Phase 2: Mobilise [Gain Commitment]

Communication

Good communication is one of the most vital ingredients of a successful project.

It is about engaging, briefing, listening to, and acting on the concerns and ideas of the various stakeholder groups.

There has to be an effective Communications Plan which defines how information about the project will be disseminated to stakeholders, people directly involved in the project, the rest of the organisation and other organisations.

It describes how people will be able to feed back their views, issues, and ideas into the project.

It is used to manage the ongoing communication about the project.

The Purpose of effective Communication is to ensure that stakeholders have an effective method to

Receive project information and

  1. Share their views
  2. in the right format
  3. at the right time.

See Generic Framework: Governance

Why do we need this?

You don’t want to alienate the very stakeholders who can help you succeed. They need to know:

  1. the reasons for change;
  2. what is proposed;
  3. the consequences of change especially for them as individuals.

Unless the project and the stakeholders communicate effectively, ‘rumour control’ takes over and the project will have great problems regaining credibility.

People can and often will wreck projects if they are not involved to their satisfaction and their concerns listened to and managed.

For any change project to have any chance of success it is vital that all stakeholders understand what is happening and when.

Without effective communication the project will probably fail.

How should I go about developing a Communications Plan ?

Research

  1. There are many different ways of communicating. How do groups and projects communicate most successfully within your organisation?
  2. Engage other project board executives/project managers/business managers about how they went about communicating. Identify what worked and what did not and any tips they may have.
  3. Involve your in-house PR or equivalent department if you have one.

Project Initiation

  1. Develop the Communications Plan where you set the overall scene for communicating with stakeholders. This will include both disseminating information about the project and receiving feedback.
  2. Develop the Communications Plan at a more detailed level showing what is being communicated, to whom, why, how, and when. The plan will develop as the project develops. A matrix (see opposite) is an effective method of describing communication.

During the Project

  1. You are trying to achieve and maintain buy in from the different stakeholder groups. Consider using one or some of the following during the project lifecycle: -
  2. Business requirement – engage users and customers in defining the requirement
  3. Initiation – talk to key groups, Unions, staff associations, business groups
  4. Progress – report to various groups about how the project is progressing using project and other pre-set regular meetings of the business
  5. Newsletter – if something is worth saying let the key stakeholder groups know. Use e-mail where possible to disseminate.

Communications matrix

  1. What are we going to communicate (different for different groups at various stages)
  2. Who are we going to communicate with (stakeholders)
  3. When are we going to communicate (at the right time, when they need to know, not too early, not too late)
  4. Why are we going to communicate (we want the change to be successful)
  5. How are we going to communicate (newsletters, email, focus groups)
  6. Where are we going to communicate (the most appropriate way, sometimes face to face, in groups, using IT) Try to go to their territory if possible.

For good examples of communications plans, see the Ryogens Project Implementation Guide: Internal and External Communications