9 ELEMENTS OF AN EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION PLAN

During periods of change, communication is key to ensure that you can take the people on the change journey.

The following 9 elements should be considered when pulling together a communications and business engagement plan across the end to end project lifecycle.

1. Use Stakeholder Analysis as a basis and use the communication planning template – see below.
2. Think carefully about what you want to achieve with each contact and what communication method you should use.
3. Provide clear and unambiguous messages.
4. Use a mixture of media – make it interesting for the audience.
5. The higher the emotional impact of the communication, the lower the amount of technology you should use.
   • Use high-tech. for low emotional content (e.g. General updates via e-mail or a mass presentation for high level approach) and
   • High-touch for high emotional content (e.g. Personal walkthroughs for new working practices using information on the walls that people can study and discuss in small groups).
6. Don’t over-communicate.  Keep communications relevant and let people know when they’ll receive the next update.
7. Senior management should be seen to drive the communications.  Get your sponsor to deliver key messages.
8. Ensure the programme team all understand the key programme messages and communications – don’t let them misinform the stakeholders by mistake.
9. Constantly review your communications for effectiveness.  Don’t be afraid to review and change your plan

The following diagram highlights typical activities that you could consider at each stage of the project lifecycle;