Category: AI-assisted summary

This category contains posts where the content was generated primarily using A.I. but reviewed and edited by Jesper Andersen.

  • IC Index 2023 by Institute of Internal Communication

    IC Index 2023 by Institute of Internal Communication

    About the paper

    The paper is a piece of original survey research about what employees in the UK want and need from internal communication, produced by Ipsos Karian and Box for the Institute of Internal Communication.

    The methodology is clearly stated: a stratified survey of 3,000 UK workers, fielded from 6–20 March 2023, covering employees in organisations with more than 500 staff across the UK; the report also says the question set was developed with an expert working group of IC practitioners.

    Length: 35 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.ioic.org.uk/resource/ic-index-report-2023.html

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report about the value of internal communication?

    The report’s main argument is that internal communication is not a soft or secondary function but a business-critical one that materially improves the employee experience and broader organisational health. The report explicitly says that employees in organisations with a dedicated internal communication team are more likely to rate communication as excellent, more engaged, less likely to plan to leave, and more likely to trust CEO communications. In other words, the presence of an IC function is associated not just with better messaging, but with stronger trust, engagement and retention indicators.

    That argument is strengthened by one of the report’s clearest contrasts: 69% of workers in organisations with an IC function rate communications as excellent, compared with 37% where there is no such team. Engagement is reported as 59% versus 43%, intention to leave within two years as 29% versus 42%, and trust in CEO communications as 60% versus 46%. These are not minor differences. The report uses them to make the case that IC teams “make a positive difference” and should be seen as a fundamental organisational requirement rather than a nice-to-have.

    A second layer of the argument is that internal communication creates value when it helps employees feel informed, connected, respected and heard. The report links good communication to advocacy, belonging and belief in strategy. So the underlying claim is not merely that IC improves information flow, but that it shapes how people experience work itself.

    2. What does the report show employees most want to hear about, and where are organisations under-communicating?

    The strongest demand is for communication about pay and benefits, with 44% saying they receive too little information on this topic. But the report is especially insistent that strategy and career development matter because under-communication here has a particularly negative effect on engagement. Strategy and direction show a net demand score of 21, while career and personal development opportunities score 23. The report explicitly flags strategy and development as topics that need a lot more attention in communication planning.

    This matters because the report finds that clarity on strategic issues is still weak for a sizeable minority. Only 57% say their employer has been clear on strategy and business priorities, while 63% say they believe the strategy is the right one for success. That gap is one of the report’s most interesting findings: belief slightly exceeds understanding. The authors treat that as a warning sign, suggesting some employees may support the strategy in general terms without truly understanding it in practical terms.

    The report turns this into a segmentation model. It says 45% of UK workers are “ambassadors”, meaning they both understand and believe in the strategy, while 25% are “passengers”, meaning they neither understand nor believe in it. Another 17% are “loose cannons”, who believe but do not understand, and 12% are “bystanders”, who understand but do not believe. This is one of the report’s most useful conceptual contributions, because it shows that strategic communication is not simply about broadcasting more information; it is about moving people from confusion or detachment into informed belief.

    3. What patterns does the report identify around channels, attention and communication preferences?

    A major finding is that employee attention is scarce. Nearly seven in ten workers spend 15 minutes or less per day reading or viewing employer updates, and a quarter spend hardly any time at all. The report therefore argues that internal communication operates in a very constrained attention environment. Employees “snack rather than binge”, often consuming updates during or between meetings rather than in long, focused periods.

    In terms of format, the report finds that written communication still dominates. More than half of respondents say they would prefer to read information about employer priorities and plans, compared with 20% who prefer to talk about it and only 12% each who prefer audio or visual formats. Email remains both the most relied-on and the most preferred channel overall. 59% rely on emails for general news and updates, and 57% say they prefer them. Team meetings, 1-to-1s with line managers, and newsletters also remain important.

    At the same time, the report complicates any simple “email still wins” conclusion. It identifies two communication “tribes”: 82% are “traditionalists”, relying mainly on channels such as email, line-manager 1-to-1s and team meetings; 18% are “non-conformists”, who are more likely to rely on channels such as Instagram, LinkedIn and enterprise social media. These non-conformists are more common among younger workers, senior leaders and employees in somewhat smaller organisations. So the report’s broader message is that the default should still be clarity and utility through familiar channels, but channel strategy needs to evolve around audience differences rather than novelty for its own sake.

    4. What does the report suggest about leadership and manager communication?

    One of the clearest conclusions is that leadership visibility matters, but different leaders should communicate in different ways. Employees generally prefer to hear from CEOs by email, whereas they have stronger demand for face-to-face interaction with departmental leaders or senior managers. The report describes this as “horses for courses”: employees distinguish between CEOs and nearer leaders, and their channel preferences reflect that difference in proximity.

    The report also shows that frequency matters. Engagement is highest when CEOs communicate every few days and falls steadily as communication becomes less frequent, dropping from 69% engagement at the highest frequency to 30% when CEOs communicate rarely, if at all. The authors are careful not to imply that CEOs should simply send more emails; rather, they argue for a consistent rhythm of meaningful leadership visibility across channels.

    Direct managers emerge as the most trusted messengers. 65% trust communications from their direct manager, compared with 54% for CEO communications. That trust gap widens in larger organisations. Employees also say they want more from managers, especially updates on team priorities and goals, information on how the organisation is performing, and explanations of how team work supports wider priorities. But there is a constraint: one in three line managers do not feel equipped to lead conversations with their teams about what is happening across the organisation. Managers want more and clearer information on what to communicate, and around a quarter say they want more training. The report therefore makes a double argument: managers matter enormously, but they cannot be expected to carry the communication load without structured support.

    5. What does the report conclude about listening, feedback and the overall implications for internal communication strategy?

    The report is quite critical here. It says that around half of UK workers do not feel listened to by their employer. While 53% say their organisation welcomes open and honest feedback, only 45% say their organisation is good at showing how feedback is used to inform decisions and actions. These scores are even lower in the largest organisations. The implication is that many organisations may have listening mechanisms in place, but employees do not experience those mechanisms as meaningful.

