we sign up for things without understanding what we’re responsible for or whether we can influence them. Many questions, for example, are about what a manager does. I can’t control all time and space for every manager. But if we spend time determining which questions reflect outcomes we can influence, that’s where we should focus. Sometimes we’re behind the eight ball because we don’t have a say in the questions being asked. Some questions are worded so broadly that you could drive a truck through them. Take a question about understanding the company mission. People may interpret that in different ways. Some will think it means the enterprise mission; some, their functional leader’s mission; and others, their team leader’s vision of where the team is going. You end up with a mixture of feedback you can’t meaningfully act on. There are three lessons here. First, understand what the questions are. Second, choose what you’re able to influence. Third, make sure the questions are worded in a way that can produce actionable information. Shel Holtz: I think that’s important. I’m actively involved in developing the questions for our survey every year. Most of them don’t change because we want to conduct longitudinal measurement and see whether we’ve improved or declined from previous years or whether a trend is emerging. But we introduce new questions, and when we identify an issue with the way a question was worded, we fix it for the next survey. I definitely have influence there. It’s not just Communication that uses the survey. It’s a significant input for Human Resources and for leadership in how they lead the organization. Part of the process is parceling out the data to the people who can act on it, even if Communication can’t. Mark Dollins: I love hearing that you have a seat at the table because, in many organizations where I’ve worked or consulted, those questions are sacrosanct. No one touches them, or changing them requires an act of God. That puts a communicator in a difficult position: How can I be accountable for changing an outcome if I have no say in how the question is worded? What did you do to earn that seat at the table and that influence, Shel? Shel Holtz: I’ve been involved with our engagement survey since we first launched it. I had experience with engagement surveys before, and that led to my role. There is an engagement-survey industry, and I think that industry has diminished the perceived value of engagement for many people. A lot of people “study for the test.” It’s engagement-survey time, leadership wants a high engagement score and the boss tells employees how to answer so they won’t get in trouble for contributing to a lower score. That’s not helpful. We need sincere answers. We need people to tell the truth when they respond. Look at Gallup’s Q12 survey, for example. One question that drives me crazy is, “Do you have a best friend at work?” It’s not one of my favorite engagement questions. I understand the rationale and why it’s there, but I don’t think that really drives engagement. Some people want to come to work, do their jobs and go home. They don’t want to go out for a beer after work or do the axe-throwing team-building activity. That doesn’t mean they aren’t engaged. Other things drive engagement besides wanting to party with your colleagues. Mark Dollins: For communicators who aren’t in your position and are trying to navigate the questions being asked and what they’re responsible for, my advice is to keep asking why: Why are we asking this question, and what do we expect to get from it? Digging deeper with those “why” questions can help communicators understand the thinking. If the questions come from the CHRO or someone else in HR, ask, “Help me under

  7. Sep 13

    ALP 315: The top two traits for new agency hires

    If you’re screening candidates on experience or technical skills, you may be making a mistake. In this episode, Chip and Gini make the case that curiosity and problem-solving are the two traits that separate great hires from mediocre ones, and neither one can be taught from scratch. Most agency skills, from writing a press release to running Google Ads to using AI tools, can be picked up on the job. Curiosity and problem-solving are different: people either arrive with some baseline capacity for them, or they don’t. Gini makes it about AI, where ever-evolving tools and audience behavior reward the people who keep asking questions instead of coasting on routine. The two discuss how to actually screen for these traits in a couple hours of interviewing. Gini leaves 15 to 20 minutes at the end for the candidate’s questions and reads a lot into what they ask, or whether they ask anything at all. Chip changes up the order entirely, opening by asking the candidate what questions they have for him before he’s asked anything himself, and he’ll throw a candidate’s own question right back at them to see how they handle being put on the spot. Both dismiss scenario-based questions and interview theater like “what animal would you be” as close to useless. Gini also flags a habit she’s trying to break on her own team, being “Gini-GPT,” where people default to asking her for the fast answer instead of working through problems themselves. [read the transcript] The post ALP 315: The top two traits for new agency hires appeared first on FIR Podcast Network.

  8. Sep 6

    OTSP #7: No Story? No Strategy.

