Allman Communication won Best Agency at the Institute of Internal Communication ICon Awards which were presented recently in London. 

"The ICons celebrate outstanding internal communication and pay tribute to some fine internal comms professionals," said Institute Chief Executive, Steve Doswell. 

"There's nothing better than proving you're worth it, so an ICon award, that's judged by your peers, is something to treasure."

"It's about those who stand out from the crowd, achieve outstanding results and make a real difference for their organsations."

Allman was also shortlisted for the Strategic Communication Management Awards and the CIPR Pride Awards - both for our programme to communicate vision and strategy to employees at PepsiCo UK.

We've been shortlisted as best agency in the IoIC ICon Awards. These national awards commend the people who consistently turn theory into good internal communication practice. We'll find out how we've done at the Awards event on 17th November - so watch this space.

As Director of the IoIC Central Region, I'm keen to promote the region's annual awards.  We know there is some great internal communication work being delivered here in the IoIC Central Region – and via our annual awards we’re seeking to celebrate the best of the best.  So, if you can demonstrate that your internal communication strategy, skills, people and channels are making a real difference to your organisation or your clients, then we want to hear from you.  It’s time to share your excellence with us and to be recognised for your achievements. 

Entries should have been produced or delivered predominantly between 1 December 2010 and 24 November 2011 by or for a company based in the Central region or for a company where more than 51 per cent of the audience is based in the region.  The deadline is 24^th November 2011. 

For further details and entry form click here.

For full rules and a map of the Central region – which is bigger than you might think – click here .

The latest IoIC Central Region Workshop (6th Oct in Coventry) was a practical session aimed at showing what makes a good entry to internal communication awards - and how to turn a good entry into an outstanding one.  Even for those not thinking of entering awards, it was interesting to learn about best practice and how to present work so its true value can be seen. Top IoIC judges Paul Brasington, Dave Morris and Keith Errington outlined what they look for in an award entry and a common theme emerged - measurement is key. The topic was picked up by Steve Doswell, IoIC Chief Executive, who said that evidence of evaluation divides the apparently good award entry from the demonstrably excellent.  Although in a recent article in Communicate magazine Steve reminded us of Albert Einstein's contention that not everything that counts can be counted and not everything that can be counted, counts - he concluded that when it comes to assessing the impact of internal communication, nothing else counts.

Whenever I attend IoIC events, I'm impressed by the passion, professionalism and integrity of those involved. The IoIC isn't there to make money, it exists to improve the quality of internal communication and the reputation of our profession.  The next IoIC Central Region workshop is on 10th November in Stratford on Avon.  It's all about the value of Internal Communication and promises to be another must attend event.  Click here for further information.

A recent survey* has shown that the role that line managers play in communication has gained in stature over the last few years. 47% of respondents said line managers had been in their top three most effective channels over the last 12 months. 48% plan to increase the resources allocated to comms training for line managers in their organisation over the coming year. Well hallelulah!  I've been banging on about line manager capability for years - in fact it is one of the vital 3 Cs of communication (Content, Channels, Capability) that I use as the basis of many communication strategies.  You can have fabulous content and super slick face to face, print and on line channels, but if your line managers (and leaders for that matter) don't have communication capability, your communication is unlikely to be effectively delivered and you're even more unlikely to receive feedback from the frontline. For more information see our website.  

*Melcrum Special Report - Key Benchmarking Data for Communicators 2011

After yesterday's post about potentially restricting or controlling employees' use of social media, here is an interesting article about utilising your employees' social media usage as a marketing tool for your company.  The idea is that you set up a Company Page on LinkedIn and then you encourage your employees to associate their own LinkedIn Profiles with your Company Page.  Then, when you have an important update to share you can ask your employees to post it on their LinkedIn Profiles, giving it much greater exposure.  I can see this working for certain types of updates (new product launches, company videos etc.) and in certain types of company (where engagement and trust are very high), but I think it needs to be approached with caution - there is a fine line between work and home life that many employees won't be happy for you to cross.  To find out more and for full instructions on how to do all of these things click here.

