Partner Pulse focus: The ROI Partner Group conducted a Partner Pulse asking our members to share how they are currently approaching applying for workplace awards. 1. Who manages the process for global workplace awards and certifications? 2. How do you continually engage employees in multiple workplace award surveys? What communication strategies do you use to encourage participation and convey what’s in it for them? How do you avoid survey fatigue? Have you used incentives? 3. What unique aspects of your company’s culture have you highlighted? 4. Any lessons learned regarding workplace aw ..read more

With the start of another year, it’s easy to be overwhelmed by the barrage of thought leaders and pundits predicting what’s ahead and warning what you must do now to stay on top of it all. What’s in, what’s out for 2024? Whether it’s Gartner or Gallup, Forbes or Fast Company, the list of “biggest trends that everyone needs to be ready for now” can feel long and disheartening. Dampened employee engagement and persistent burnout Social issues and an increase in employee activism Divisive elections Influx of new technologies Economic uncertainty and its impact on headcount and resource c ..read more

This is the final part of a three-part series on workplace creativity. Read Parts One and Two. Original artwork by Jeff. The most iconic image of workplace creativity is a group of people coming together at a particular moment in time to generate ideas around a specific topic: the brainstorm. While increasingly sophisticated digital tools — and a global pandemic — have expanded this portrait to include virtual contributors across geographies alongside folks sitting around a conference table, the basic principle remains the same. If you’ve ever participated in a hybrid brainstorm, you know ..read more

As internal communication teams finalize their annual initiatives at the start of every year, an effective way to develop the tactics they will use is to conduct virtual focus groups. Focus groups can give you significant insight that goes beyond standard employee surveys. They’re a great tool for communicators who need to uncover workplace opinions about organizational strengths and weaknesses while also inviting fresh solutions to stubborn issues. When done well, virtual focus groups not only demonstrate an organization’s openness to feedback, but also sends a strong signal to employees t ..read more

We seem to be living in an age of constant crisis, with new once-in-a-lifetime disruptors regularly emerging. These are rarely simple issues, but rather are far-reaching, deep-rooted crises with wide-ranging reverberations that your crisis communication plan, if you have one, often hasn’t predicted. For professional communicators, counseling leaders on when to engage with these issues, when not to engage, and how to clean up when engagement goes wrong, is an exhausting cycle — one with no apparent end in sight as the past 5 years have shown. There are, of course, no easy answers. Crisis resp ..read more

An ROI presentation recap, given in partnership with Staffbase. As internal communicators get ready to evaluate the initiatives from the past year, it’s also the season to begin planning for the year ahead. At Staffbase‘s Comms Club, a national in-person roadshow for internal comms professionals, ROI SVP Janice Smith Collins and ROI VP Cat Jordan led a captivating session on how to kick off your annual communications plan with success. As communicators build out strategies for the upcoming year, it’s important we consider not just current issues, but flex to incorporate new and future IC ..read more

Partner Pulse focus: The ROI Partner Group conducted a Partner Pulse asking our members to share how they are currently communicating about AI. How is your internal communication team currently using AI? How are you communicating with employees about AI? Is your company encouraging employees to use AI? Why/why not? Have you provided specific guidance to employees on how to use approved AI tools? Which, if any, AI tools are approved for use? Interested in viewing the data and results shared in this Partner Pulse survey? Full access to our Partner Pulses is available as part of an ROI Partner ..read more

Released to PR Newswire [SF Bay Area] — The diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) pendulum has begun a swing downward from its high point of corporate adoption following the civil unrest in 2020, which saw consumers and employees demand organizations make public social commitments aimed at creating a more equitable workplace. In 2023, ROI has seen a 55% reduction in requests for DEI-related communication support year over year. The ongoing DEI work that ROI supports its clients with has seen budget reductions upwards of 30%, almost double the reduction compared to the average of 15% fo ..read more

 Released to PR Newswire [SF Bay Area] — 2023 witnessed the corporate workplace undergo its third consecutive year of significant transformation, reshaping the future of work and the roles of internal communicators and employee engagement professionals. ROI presents its top five workplace trends in 2024 Generative AI and Digital Transformation Take Center Stage: CEOs and C-suites are set to prioritize generative AI and digital transformation as major organizational focuses. In April, 59% of professional communicators had already started experimenting with incorporating AI-driven appl ..read more

Part of a series of blogs expanding on the findings of the latest ROI Benchmark. If there’s one coworker every employee can name, it’s the CEO. Regardless of the size of the company — and whether they enjoy the privilege — the CEO is a celebrity headliner, treated as the living personification of the organization’s values and culture. As such, many of today’s chief executives are anxious to remind everyone that there’s a human underneath the icon, a human that employees would very much like to know better. CEO communications, alongside 20 other priorities, is climbing to the top of priority ..read more