Characteristics of a good communicator
2nd February 2007 by Michael Zimet
Last night, I attended New Jersey IABC’s IRIS Awards Gala, which was delightful (kudos to their planning team). Peter Thonis, Chief Communications Officer of Verizon (and a former colleague of mine at IBM, in the last millennium), was honored as Communicator of the Year.
In his remarks, Peter reflected on what it takes to be a good communicator and listed several traits. Credibility, integrity and a team you can trust seemed fairly obvious — but two others caught my attention:
Are these characteristics that we should reflect in our Advocacy (for our profession)? Is one facet of Advocacy our passion? Our belief in ourselves and what we do? Is this something our Advocacy initiative should reflect? And if so, how?
What do you think?
February 2nd, 2007 at 6:26 am
Interesting stuff–but I’d opt to be a bit more expansive and inclusive in terms of using :
Passions: IABC incorporates a diverse array of disciplines and skill sets–an internal communicator doesn’t necessarily have the same “passion” as a graphic artist. I’d say IABCers share related but highly distinct “passions” rather than a common, one-size-fits-all “passion”.
Belief in Company: For me, I’ll love any organization that allows me to use my skills to make a difference and have an impact–far more than I will ever love any company purely out of any belief in its intrinsic value or virtue.
I make these comments because if we are to engage in advocacy for the range of professions under the IABC umbrella, we will probably make more way if we tangibly demonstrate our effectiveness and value as opposed to touting our virtues.
To be fair, such virtues can drive our effectiveness and value from within–and may be useful as subsidiary messages, but I’m wary about using them as a main thrust.
February 2nd, 2007 at 12:23 pm
I applaud the IABC for its new discussion group that is open to the public. I look forward to some spirited discussion of topics that need to be addressed including the overall image of PR and communications in the press and what can be done about the current deluge of negative articles about PR, especially the one coming from the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.
February 3rd, 2007 at 7:38 am
Belief, yes. Passion, absolutely. But one that I value even more is INITIATIVE. The will to DO something. Nike got it right: “Just Do It.”
I would love to get on with explaining what good–and great–public relations can be to senior executives and the general public in a not overly structured Advocacy campaign.
I’d love to see IABC executives on television and quoted in print publications, explaining the REAL PURPOSE and VALUE of public relations, which by my very expansive definition INCLUDES corporate communications and internal communications.
February 3rd, 2007 at 12:17 pm
Jana is right. It definitely takes a healthy level of Initiative to be a good — and effective — communicator.
By way of introduction, Toronto-based Jana Schilder is a member of our Advocacy Work Group and has been the catalyst for some active discussions on Advocacy for the profession.
One of those discussions centers around how we define “public relations” and “business communications” — and whether they are all-inclusive or mutually exclusive. There’s a broad spectrum of opinion on that, which will make an excellent separate discussion topic. Watch this space!
February 3rd, 2007 at 1:15 pm
I agree that Jana’s right about Initiative. And I think Michael is right about being clear about how we define our terms and structure our messages.
There’s a real concern about using the term “public relations” as the catch-all term to incorporate the full range of organizational communications, particularly as the term “public relations” is increasingly being used to describe external comms. Ultimately, my desire to see multiple, member-driven, trans-chapter advocacy efforts stems from a sense that a number of major comms specialties lack organized advocacy in the marketplace.
Internal communications in particular, in my opinion, needs a discrete advocacy effort–and something touting the virtues of “public relations” isn’t going to cut it.
February 4th, 2007 at 6:33 am
(That scraping sound you hear is me dragging my soapbox to the centre of the ring.)
I think the missing component here is ethics. In my 25 years in this business, I have met people who believed in themselves and their companies, and had a passion for their work, with whom I would check for my watch and wallet after we’ve shaken hands.
It has never been said out loud in this forum, but I’m betting that if you asked 20 people who know him to describe Peter Thonis, moral character would find its way onto the list. I suspect he treats others with respect and, when he leaves the room, there are very few (if any) knives sticking out of people’s backs. And he has undoubtedly had many spirited discussions with management groups at Verizon and IBM about the moral implications of the decisions they’ve made.
Which brings me to my next point. IABC’s ethics study struck a chord for a reason. I believe we should advocate ethics on two levels.
The first is the behavior of communicators and public relations professionals in bringing a moral focus to the communication they undertake on behalf of their organizations and clients.
The second is to help guide organizations and clients in that moral behavior, regardless of where in the world they operate or are located.
(Steps down from soapbox)
My C$.02.
February 4th, 2007 at 7:37 am
Eric, you’re right — ethics belongs at or near the top of the list.
And yes, it’s high on Peter Thonis’s list, too. I can vouch for that.
One way in which each of us can do Advocacy for our profession right now is to exemplify all of these characteristics ourselves. That doesn’t require a task force, and the only “plan” we need is to raise our personal bars higher and higher.
Agreed?
February 15th, 2007 at 6:52 am
I’d like to add “ability to spot jargon at 20 paces” to this list!
Actually, I am on the verge of publishing a set of generic competencies for internal communicators based on an international research programme. My partner Sue Dewhurst and I think there are 12 characteristics which include most of the things mentioned here (when we do the final publication I’ll check back here with the details of how to get it them for free).
When we interviewed senior communicators a few things kept coming up. One is the ability to ‘Make things happen’ - in other words having a track record of delivering communications. Clearly there are too many windbags out there!
Another is setting and living by standards.