    Importantly, the report shows that listening is strongly associated with better outcomes. Where employees say their organisation both welcomes feedback and acts on it, advocacy and engagement rise sharply. The report also argues that annual staff surveys on their own are not enough. The best balance of effort and results comes from combining an annual survey with at least two other listening channels, especially pulse surveys and two-way manager conversations. That is a notable finding because it shifts the emphasis from periodic measurement to ongoing dialogue.

    The broader implication is that effective internal communication strategy should rest on four pillars. First, clearer communication about strategy, priorities and performance. Second, stronger leadership visibility, with the right leaders using the right channels. Third, better-enabled line managers, since they are both trusted and central to sense-making. Fourth, a more credible listening system that closes the loop visibly. Taken together, the report’s perspective is practical rather than theoretical: internal communication works best when it helps people understand where the organisation is going, trust the people leading it, connect that direction to their own team reality, and see that their voice has consequences.

  • Global CommTech Report 2023 by Purposeful Relations

    Global CommTech Report 2023 by Purposeful Relations

    About the paper

    The report examines how public relations and communications professionals think about, use, and plan to invest in communication technology and AI.

    It is based on original research from an online survey run between December 2022 and March 2023 using the Stickybeak chatbot research tool, with 329 PR and communications professionals surveyed and 160 completing all questions.

    The data is global in scope, covering respondents from Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, North America, and Latin America, although the sample was recruited through the organisers’ and partners’ networks, so it is not presented as a representative global sample.

    Length: 55 pages

    More information / download:
    https://purposefulrelations.com/global-commtech-report-2023/

    Core Insights

    1. What is the report’s central argument about the current state of comms technology in PR and communications?

    The report’s central argument is that there is a substantial gap between how competent PR and communications professionals believe they are with technology and how they actually use it in practice. The authors repeatedly suggest that many teams overestimate their digital maturity while still relying on basic, often inefficient tools for core work.

    This “reality gap” is the backbone of the report. More than half of respondents say they are very or extremely competent with their current communication technology, yet the underlying usage data points to widespread under-adoption of fit-for-purpose systems. The report highlights, for example, that 41% use spreadsheets to manage project tasks, only 46% use CRM software, and 39% use spreadsheets to manage contacts. That pattern implies that many teams are still handling critical workflows through improvised or outdated methods rather than through dedicated platforms.

    The broader meaning is that PR and communications has not yet modernised to the extent its own practitioners may believe. The report argues that the profession has missed earlier waves of innovation, including SEO and social media, and now risks falling behind again unless it improves its grasp of data, analytics, workflow systems, and AI. In that sense, the report is both a diagnostic study and a call for acceleration.

    2. What does the study show about how PR teams actually use technology, and where are the biggest weaknesses?

    The study shows that adoption is strongest in traditional, familiar categories and weakest in areas that support workflow discipline, relationship management, and integrated operations. Respondents rate media monitoring and social listening, collaboration and messaging, content creation and production, and social media publishing as highly important. By contrast, planning, project and task management, and especially CRM, appear much less embedded in practice.

    Three weaknesses stand out in particular. First, project and task management is underdeveloped. Almost half of respondents are not using proper project management software, with 41% relying on spreadsheets and 6% on paper. That suggests a profession still managing complex, collaborative work through tools not designed for that purpose.

    Second, contact and relationship management is weak. Fewer than half use CRM software, while nearly four in ten use spreadsheets as a pseudo-database for contacts. For a field built around relationships with journalists, stakeholders, communities, regulators, and others, the report treats this as a particularly telling weakness.

    Third, there is a fragmentation problem. Teams use a wide mix of tools, and the report identifies integration difficulties as one of the biggest barriers to effective use of technology. This matters because even when tools are present, disconnected systems can prevent efficiency gains. The report’s implicit point is that digital maturity is not just about buying more tools; it is about coherent systems, trained teams, and better workflows.

    3. How does the report portray the role of AI, data, analytics, and measurement in the future of the profession?

    The report presents AI, data, analytics, and measurement as central to the future of PR and communications, not as side issues. AI is seen overwhelmingly as an opportunity rather than a threat, while analytics and data are rated as the strongest opportunity area of all. Measurement and evaluation is identified as the most important emerging skill for the future, followed closely by data science and analytics.

    This is important because the report ties future relevance not just to faster content production, but to better insight, better planning, and better decision-making. Several sections argue that communications teams need to move beyond using technology only for monitoring, publishing, and content support. The more strategic opportunity lies in using technology to generate insight, improve accountability, model outcomes, and support governance and reputation management.

    At the same time, the report suggests that the profession is not fully ready. Although respondents recognise the importance of these capabilities, recruitment is difficult in precisely these areas, and many teams still struggle with basic data use, technology adoption, and evaluation practice. The report also notes that understanding of the ethics of AI and communication technology is uneven. So while the future direction is clear, the transition remains incomplete.

    4. What differences does the study identify between agency and in-house respondents?

    The most striking difference is the contrast between confidence and actual practice. Agency respondents rate themselves more highly than in-house respondents when it comes to using existing technology and identifying new tools. However, the report suggests that this confidence is not always matched by stronger adoption in practice. In some areas, in-house teams appear more advanced.

    For example, 64% of agency respondents say they are very or extremely competent in using their current technology stack, compared with 44% of in-house respondents. Similarly, 67% of agency respondents say they are competent at identifying and adopting new communication technology, against 52% of in-house respondents. Yet when specific use cases are examined, agencies are not clearly ahead. In-house practitioners are shown as more likely to recognise the importance of project planning and task management, for instance.

    There are also differences in spending patterns and organisational context. In-house teams face more complex decision-making, with procurement, finance, and IT more involved in technology investment. They are also more likely to be increasing investment in owned media and content creation, and 23% are cutting spending on external agencies. That hints at a structural shift: in-house functions may be building more capability internally, which could put pressure on agency fee models, particularly in content-related services.