    A strategic narrative is a critical asset for any organization. It is the overarching story that explains where an organization came from, what it stands for, where it is going, and why that direction matters. Grounded in the organization’s purpose, values, vision, and strategy, it provides a common foundation for communication and helps employees and other stakeholders understand how they fit into the larger story and why they would want to be part of it. In this episode, Mark and Shel dig into strategic narratives, why they are so important, and why so many organizations seem to dismiss their importance. Links from this episode The Strategic Narrative (from Shel’s blog) Strategic Narrative (from Engage for Success) How To Build A Strategic Narrative That Inspires And Aligns Raw Transcript Shel Holtz: Mark, how are you doing? Mark Dollins: I’m good, Shel. How are you? Happy Sunday on the West Coast to you. Shel Holtz: Thanks, and happy Sunday on the East Coast to you. Mark Dollins: Thank you very much. We’re loving it. We’re getting close to Labor Day. Shel Holtz: It’s getting there—a day off for us. I find strategic narratives to be a fascinating topic. They’re well established in theory. You can’t pick up a book on communications, internal or external, and not find strategic narratives in there. Engage for Success, the UK employee engagement movement, lists a strategic narrative as one of the four enablers of employee engagement. And yet, in 21 years of consulting on internal communications, I was never asked to be involved in developing or evolving one, and one was never given to me as part of the package when I was preparing to work with a client. I think the theory is more prevalent than the actual practice. Is that what you’ve found? Mark Dollins: I think that’s true. In fact, when I’m working with clients, I always ask them, “What is your story?” I could go online and say what I think their story is based on what they’ve put on digitally managed channels, but when I ask them to tell me their story, often there isn’t a lot there. Pardon the pun, but it’s the North Star. It is the single most important element for any communication because it’s all about purpose and mission. If you can’t make that really clear, it’s hard to tell a story about it. Shel Holtz: I remember when I was working on the strategic narrative where I work, I had to explain that we weren’t inventing something. We weren’t going to introduce concepts that we’d have to get employees to buy into. We were creating a package containing all of these statements and philosophies: our core values, purpose, mission, vision and strategic plan, all baked into a narrative. Where did we come from? Where are we today? Where are we going? Wouldn’t you like to join us on this journey? Mark Dollins: Exactly. I did a little research and found that the word “narrative” comes from the Latin narrare, meaning “to relate,” and gnarus, meaning “knowing.” It’s all about attaching meaning to the facts we’re presenting. That’s really important for any kind of North Star narrative because everything comes from that. Shel Holtz: I thought we would talk about the strategic narrative as an element of communication and the role the internal communicator plays in it. I was surprised in my research to find that sometimes these are delivered fully baked to the internal communicator, who is told to convey the narrative rather than play a part in developing it. Mark Dollins: Bummer—as if we have nothing to add to it. We’d have to be involved. There’s no question, because we work with internal stakeholders. If the external message doesn’t live up to, inspire or align with the internal experience, we’re wasting a lot of time and energy. Shel Holtz: Right. It’s particularly important because the narrative gives you the “why” behind everything. You should be able to connect the stories you tell to the narrative. More importantly, as you’re developing those stories, the narrative should be their foundation. They should all be consistent. What you want to avoid is having your salespeople tell one story while your investor relations team tells another and your CEO delivers a keynote telling a third. These should all be the same story. Mark Dollins: They absolutely should. You’re raising an important point about the connection between a narrative and a story. Let me give you my framing of it. I believe the narrative is a never-ending story. It is your North Star. It takes place over time and doesn’t have an ending. It presents the very big picture. It is usually purpose- and vision-driven, and it’s inspirational. It gets to the heart. It gives people a reason not only to understand the “why,” but to ask, “What’s in this for me? Why should I care?” As I said, it really has no end. That’s a narrative in my framing. A story is a proof point connected to the narrative. It addresses a specific problem, issue or opportunity. You use the traditional elements of storytelling. That may include a hero or a catalyst and an antagonist. You’ve got a conflict, a turning point, a resolution and, importantly, a lesson to be learned. It often highlights the hero’s role, and you can decide whether that’s the company, internal communications, HR or whoever the story is about. At the end of the day, there’s a hierarchy. It starts at the top with the narrative. Then it gets to what I’m going to call the capital-S Story—the presentation, event or other thing you’re going to communicate. Within that are the proof points: stories with those traditional elements. I often advise clients to think about this connectivity, but it has to start at the top with the narrative. Shel Holtz: Absolutely. I’ll give you a great example. I work, as you know, for a commercial general contractor, and one of our value propositions is that we’re a client advocate. You won’t find a big commercial contractor that doesn’t say that: “We’re on board with the client. We’re there to help them realize their vision. We’re not going to keep secrets. We’re going to be upfront and fill them in on everything that’s happening. We’re committed to transparency.” Claiming to be a client advocate is not a unique marketing approach. But if you look at our strategic narrative, you learn from our history that two of our founders were general contractors—and also developers. In other words, the client perspective was represented in the organization’s leadership, rather than being someone you worked with only externally. When we talk about being a client advocate, we can say it’s in our DNA because two of our founders were clients. We were founded with this philosophy. We’re different. If that finds its way into the interviews the business development team conducts after being shortlisted for a project, it makes a difference. That’s why having the narrative is important, but so is making sure people pay attention to it. Mark Dollins: I love that. Exactly—it’s got to be real. The other thing about narratives, and I think you’ll agree, Shel, is that they change over time. It doesn’t mean they change fundamentally. The mission and purpose remain the same. But as organizations go through change, they have to evolve the narrative that goes with them. I’ll give you a quick example. Pittsburgh International Airport launched a $1.8 billion new terminal last November. The narrative the leadership team developed positioned it as more than an airport. They looked at positioning themselves as a leader in aviation and a driver of economic growth for the region. Those words are really important because they stood the test of time. The airport announced it was going to build the new terminal. Then it entered what I’ll call the narrative’s second chapter: We’ve done all the groundwork, but now we have to start building it and preparing our people. They developed the Smart Plan Forward, a five-year journey with a clear destination: creating a smarter airport. They said they were going to enable, empower and equip their people to innovate and collaborate in the name of change, and that was why they were taking a customer-first approach in everything they did. It took the original narrative—“We’re building this airport, leading the aviation industry and creating economic growth for the region”—and said, “Now we’re going to do this part of it,” while staying true to the original narrative. The new terminal had a very powerful and successful opening last November. It was fun to watch the airport develop, launch and then update the narrative as part of an overall change in its positioning within the aviation industry. Shel Holtz: It’s interesting that you bring up change as a catalyst for evolving a narrative. My research indicated that most strategic narratives are actually developed during a time of change, as part of a change communication effort. If we’re going to explain the change, we need to tell the story of where we came from, where we are today and why we’re making this change now. So let’s establish that narrative. For organizations going through some sort of change—which is everybody—I think it’s a good reason to start. Mark Dollins: Everybody is going through change. You’re right. The big issue most organizations miss in the narrative—and I didn’t give the whole narrative in this example—is the burning platform. Why the hell are we going through this change? What’s at stake? There’s a way to engage people in the work they’re doing and the mission, but especially around change, there has to be a reason. What happens to us as a team, institution or organization if we don’t make this change or pivot? What’s at risk? On the other side, what’s the opportunity? How do we position ourselves in a much better, mo

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