I think ‘ethics’ is a difficult concept - your ethics are often culturally specific. I think is better to talk about being consistent in the standards that you apply and abiding by the expectations of your stakeholders.
Finally, I would challenge Mike on his assertion about PR and internal communications. As a long-term member of the UK’s Chartered Institute of PR, I’ve never felt excluded because I’m an internal specialist. In fact as a a past external examiner for the CIPR’s qualifications I saw IC get more than its fair share of attention. This year the CIPR awared three fellowships to internal communicators (out of a total of 13 handed out).
And, most of the classic definitions of PR speak directly to the concerns of internal communicators. And I’m not sure if the wider understanding of the communications profession could be well served by sectarianism of any kind.
(you can have your soapbox back Eric…)
Liam
February 17th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
In response to Liam’s challenge, let me reply by challenging both the notion that “sectarianism” would undermine the wider understanding of the communications profession—and the insinuation that the beneficent reaction of the UK Chartered Institute of Public Relations’ awarding of three fellowships to internal communicators is some kind of manifestation of this “beneficial nonsectarianism”.
Having been a member of (C)IPR while I lived in the UK, I witnessed the early stages if IPR forming an “Internal Communications Alliance” (ICA). Now fully formed and under the leadership of a former colleague and client of mine, Stephen Windsor-Lewis, ICA is now one of three “sectarian” internal comms organizations in the UK, the others being Communicators in Business and the UK IABC chapter, whose membership has substantially consisted of leading internal communications pros for quite some time.
It is indeed this critical mass of internal communication networking, activism and leadership that is making a huge difference for internal communications as a strategic profession in the UK, as well as raising the estimation of the internal communicator in the marketplace and among fellow communicators. Rather than simply droning about the virtues of “public relations”, IPR saw both an opportunity in creating a “sectarian” group of members and deputizing them to champion their own interests, and in turn, entice internal communicators to consider membership in IPR. In short, IPR’s creation of ICA is exactly what I’d like to see IABC do for members from “sectarian specialties” that have sufficient critical mass to support their own “Alliances”.
To be fair, the UK experience does not translate one-to-one with the US. In the UK, the London area combines the functions and gravitational pull of a New York (financial center), Washington (political center), Chicago (logistics and distribution center), Los Angeles (media center), and San Francisco (technology center). Consequently, London has enough internal communicators from all these sectors to support physical meetings of internal communicators from all these industries. In Washington, where I currently live, when I attend an IABC meeting, there are maybe 5-10% internal communicators, and we are outnumbered by marcomms folks, vendors, government PR folks and web designers. If there’s going to be critical mass, it has to be a trans-chapter, member-led, fully networked approach.
IABC has the potential to do this, to facilitate it, and support it, and in turn, entice internal communicators to join in the larger “business communication” conversation. It seems to be working well for IPR—why not for us?
February 19th, 2007 at 2:05 am
Oh dear - didn’t mean to provoke that one! Mike may have misunderstood me.
My point is that “public relations” is as good a term as any to cover what communicators do (and I’m working off the various definitions of PR that exist out there). Saying “Internal communications in particular, in my opinion, needs a discrete advocacy effort–and something touting the virtues of “public relations” isn’t going to cut it” suggests a diversion of energy when we all have the same underlying objectives.
As a side observation, the UK experience is that volunteer bodies wax and wane. Right now the UK chapter of the IABC is very active, whilst the CIPR has been rather quiet for a while. The Communicators in Business has different levels of activities around the regions of the country. This pattern changes continually depending on the energy of individuals who give up their time to drive things forward.
One of the challenges is to maintain a level of energy around speaking up for a profession and having separate organisations claiming similar territory means you never really achive critical mass.
Looking forward to seeing Mike at an event next time he’s back in the UK.
Liam
February 19th, 2007 at 9:51 am
Thanks Liam for the invitation.
Let me reply by citing one the best admonitions from my previous life as a political consultant:
“All politics is local”–Tip O’Neill (legendary US House Speaker)
While I can understand the logic behind creating some global thinking about how to advance “the profession”, the fact remains that “local” doesn’t just consist of chapters in Cincinnati, London and Victoria, but of distinct disciplines like internal comms, marcomms, video and print production, and branding.
IABC does a fair job with its chapter structure–but its attitude toward members who want to organize specialty groups or cross-chapter efforts has in my experience been indifferent to hostile.
Internal comms in particular needs an organized and vigorous advocacy effort–in the US and elsewhere. It would be nice if such an effort were to be compatible with a “global” IABC effort, and nicer still if IABC were to empower and provide support to members who could participate.
In my view, having 5-10 member-driven advocacy efforts under the IABC umbrella could have far more impact than some kind of board-driven approach, or more still than something like “IABC Advocacy in a Box” that gets cascaded by SF down to the chapters.
February 28th, 2007 at 10:03 pm
Now it’s my turn to get on the soap box….
Being an internal comms professional in Australia, I’m heartened to see that more and more organisations here in Oz are looking to appoint specialists in the internal communications space.
I don’t believe internal communication can be captured under PR. In this country PR still has a long way to go to being accepted as being ethical and honest. A large number of the members of IABC (at least in Sydney) are internal communication specialists - I joined so that I could have access to my peers in the field.
I think it’s dangerous to advocate having one size (or label) fits all - each discipline in communication has it’s own unique challenges which I think need to be taken into consideration. I truly believe the way we view communication is very much dependent on which area of the profession we belong to.
Now I’m off my soapbox.