Acas, the workplace relationship body, has published a social media guide for the workplace in response to the increased use of social networks by employees in the workplace. Apparently, nearly six out of 10 staff now access social networks at work, either via their computer or smartphone, every day.

The guide urges employers not to be "heavy-handed" by penalising staff for unprofessional comments on websites such as Facebook. It suggests that online behaviour should be judged within specific contexts, as offline behaviour is and that if managers check on employees' use of social media, they should make it known what they scrutinise and why.

Acas advises bosses to draft their own social media policy in order to avoid staff confusion about what is and isn't allowed online and that such policies should preach common sense and apply principles used in the real world rather than be too heavy handed.

There seem to be two concerns here - one about time being spent on social media that should be spent 'working' and the other is about what is being said by employees about employers via social media.

I'm old enough to remember more or less exactly the same conversations taking place about employees' use of the internet during work time. In the end it comes down to employee performance and engagement. Employee performance should be judged on outputs - are they getting their jobs done and doing them well? If so, then time spent on social media is obviously not having a negative impact. If not, then you've got to ask why? Chances are, there is a lot more to it than simply use of social media. Employee engagement matters because happy staff are unlikely to be making negative comments about their employer on line. When employees are complaining, whether it be on line or with their mates down the pub, then again, you've got to get to the nub of the issue. Social media may make employee gripes visible, but it is not likely to be the cause of them.

Read more about the Acas guide in today's Daily Telegraph via this link http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/businessclub/management-advice/8739391/Think-Tank-How-to-snoop-on-employees-without-causing-offence.html

New research by Teresa Amabile, a professor at Harvard Business School and Steven Kramer, an independent researcher, shows that what they call 'inner work life' has a profound impact on workers’ creativity, productivity, commitment and collegiality. Employees are far more likely to have new ideas on days when they feel happier. Conventional wisdom suggests that pressure enhances performance; this data, however, shows that workers perform better when they are happily engaged in what they do. And what is the secret to being happily engaged? Thier managers. Workers’ well-being depends, in large part, on managers’ ability and willingness to support progress — by removing obstacles, providing help and acknowledging strong effort. The research showed that of all the events that engage people at work, the single most important — by far — is simply making progress in meaningful work. Unfortunately, most managers don't realise this. When managers were asked to rank five employee motivators in terms of importance, they ranked “supporting progress” last. 95% of these managers failed to recognise that progress in meaningful work is the primary motivator, well ahead of traditional incentives like pay rises and bonuses.  You can read the entire article in the New York Times by clicking here.

Allman Communication provided communication support for the completion of a sale and an acquisition last week.

On the selling side, Premier Foods completed the sale of its canning business to Princes for £387 million on Monday 25th July.  As a result over 1000 employees TUPE transferred to Princes.   Later in the week, Pattonair was sold to Exponent Private Equity for £145.8 million.  The company is a leading supplier of supply chain services to the aerospace and defence market.  The company's 780 employees are based at 17 global locations and work with major customers such as Rolls-Royce, BAE Systems and Parker Aerospace. 

M&A communication has to be well choreographed and is always complex - with so many interested audiences including employees, suppliers, customers, media and politicians - but you get a real buzz on the big day when everything comes together, the messages are joined up, the materials look great and the audiences feel informed and engaged in what is happening.  Let's hope this flurry of activity signals an upturn in M&A deals in coming months. 

An Institute of Internal Communication (IoIC) Central Region Best Practice Workshop is being held at The National Brewery Centre in Burton on Trent on 5th July from 4pm to 8pm.The event features case studies showcasing award winning employee communication from the Central Region. Hosts Molson Coors will talk about their award winning employee publication and Premier Foods will tell you all about their award winning Vision and Strategy employee communication campaign.  They'll also be a buffet and a brewery tour and, of course, beer!  Costs are £35 for IoIC members and £60 for non members. For further information click here.

Lesley Allman, Central Region Director IoIC, on lesley@allmancommunication.com or 07808 095803