    5. What are the report’s main implications for the PR and communications industry?

    The report’s main implication is that the profession needs a broader and more disciplined approach to digital transformation. Its message is not simply “buy more tech.” Instead, it argues that teams need to audit existing tools, improve training, integrate systems, build a better measurement culture, and treat data and analytics as core capabilities rather than specialist extras.

    A second implication is that efficiency pressures are becoming strategic pressures. Budget is seen as the biggest challenge facing teams, yet the report argues that better use of technology can help address budget pressure by improving productivity and effectiveness. In that sense, comms technology is framed ոչ only as an operational aid but as a lever for resilience in tougher economic conditions.

    A third implication concerns the evolving shape of professional value. The report suggests that automation and AI will reduce time spent on routine tasks and may weaken traditional agency billing models based on labour time, especially in content creation. That pushes both in-house teams and agencies towards higher-value work rooted in insight, prediction, relationship management, and strategic counsel. Several contributors describe a future in which communications professionals must become more analytical, more technologically fluent, and more ethically confident.

    Finally, the report implies that culture matters as much as software. One of its consistent themes is that adoption barriers often come down to skills, training, resistance to change, and weak governance rather than lack of tools alone. The industry therefore needs not just new platforms, but new habits, clearer frameworks, and stronger professional development.

  • Future of Jobs Report 2023 by World Economic Forum

    Future of Jobs Report 2023 by World Economic Forum

    About the paper

    The World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2023 analyses how macro-trends, technology adoption, skills disruption and workforce strategies are expected to reshape labour markets from 2023 to 2027.

    It is a mixed-methods report built primarily on the fourth Future of Jobs Survey of 803 companies employing more than 11.3 million workers, across 27 industry clusters and 45 economies from all world regions, supplemented with data collaborations from Coursera, Indeed and LinkedIn.

    Length: 296 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.weforum.org/publications/the-future-of-jobs-report-2023/

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central labour-market outlook presented in the report?

    The report’s central argument is that the global labour market is entering a period of significant structural churn rather than simple expansion or contraction. Employers expect major reconfiguration of roles, driven by technology, the green transition, economic pressure, supply-chain shifts and changing worker expectations.

    The headline estimate is that 23% of jobs will change structurally between 2023 and 2027. In the dataset covering 673 million jobs, employers expect 69 million jobs to be created and 83 million to be displaced, resulting in a net decrease of 14 million jobs, or about 2% of current employment.

    This is not presented as a uniform jobs crisis. The report’s more nuanced claim is that losses and gains will be unevenly distributed. Some roles, especially clerical, administrative and record-keeping jobs, are expected to decline sharply, while roles linked to technology, sustainability, education, agriculture and digital commerce are expected to grow.

    2. Which forces are expected to transform businesses and jobs most strongly?

    The report identifies technology adoption as the most widely expected driver of business transformation. More than 85% of surveyed organisations expect increased adoption of new and frontier technologies and broader digital access to transform their organisations.

    However, the report broadens the analysis beyond technology. It also highlights the green transition, ESG standards, climate adaptation, localisation of supply chains, slow economic growth, inflation, rising costs and geopolitical fragmentation.

    The strongest expected net job-creation effects come from green-transition investment, broader ESG adoption and more localised supply chains. By contrast, the strongest expected net job-destruction effects come from slower economic growth, supply shortages, rising input costs and the rising cost of living.

    So the report’s view is not “technology destroys jobs” or “technology creates jobs”. It argues that technology, climate, economics and geopolitics are interacting, producing both new demand and significant displacement.

    3. Which jobs are expected to grow, and which are expected to decline?

    The fastest-growing roles relative to their current size are mainly technology- and sustainability-related. AI and Machine Learning Specialists are at the top, followed by Sustainability Specialists, Business Intelligence Analysts, Information Security Analysts, Renewable Energy Engineers and related roles.

    Large-scale job growth is also expected in education, agriculture and digitally enabled commerce. The report projects growth in roles such as Vocational Education Teachers, University and Higher Education Teachers, Agricultural Equipment Operators, E-commerce Specialists, Digital Transformation Specialists and Digital Marketing and Strategy Specialists.

    The steepest declines are expected in clerical and administrative work. Bank Tellers, Postal Service Clerks, Cashiers and Ticket Clerks, Data Entry Clerks, Accounting and Payroll Clerks, and Administrative and Executive Secretaries are among the roles expected to decline most.

    The report estimates that 26 million fewer jobs may exist by 2027 in record-keeping and administrative roles alone. This makes administrative work one of the clearest areas of projected displacement.

    4. What does the report say about skills disruption and future skill needs?

    The report estimates that 44% of workers’ skills will be disrupted over the next five years. This is lower than the 57% disruption forecast in the 2020 edition, but still signals substantial pressure on workers and employers.

    Analytical thinking is identified as the most important core skill in 2023, followed by creative thinking. The report also places strong emphasis on resilience, flexibility, agility, motivation, self-awareness, curiosity, lifelong learning and technological literacy.

    The fastest-rising skills include creative thinking, analytical thinking, technological literacy, curiosity and lifelong learning, resilience, systems thinking, AI and big data, talent management and customer-service orientation.

    A key point is that companies’ training priorities do not simply mirror current skill importance. AI and big data rank only 15th as a current core skill, but third as a corporate training priority. This suggests that employers see AI capability as strategically urgent, even where it is not yet embedded across the workforce.

    5. What workforce strategies do companies expect to use, and what are the implications?

    The report finds that employers see skills gaps and difficulty attracting talent as the two biggest barriers to business transformation. Skills gaps in local labour markets are identified by 60% of surveyed companies, while 53% cite inability to attract talent.

    The most common workforce strategies are investing in learning and training on the job, and accelerating automation. Around four in five companies expect to use each of these strategies.

    The report estimates that six in 10 workers will need training before 2027, but only about half currently have access to adequate training opportunities. Companies expect much of this training to happen internally, through on-the-job training, coaching and internal training departments, rather than mainly through external providers.

