It’s sometimes hard not to get caught up in all the exciting new tech out there, but as internal communicators we need to be wary of tech saturation when using it as a medium of communication.

It is important to think about the culture in your workplace, and how people like to communicate. Are they social, do people have organic conversations with one another about the business or do they require more direction, such as a town hall? Are they happy to absorb and communicate on an intranet in addition to informative emails? It’s good to know how teams engage with print and digital comms, but most will agree that nothing beats face to face interactions. This is when people are most engaged, they can ask questions and feel involved. Bearing this in mind, we must endeavour not to replace face to face with tech unless for a good reason. Tech should support real conversations, but not replace them.

From control to curation, ensure you are actively thinking about all pieces of digital comms, in particular their purpose and relevance.  Let employees pick and choose what they want to see and how they want to interact; user generated content is well received and organic.

As we are becoming more connected than ever, new best practices and etiquette must too evolve to match the rate of change. Companies can set protocols around emails sent and received out of hours to ensure everyone knows what is expected of them, without feeling constant pressure to respond.