The role of IC in clarifying roles and responsibilities
An area we’ve not covered on the show before is about internal communications within charities. Charities are really interesting organisations in that a lot of people who work in charities are employees, but there are also a significant number of volunteers. I was really interested to find out what it’s like to be an internal communications manager or leader within an organisation that is a charity, and what challenges that brings in terms of communicating with people who already have a very deep sense of purpose, which is often why they work with the charity or volunteer for the charity. Added to that, these employees and volunteers are working in very chaotic situations borne out by the type of work that they are doing, so this is another interesting addition to the mix that we’re looking at from an internal communications perspective. So what channels do we use and how do we help people to understand their roles and responsibilities in delivering our overall purpose? There’s also the additional challenges, big changes that often are required in any organisation.
But particularly then how do we bring those into a situation where we have volunteers and employees who again, are driven by purpose? In this interview, you’ll hear all about the three principles that this particular charity uses and how the internal communications team plays a key role in actually helping employees to understand what those principles are and how they can fundamentally drive the change that the organisation was looking for. So it’s a really interesting conversation, both from the perspective that we’re looking at a charity here and not a traditional organisation, but also an organisation which has a significant number of volunteers alongside paid employees who are all very much engaged with the overall purpose of the organisation. So I hope you enjoy this interview.
Guest profile
Faye Greason is Brand and Corporate Communications Manager at Changing Lives. Faye has a strong international HR background, experience in change management and people engagement working for organisations like Sainsburys, Save the Children, BT and Mayborn Group. Faye is currently specialising in internal communications.
Useful links
Link to relevant episode: https://thebigpicturepeople.co.uk/blog/podcast/adapting-internal-comms-s2-e8/
Faye’s LinkedIn profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/faye-greason/
Changing Lives’ website: https://www.changing-lives.org.uk