    The implication is that the future of work will depend heavily on whether organisations can move from abstract concern about skills to practical, scaled workforce development. The report’s underlying assumption is that labour-market disruption is not fully predetermined: policy choices, business investment and talent strategies will shape whether the transition becomes exclusionary or opportunity-generating.

  • State of the Sector 2022-23 by Gallagher

    State of the Sector 2022-23 by Gallagher

    About the paper

    The report analyses the state of internal communication and employee experience in 2022/23 using original survey research conducted from October to November 2022.

    It draws on responses from more than 2,000 organisations across 53 countries, making it a global survey-based benchmark study; the report clearly states the respondent mix and geography, though some methodological details beyond the survey design are not specified in detail.

    Length: 59 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.ajg.com/employeeexperience/state-of-the-sector/

    Core Insights

    1. How does the report define the changing purpose of internal communication in 2022/23?

    The report’s core argument is that internal communication is no longer defined primarily as a vehicle for top-down strategic alignment. That still matters, but it now competes with a broader, more human-centred purpose: shaping culture and belonging. On page 10, 74% say the purpose of internal communication is to support culture and belonging, while 67% point to strategic alignment. That is a significant shift in emphasis, especially for smaller organisations, where culture and belonging outrank strategy more clearly.

    This matters because it shows the profession moving from a transmission model to a relational model. Internal communication is presented less as a tool for informing employees and more as a mechanism for helping people feel valued, included and connected to the organisation. The report explicitly links this shift to diversity, equity and inclusion, values and behaviours, and physical and emotional wellbeing. Those themes sit at the centre of the report’s framing of what communication is now for.

    The topic data reinforces that interpretation. On page 11, the most communicated topic is still strategy, vision and purpose at 45%, but DEI follows at 29%, and both values, behaviours and culture and wellbeing and mental health stand at 27%. So the report is not saying strategy has disappeared. It is saying strategy now sits alongside a stronger expectation that communication should help create meaning, belonging and organisational cohesion.

    The executive summary also frames this as a recalibration. The report argues that after years of disruption, organisations are moving beyond short-term channel adaptation and asking bigger questions about the “why” and “what” of internal communication, not only the “how”. That is one of the report’s clearest underlying messages.

    2. What does the study reveal about the relationship between internal communication, culture, belonging and employee experience?

    The report presents culture and employee experience as the two strongest growth areas in the remit of internal communication. It argues that communicators are increasingly expected to influence how work feels, not just how information flows. That includes belonging, inclusion, trust, wellbeing, EVP understanding and the quality of everyday employee interactions.

    On culture and belonging, the report finds that DEI is widely communicated but not always strategically embedded. On page 17, only a little over 4 in 10 respondents say they have a clearly defined DEI strategy, even though DEI is the second most communicated topic. Tactics such as awareness days, employee resource groups and training are common, especially in larger organisations, but the report suggests many organisations are still using disconnected activities rather than integrated, behaviour-shaping communication.

    The report is especially sceptical about authenticity. On page 18, only 45% say they have a say in what gets communicated and how, 35% feel able to inject more personality into communications, and just 26% say their organisation is open to creativity and humour. This is one of the report’s strongest interpretive threads: employees increasingly want candour, humanity and personality, but many organisations still default to sanitised corporate language. The report’s own commentary on page 21 is blunt: people want authenticity, yet internal communication still tends to be led by “corporate speak”.

    On employee experience, the report suggests that organisations have recognised the issue more than they have solved it. On pages 22–25, it shows that 57% have taken steps to revisit their EVP, but only 26% have formalised it in writing. Just 53% rate employee understanding of pay, rewards and benefits as excellent or good, and only 34% say the same for career development opportunities. At leadership level, 72% believe employee experience is on the executive radar, yet only around a third report a clear formal mandate from the top. In other words, employee experience is widely acknowledged but still insufficiently structured.

    The report also shows that some parts of employee experience are much more developed than others. Purpose and strategy, rewards, learning and development, and wellbeing are comparatively more likely to have clear strategies, while digital experience, environmental and social impact, and workplace experience lag behind. That suggests a patchy and uneven employee experience agenda rather than a coherent one.

    3. Which practical weaknesses are most limiting organisations’ internal communication efforts?

    The report identifies a cluster of operational weaknesses that keep appearing across the data: lack of time and capacity, disengagement, budget constraints, weak measurement, poor people manager enablement, and underdeveloped change communication.

    The most immediate constraint is resourcing. On page 14, lack of time and capacity is the top challenge for 2023 at 34%, ahead of disengaged employees at 30% and lack of budget at 24%. That is important because it changes the story from one of ambition to one of delivery pressure. The report repeatedly suggests that internal communication teams are being asked to cover more ground, especially across culture, wellbeing, experience and change, without enough additional support.

    People managers are another weak point. On page 19, 34% still view people managers mainly as a cascade channel. While 56% say managers are expected to reinforce and adapt corporate messages for their teams, preparedness is middling rather than strong: 58% say managers are well equipped to support wellbeing, 56% to connect employees to purpose, and 53% to create an inclusive workplace. The report’s implication is that managers are central to culture and experience, but most organisations are not enabling them robustly enough.

    Change communication is a particularly notable weak spot. On pages 33 and 34, almost 90% of organisations report planned change programmes for 2023, yet performance on key change communication practices is poor. Only two ingredients stand out as reasonably well handled: visual identity and long-term vision. Clear change narratives, communication calendars, audience understanding, behaviour insight and advocate networks all score weakly. The executive summary states that 58% fail to articulate a clear change narrative or design a consistent calendar of activities. That is a serious gap given how much change organisations are navigating.

    Measurement is another area where the profession looks stuck between aspiration and maturity. On pages 47 and 48, reach and employee understanding are measured more often than business outcomes or overall satisfaction, and the top reason for measuring is to show ROI to leaders rather than to improve communication for employees. The main barriers are lack of time and resource, lack of clear objectives, and technology limitations. The report clearly sees this as a problem: measurement exists, but it is not yet consistently outcome-focused or improvement-led.

