I believe that now internal communication has just begun to be recognized as a business discipline, it is no longer a nice-to-have culture feature in a organization, it is a must to have. I like a lot how Kevin Roberts, former Saatchi & Saatchi CEO, ”read” teh well-known ROI: return on investment becomes return on involvement. It is interesting to note how, after writing lots of books over science of communicating, current communication in organizations returns to Palo Alto's simple observations: "Communicate at an informational and relational level." Indeed, informations is everywhere, is a common commodity, but processing it makes the difference. And in this precise respect, it seems to me that the role of internal communication is critical.
Regarding classical internal communication activities, I think there are tools that have become stronger and there are also new techniques. I would like to emphasize the change that using coaching in a larger and larger scale inside companies brings a new aspect in the way with communicates with the internal public.
Years ago it was not about it - Fayol was still at the buttons "command" and "control." A recent PwC study says that 90% of global leaders say they are making changes in how they conduct their business in response to "the evolution of labor expectations." The point is that these changes contain all, explicitly or implicitly, the activity of communicating: it is about increasing collaboration, trust, responsibility, and motivation of employees. As we know, there is a lot of talk about the manager as a coach, the leader as a coach, and, as a natural consequence, a "culture of coaching" in organizations. As a result, it seems essential to the role of internal communication in shaping - and formalizing, making operational - the specific processes of coaching communication. It is about not only having an open communication climate but, moreover, having a solution-oriented communication climate. And this is the characteristic of the performance businesses.