    4. What does the report say about channels, technology and the digital employee experience?

    The report argues that channels and technology remain a major frustration, but not simply because there are too many tools. Its position is more nuanced: many organisations still lack a coherent channel strategy, sufficient investment and the data sophistication needed to make channels work well together.

    Overall channel satisfaction is mediocre rather than strong. On page 37, 63% are satisfied or very satisfied with their current channel mix, which still leaves more than a third dissatisfied. At the same time, 46% say their organisation is not investing enough in communication technology. The report treats this as evidence of a widening gap between what digital tools could enable and what employees actually experience.

    The value ratings on page 38 show where the main problems lie. Channels perform best at basic reach, with 73% saying they help reach people wherever they are based. But only 60% say they connect people on a human level, 59% say they create a consistent experience, 55% say they help gather employee feedback, 52% say they drive collaboration, and just 45% say they let employees share their own content. So the digital environment is relatively better at distributing information than at fostering participation, dialogue or belonging.

    The report also points to structural immaturity behind that dissatisfaction. Only 31% have a channel framework, only 33% have channel-specific editorial calendars, and segmentation and personalisation remain limited. On pages 39 and 40, segmentation tends to focus on basic criteria such as management responsibility, job role and location, while more sophisticated targeting based on interests, attitudes or response to change remains weak. Personalisation is even less mature. This supports one of the report’s broader conclusions: the profession talks about digital sophistication, but the operational foundations are often still basic.

    Interestingly, the report does not say all channel types are failing equally. It shows strong use and effectiveness for broadcast staples such as email and town halls, and high effectiveness ratings for collaboration channels such as team meetings and enterprise chat tools. Intranets remain common but attract criticism for analytics, integration and social functionality, while employee apps are seen as effective but not yet dominant. AI, meanwhile, appears more as an emerging aspiration than an established practice, with only 9% reporting current use.

    So the report’s position is not anti-technology. It is that technology alone has not solved the communication problem. Without clearer governance, sharper purpose, better content and stronger audience insight, more tools will not automatically create a better employee experience.

    5. What are the report’s main strategic implications for communication leaders in 2023 and beyond?

    The report’s strategic message is that internal communication leaders need to think bigger than channels and bolder than messaging. They are being asked to shape culture, strengthen belonging, improve employee experience, support change, and demonstrate value in measurable terms. That requires a more strategic, integrated and evidence-led function.

    First, communication leaders need to clarify the function’s purpose. The conclusion on page 55 begins with the need to have a defined purpose and strategy, aligned to what the business needs and what value communication provides. That recommendation follows directly from the report’s evidence that many teams still operate with campaign plans and tactics, but without an overarching long-term strategy.

    Second, they need to build a stronger narrative capability. The report shows that only 30% have a written strategic narrative, and fewer than half believe employees understand how they contribute to strategy. That makes narrative not a stylistic extra, but a strategic necessity. Communicators are being urged to articulate purpose, change and meaning more clearly and consistently.

    Third, the report strongly implies that authenticity is becoming a competitive communication capability. Employees want open, human and credible communication, yet many organisations still resist humour, creativity and personality. The report’s commentary repeatedly frames authenticity as necessary to trust, relevance and memory. For leaders, that means not just polishing leadership messages, but helping leaders communicate more like real people.

    Fourth, communication leaders need to shift from output metrics to impact thinking. The report explicitly says the focus should move from outputs to outcomes. If culture, belonging and employee experience are the new frontier, then success cannot be assessed only through open rates or attendance. It has to include understanding, behaviour, sentiment and business-relevant effects.

    Finally, the report suggests that internal communication is at a turning point. Its remit has expanded, its influence appears higher than in the past, but its operating model has not fully caught up. Teams are under pressure, technology is underperforming, and measurement remains imperfect. The opportunity is clear: communicators who can connect purpose, experience, change and evidence will be better placed to become trusted advisers rather than content distributors. That is the report’s underlying vision of what world-class internal communication now looks like.

  • The Changing Face of Leadership Communication by Padilla

    The Changing Face of Leadership Communication by Padilla

    About the paper

    The report examines how leadership communication is changing under sustained pressure from pandemic disruption, employee volatility, social issues and economic uncertainty.

    It is a mixed-methods report drawing on an online survey of 100+ C-suite executives and company owners, an online survey of more than 1,000 employed adults, and nearly 20 one-to-one depth interviews with C-suite leaders; the geographic scope is not clearly specified in the report.

    Length: 58 pages

    More information / download:
    https://padillaco.com/post/the-changing-face-of-leadership-communications

    Core Insights

    1. Why does the report argue that leadership communication has changed so sharply?

    The report’s core argument is that the context around leadership has become far more unstable, emotionally charged and publicly scrutinised than the environment many senior leaders came up in. It describes the past “2½ years of chaos” as shaped by COVID-19, polarised politics, unsettled employees, gun violence and other social issues, geopolitical uncertainty, supply chain shortages, whiplash economics, racial reckoning and stagflation. That combination has made it “not an easy time to be in the C-suite”.

    The report also shows that these pressures are not abstract. In the survey, the top reported leadership challenges were coping with economic uncertainty at 42%, rising inflation at 33%, public health incidents at 32%, supporting employee well-being at 29%, and attracting and retaining talent at 27%. That puts emotional, operational and reputational strain into the same leadership frame.

    In other words, the change in communication is presented as a response to a changed operating environment. Leaders are no longer communicating in relatively stable conditions; they are communicating amid overlapping crises, faster feedback loops and heightened stakeholder expectations. That is why the report treats communication change as structural rather than cosmetic.

    2. How does the report characterise what leaders are feeling, and why does that matter?

    The report’s clearest single-word diagnosis is that leaders feel “conflicted”. That matters because it frames leadership communication not as a polished top-down exercise, but as something shaped by genuine internal tension.

    That tension shows up repeatedly in the interview material. Leaders describe feeling helpless during COVID, uncertain about what the next day would bring, and torn between different employee needs: flexibility versus certainty, empathy versus business discipline, transparency versus reassurance. The report also argues that many leaders were rewarded earlier in their careers for confidence, infallibility, competitiveness and prioritising work over personal life, but are now being asked to lead in a very different climate.

    This matters because the report sees conflict not as weakness, but as the defining emotional condition of contemporary leadership. The better leaders recognise that conflict, rather than pretending it does not exist. That becomes the basis for a more adaptive communication style: less rigid certainty, more judgement, and more conscious balancing of competing demands.

    3. Which leadership qualities does the report say have become more important, and what does that reveal about the new leadership model?

    The report shows that credibility and authenticity top the list of qualities ranked “extremely important” for effective employee communication, at 74% and 73% respectively. Confidence follows at 66%, then ethics at 65% and transparency at 63%. Empathy sits at 52%, humility at 51%, while vulnerability and stoicism are both much lower at 26%.

    But the more revealing finding is the change over time. The qualities seen as more important than two years ago are led by social issue advocacy at 80%, empathy at 76%, flexibility at 73%, vulnerability at 70% and a growth mindset at 68%. That suggests the leadership model is shifting away from simple command-and-control confidence towards a more complex mix of moral positioning, emotional intelligence and adaptability.

    The report does not argue that traditional strengths disappear. Confidence, credibility and certainty still matter. Instead, it suggests leaders are having to combine older expectations of competence with newer demands for candour, empathy and social awareness. That is why the report repeatedly presents today’s leadership as a balancing act rather than a clean replacement of one model by another.

    4. What communication dilemmas are leaders now trying to manage in practice?

    The report identifies several recurring dilemmas. One is the challenge of creating a “change comfortable” culture. Leaders describe shorter planning cycles, the need to keep returning to the “why”, and a growing focus on resilience, interconnections and comfort with ambiguity. Long-term direction still matters, but detailed long-range plans are presented as far less reliable than before.

    A second dilemma is transparency. The report explicitly labels this the “transparency dilemma”, framing competency and confidence against transparency and candour as potentially conflicting leadership attributes. Interviewees say they are getting more comfortable saying “I don’t know”, but not stopping there; they must acknowledge uncertainty without undermining reassurance.

    A third dilemma concerns humanity. At company level, that means expanded benefits, flexible work, culture-building and taking stands on social issues. At leader level, it means more empathy, more visible personal openness, more kindness and more acknowledgement of blind spots. Yet even here the report stresses boundaries: leaders may need to show that they have feelings without fully exposing those feelings.

    Finally, there is the dilemma of criticism. Because leaders are listening more, they are hearing more dissent from employees, customers, investors and communities. The report argues that criticism is now a given, not an exception. Negative feedback no longer automatically signals a bad decision; it is part of the new communications environment.

    5. What are the report’s main implications for communication advisers and teams?

    The report’s practical conclusion is that communicators need to evolve from message crafters into strategic advisers. It contrasts old requests such as “Go say this for me” or “How do I say this?” with broader questions such as “What are the consequences of what I say and do?” and “What should I do?” That signals a move from tactical execution to leadership counsel.

    According to the report, today’s strategic communications adviser must be in tune with the complexities of the business, highly attentive to stakeholder groups and subgroups, able to think about the message, the messenger and the methods, and capable of listening to and interpreting feedback.

    The broader implication is that communicators are no longer just helping leaders express decisions. They are helping leaders navigate ambiguity, stakeholder conflict, social expectations and organisational change. The report ends by saying that strategic communications professionals have “never been more essential as advisors and transformers”. That is the document’s clearest statement of purpose: it is making the case for a bigger, more embedded and more strategic role for communication counsel.

  • State of the Sector 2021-22 by Gallagher

    State of the Sector 2021-22 by Gallagher

    About the paper

    The report presents Gallagher’s 2021/22 global survey of the internal communication and employee engagement landscape, based on a survey run from October to November 2021.

    It is original survey research with comparative analysis across respondent segments; more than 1,300 organisations took part, spanning more than 33 industries, with a global footprint led by North America (46%) and Europe (35%).

    The report clearly states the respondent volume and regional mix, but does not clearly specify the detailed sampling approach beyond survey participation.

    Length: 56 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.ajg.com/employeeexperience/state-of-the-sector/

    Core Insights

    1. What does the report say are the biggest strategic priorities for internal communication in 2022?

    The report’s clearest message is that the profession’s core mission has remained stable, but the agenda around it has shifted. The number-one priority is still engaging employees around purpose, strategy and values, selected by 53% of respondents. That matters because it shows internal communication still sees its central role as creating clarity, alignment and meaning across the organisation.

    What changed around that core is more revealing. Adapting channel strategy to hybrid working came in second at 39%, and enhancing people manager communication entered the top three for the first time at 31%. Building the internal communication function followed at 29%, while improving impact measurement and evaluation, enhancing leadership visibility, and developing communication strategy and tone of voice each stood at 26%.

    This signals a profession moving from pure message distribution towards workforce experience, channel governance and managerial enablement. The report explicitly notes that leadership visibility dropped from its previously dominant position, suggesting that after the pandemic’s peak phase, the problem is less about simply seeing leaders and more about helping employees navigate hybrid structures, organisational change and overloaded communication environments.

    So the strategic picture is not that internal communication has abandoned its traditional purpose. Rather, it has had to retool around new organisational realities: hybrid work, employee uncertainty, changing expectations of managers, and the need to prove impact more credibly.

    2. What are the report’s main findings about the biggest challenges facing internal communication teams?

    The most striking finding is that employee disengagement is now the leading challenge, cited by 37% of respondents. The report treats this as a major shift, noting that disengagement had risen from third place the year before. That suggests organisations were not simply managing communications complexity; they were confronting a deteriorating emotional and motivational climate among employees.

    The second-biggest challenge is lack of capacity or human resource in the internal communication team, named by 32%. That is followed by lack of analytics and measurement and poor people manager communication skills, both at 27%. Internal technology not fit for purpose and volume of communication too high each register 22%.

    Taken together, these findings point to a structural tension. Internal communication teams are being asked to take on broader responsibilities, yet many remain under-resourced, insufficiently supported by measurement capability, and dependent on people managers who are expected to communicate more without being developed enough to do so well. The report also points to “noisy organisations”, poor channel governance and confusion caused by expanding digital ecosystems, especially around Office 365 tools and social platforms.

    What is especially important is that the report does not frame these challenges as purely technical. It links them to deeper organisational issues: uncertainty from the top, unclear strategic direction, weak feedback loops, and the difficulty of preserving belonging, wellbeing and attention in hybrid settings. In other words, the challenge is not just sending better messages. It is sustaining employee connection and meaning in a fragmented workplace.

    3. How does the report assess organisations’ ability to create understanding around purpose, strategy and employee contribution?

    This is one of the most revealing sections of the report. Although purpose and strategy remain the profession’s top priority, employee understanding appears uneven and weakens the closer one gets to practical relevance. Respondents say employees’ understanding is good or excellent for purpose and vision in 63% of organisations, but only 47% for business strategy, and just 41% for how employees themselves contribute to purpose and strategy.

    That drop-off is crucial. It suggests many organisations are reasonably good at expressing an overarching idea of who they are and what they stand for, but much less effective at translating that into operational understanding and individual line of sight. The report explicitly identifies this as a core internal communication challenge.

    There are also clear process weaknesses behind this. While 88% say their organisation values employee feedback, only 64% believe the organisation learns from and acts on it, and just 47% think there is a robust process for capturing employee insights and feedback. Qualitative listening methods such as focus groups and listening sessions are used by only 39%, while feedback from people managers is used by 49%, and social channels by just 25%, despite wider adoption of those channels.

    The report’s interpretation is that many organisations talk about listening more than they practise it. That matters because understanding is not created by broadcasting a purpose statement. It is built when organisations actively connect narrative, behaviour, employee voice and managerial reinforcement. The report also shows that organisations with stronger talent attraction and retention are more positive about listening, more likely to act on feedback, and report much stronger employee understanding of strategy and personal contribution.

    4. What does the report argue about employee experience, hybrid working and the role of people managers?

    A major argument of the report is that internal communication can no longer be treated narrowly as message management. It increasingly sits inside the broader employee experience. The report says 82% agree that internal communication is seen as a key driver of employee experience, and 73% say employee experience is discussed at C-suite level. But there is a gap between executive discussion and organisational execution: only 31% report a clear top-level mandate, 19% say there is a cross-department working group in place, and 44% describe the approach as siloed.

    On hybrid working, the report shows that organisations know change is needed. Adapting channel strategy to hybrid working is a major priority, and 19% say they have already conducted an in-depth review of channels and engagement strategy, while 34% are still in the process. Yet the report also notes that this review has not translated into radical channel change. Instead, many organisations seem to be adjusting how they use existing channels rather than replacing them.

    The report’s channel findings underline the problem. While 80% say their current channels can reach employees wherever they are based, lower shares believe channels support opinion-sharing, collaboration or innovation. Only 25% say employees can choose how they receive communications to any real degree, and 47% say they have no plans to implement that.

    People managers are central to this whole picture. Expectations of leaders and people managers as communicators have increased for 81% of respondents, yet support has not kept pace. Thirty-five per cent say people managers are the primary communication channel for many employees, and 54% say they are important in reinforcing messages. But only 63% say people managers are treated as a proper communication channel, 46% say it is easy for managers to share team feedback upward, and just 34% say people managers have access to communication training.

    The report’s implication is sharp: organisations are leaning more heavily on managers in the hybrid era while underinvesting in their communication capability. That creates a bottleneck in the employee experience and weakens both listening and strategic alignment.

    5. What does the report suggest distinguishes stronger organisations and ‘world-class’ communicators from the rest?

    The report repeatedly compares higher-performing organisations and “world-class communicators” with the broader sample. Its core conclusion is that stronger organisations are more proactive, more strategic, and more disciplined in planning, listening, change and measurement.

    For organisations that outperform peers on talent attraction and retention, several patterns stand out. They are more likely to value and act on employee feedback, more likely to discuss employee experience at C-suite level, more likely to have formal employee experience structures, and more likely to review and adapt their channel strategies in response to hybrid work. They also report stronger employee understanding of purpose, business strategy and individual contribution.

    For “world-class communicators”, the report defines this group as the 11% who said their influence had increased and who strongly agreed they are viewed as trusted advisers. Compared with others, they are more likely to have formal planning documents such as annual master plans, longer-term internal communication strategies, channel frameworks and editorial calendars. They rate their organisations more positively on change communication, especially long-term vision, compelling change story, and leader consistency. They also measure more systematically, including understanding, satisfaction and behaviour change, and make better use of data to refine messaging and channels.

    This points to the report’s underlying perspective: influence is not earned merely by producing more content or being visible in leadership meetings. It is earned by building strategic clarity, disciplined planning, strong change communication, active listening and credible evidence of impact. In that sense, the report is making a professional argument as much as an empirical one. It is saying the future of internal communication belongs to teams that can connect narrative, employee experience, managerial capability and measurement into a coherent operating model.

    The report’s overall conclusion is that internal communication has gained status, but not yet full maturity. Its remit is expanding faster than many organisations’ structures, skills and resources. Those that turn listening, planning, employee experience and measurement into real operating disciplines appear better placed to retain talent, navigate hybrid work and strengthen organisational performance.

  • 2021 Future of Corporate Communications Study by Edelman

    2021 Future of Corporate Communications Study by Edelman

    About the paper

    The report examines how the corporate communications function is evolving from a transactional support role into a more strategic business partner, focusing on priorities, structures, capabilities, investment, and reporting lines.

    It is a mixed-methods original research report based on a quantitative survey of 200 participants fielded in December 2020 and January 2021, plus 35+ in-depth interviews with senior communications leaders from participating U.S.-based organisations.

    The dataset is globally distributed but heavily North America-led, with survey geographies reported as North America (85%), EMEA (7%), APAC (4%), and Latin America (4%); interview participants were drawn from U.S.-based organisations.

    Length: 76 pages

    More information / download:
    https://www.edelman.com/expertise/commstech/2021-Future-of-Corporate-Comms-Research

    Core Insights

    1. What is the central argument of the report about the future role of corporate communications?

    The report’s core argument is that corporate communications is moving up the strategic continuum, from being treated as a cost centre or executional service provider to becoming a value-generating business partner. Edelman argues that external disruption, especially the pandemic, social issues, business transformation, and a more complex stakeholder environment, has increased the strategic importance of communications inside organisations. The report presents this not as a marginal shift, but as a structural change in what senior communicators are expected to do.

    A major theme is that communications is no longer just about media relations, messaging, and storytelling. Instead, the function is increasingly expected to help shape decisions on risk, workforce issues, reputation, transformation, social purpose, and stakeholder trust. The report says this has brought communicators closer to CEOs, boards, and the C-suite, with 46% now reporting to the CEO versus 34% in 2014, and 77% saying perceptions of communications as a strategic business driver changed within their organisation during 2020.

    At the same time, the report is careful not to suggest that this evolution is complete. It repeatedly notes that progress is uneven. Some organisations still see communications in largely reactive or transactional terms, and maturity varies by industry, geography, and leadership culture. So the report’s argument is both optimistic and cautionary: the opportunity is real, but it has to be claimed and proved.

    2. What forces are driving this shift in corporate communications?

    The report identifies several forces pushing communications into a more strategic role. COVID-19 is presented as the immediate accelerator. It increased the visibility and relevance of communications, especially around employee engagement, business continuity, internal alignment, and executive decision-making. More than half of respondents said COVID-19 shifted the communications focus and demand on their function, with employee communications emerging as the most strongly affected area.

    Beyond the pandemic, the report highlights business transformation as the most important long-term driver, cited by 77% of respondents, followed by social issues at 73%, customer or consumer demand shifts at 56%, and talent at 38%. This matters because it frames communications not as a function reacting to one crisis, but as one increasingly embedded in permanent organisational change. Communicators are being pulled into transformation programmes, social issue response, workforce strategy, and stakeholder trust management.

    The report also stresses the importance of the changing media and information ecosystem. Social media, digital channels, and faster news cycles have altered how organisations reach stakeholders and how quickly reputational issues can escalate. That has expanded the role of communications into digital, content, creative, analytics, and more direct coordination with marketing. In other words, the environment has become too fast, fragmented, and high-stakes for communications to remain a back-end support function.

    3. How does the report say the communications function itself needs to change in order to meet these expectations?

    The report argues that strategic credibility starts inside the function. Communications teams need to change how they think about themselves, how they organise, and what capabilities they prioritise. The report contrasts an older model built around reactive storytelling and service delivery with a newer model based on strategic planning, business acumen, insights, measurable outcomes, and multidisciplinary collaboration.

    A recurring theme is that the modern function must be agile, multidisciplinary, and insights-driven. Teams can no longer rely only on classic PR strengths such as writing, media contacts, and message development. They now need broader capability across employee communications, risk and crisis, brand and corporate positioning, change communications, digital, creative, data, and analytics. The report explicitly describes the ideal talent profile as “T-shaped”: people with deep expertise in one area, but enough breadth to work across multiple strategic contexts.

    The report also argues that relationship-building with senior leadership is essential. Functions that are seen as more strategic have typically earned closer CEO and C-suite access, often by combining stronger counsel with better evidence of impact. It recommends integrated strategic planning, clearer governance, clearer roles, and more consultative team behaviour. The implication is that structural change alone is not enough. A communications team only becomes strategic when it shows business understanding, connects its work to organisational goals, and consistently executes at a high level.

    4. What does the report reveal about investment priorities, technology, and capability gaps?

    One of the clearest findings is that expectations are rising faster than resources. The report says communicators are being asked to do more, across more areas, with stronger proof of business value, but many are not receiving proportional budget increases. It notes that only 6% of CCOs expected a budget increase of 15% or more, while 45% anticipated a budget decrease or no change in the coming year. Later benchmarking pages show a similar tension, with 54% expecting some increase but 46% expecting budgets to stay flat or decline.

    Within that constrained environment, CommsTech emerges as the headline investment priority. The report defines this as the tools, technology, and data that allow communicators to target, measure, and shape perceptions and behaviour. Seventy percent said CommsTech was a top investment area, and the report positions it as central to proving ROI and connecting communications work to business results. But it also shows that adoption is still immature: 44% report baseline media-impression measurement, yet only 30% map revenue growth back to communications activity.

    The report is especially useful in showing why adoption is slow. Barriers include difficulty justifying large tech investments, weak support from CEOs or business leaders, IT ownership conflicts, poor collaboration with marketing and sales, and internal team struggles to adopt digital tools and analytics. So the report is not simply making a pro-technology argument. It is saying that technology only matters if organisations also invest in skills, processes, governance, and data fluency. Capability gaps in change communications, analytics, and ESG are also singled out as emerging needs.

    5. What are the main implications and conclusions for communications leaders and organisations?

    The report’s main conclusion is that this is a pivotal moment for the communications profession. The external environment has created an opening for communications leaders to claim a more central role in business strategy, but doing so requires deliberate change. Communicators must demonstrate business acumen, link activity to outcomes, invest in specialist capability, and speak the language of strategy, ROI, and performance. In the report’s framing, the opportunity will not convert automatically into influence. It has to be operationalised.

    For organisations and CEOs, the implication is equally strong. If they want communications to function as a true strategic partner, they need to bring it into decisions earlier, provide closer access to leadership, resource it properly, and recognise reputation, trust, employee engagement, and stakeholder alignment as business-critical issues rather than peripheral concerns. The report even suggests that some companies are beginning to elevate reputation into shared business goals and leadership accountability.

    The report’s final perspective is practical rather than theoretical. Across its “playbook” sections, it repeatedly returns to six or seven concrete ideas: have a clear vision for the function, align communications with business strategy, combine planning with insight, improve governance and process, build multidisciplinary teams, invest in people and specialist skills, and prove impact through measurement. That makes the report less a prediction document than a management guide for how communicators can turn heightened relevance into durable strategic authority.