Good communications practice and organizational performance are inextricably linked. Our 2014 survey of 81 organizations, across 10 countries with approx 390,000 employees identified 11 challenges that today's communicators are facing. We saw a link between some of the 11 factors identified and organizational underperformance. This year have updated the data in order to analyse year-on-year trends.

1. Powered by
#11ways Part II - Does communication
really make a difference?
 Research Conducted by Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
 #11ways via Twitter
 125 respondents covering over 100 organizations with over a million employees

2. Who we are
Michael Ambjorn
Passionate about helping leaders
achieve purpose-driven impact -
and willing to cross oceans to
make it happen.
Chair @IABC, Founder
@alignyourorg, Director-at-Large
@NearDesk
LinkedIn
Twitter: @michael_ambjorn
Dana Poole
Helping communicators
understand the digital landscape
and deliver business strategy and
goals through Digital Literacy.
Internal Communications and
Social Media Consultant at
Unilever
LinkedIn
Twitter: @dana_poole
Stephen Welch
Helping organizations improve their
communications to support culture
change, innovation,
communication, leadership
development.
Leading the development of the
Communications Department at
Dialog Semiconductor
LinkedIn
Twitter: @stephenwelch11
2

3. #11WAYS RESEARCH INSIGHTS &
TRENDS
3

4. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
High performers think “impact”
 Our research – covering over 100 organizations with over a million
employees – tells us that there are some clear differences between high
performing organizations and others in terms of their communications.
 89% of high performers align communications and strategy, but only 58% of
average companies do.
 High performing organizations are 3 times more likely to rate their
communications as excellent or very good.
 A clear theme emerges in high performing organizations – a theme which
is absent from the others:
 They think about impact, not just output.
4

5. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
High performers understand “business”
 In a high performing organisation, communicators are twice as likely to claim that
they have strong business know-how and operational understanding.
 Less than one in five communicators in an average organization would say this.
 Those that do:
 Find it easier to get senior leader buy-in for budget and resources
 Show more agility in responding to change: adopting new technologies, influencing
culture change, managing competing agendas
 Navigate complex and siloed organisational structure to achieve their goals
5

6. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
High performers think “audience”
 53% of communicators surveyed keep their language simple and jargon
free
 The high performer organisations are more likely to keep their language
simple, make emotional connections, and think about communication
from the audience’s point of view.
 In these organizations, we also see stronger connections between the
communications team and the rest of the business:
 In an average company, only 12% of communicators rate the communication
skills of line managers and business leaders as excellent or very good. This figure
is 3x higher for high performing organisations.
6

7. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
High performers are fast adopters
 Most communicators surveyed have adopted new tools and technologies
during the past year and almost 70% said this has been very helpful when
engaging with stakeholders.
 We see the emergence of messaging apps (Microsoft Lync) and wider
spread of webex/video conferencing (Skype for business, Google
Hangouts)along the more traditional channels: intranet, social networks,
online newsletters
 High performing organisation have developed staff capabilities and
talent to not only adopt new tools and technologies but embed them
through new ways of working and cross-silo governance models
7

8. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
High performers align communication to
strategy
 89% of high performing organisations align communications and business
strategy
 Only 8% of the communicators surveyed said they measure the strength of
their communication activities by organisation productivity.
 Perhaps is unsurprising then that the biggest barriers to improving
communication were seen as:
 Lack of senior buy-in
 Leadership does not value comms
8

9. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Trends
 Since our 2014 survey, we’ve seen some positive trends:
 71% (from 54%) now say they align communication strategy and goals
 53% (from 32%) now aim for simple and jargon-free language
 47% (from 31%) now have processes for creating great stories
 53% (from 34%) now claim to regularly make emotional connections with
audiences
 But the overall level of business knowledge and operational
understanding of the communication professionals has worsened:
 25% (from 31%) now claim to have an excellent or very good business
knowledge
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10. #11ways RESEARCH PURPOSE
10

11. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Why conduct this research?
 Good communications practice and organizational performance are
inextricably linked.
 Our 2014 survey of 81 organizations, across 10 countries with approx
390,000 employees identified 11 challenges that today's communicators
are facing.
 We saw a link between some of the 11 factors identified and
organizational underperformance.
 This year are updating the data in order to analyse year-on-year trends.
11

12. #11ways
2015 RESEARCH
DETAILED RESULTS
12

13. About the organisations surveyed
No of employees No of employees in Communications
13
100 organizations with over a million employees
39%
16%
6%
8% 7%
11%
8%
0%
5%
10%
15%
20%
25%
30%
35%
40%
45%
0-5 6-10 11-20 21-50 51-100 101-300 300+
14.0%
7.0%
5.0%
9.0%
10.0%
23.0%
18.0%
14.0%
0.0%
5.0%
10.0%
15.0%
20.0%
25.0%

14. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
About the respondents surveyed
 Strategic Advisor - You coach and support
business leaders, and are seen as a true partner to
the business
 Generalist - You have a management role in your
function to deliver programs and initiatives,
working across channels and approaches
 Specialist - You work in a particular area of
communications and are an expert in your
organization
 Business Leader - You lead your function, have a
view across the organization, and a role on the
management team
 Foundation - None of these apply to you. Perhaps
you have just started your career in
communication
14
30.3%
28.3%
28.3%
9.1%
4.0%
What role best describes your
career at this point?

15. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q1 - How would you rate?
15
23%
66%
10%
20%
61%
18%
25%
66%
6%
0%
50%
100%
150%
200%
250%
Excellent + Very Good Good/Fair Poor/Terrible
The overall level of business knowledge and operational understanding of the communication
professionals across your organization
The general communication skills of the leaders and managers in your organization
The overall effectiveness of communications in your organization

16. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q2: How much do you agree or disagree
with each of these statements about
communications in your organization?
July 19, 2015
16
0%
10%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
70%
80%
90%
100%
1. All of our
communication
is aligned to our
organizational
strategy and
goals
2. Corporate
messages are
generally
devised and
written by senior
executives
3. In general we
try to pack a lot
of messages into
our
communications
4. In our
communication
to external and
internal
audiences, we
talk a lot about
ourselves
5. Our
organization
regularly invests
in new tools and
technologies to
improve
communication
6. Our senior
managers think
they are good
communicators
7. We always
keep our
language simple
and jargon-free
8. We have a
process for
creating great
corporate stories
9. We regularly
make emotional
connections with
our audiences
10. We regularly
think about
communication
from the
audience’s
perspective
11. When
planning
communication,
we give a lot of
thought to who
delivers what
messages
12. We measure
the outcome
rather than
communication
activities
Strongly /Tend to agree Neutral Tend to/Strongly disagree Don't Know

17. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q3: What new technologies, if any, have
you introduced in the last year for your
communication activities?
17

18. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Top 5 Tools & Technologies adopted by
communicators
18

19. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q3: What new technologies, if any, have
you introduced in the last year for your
communication activities?
July 19, 2015
19
New devices for teams in
every store, a global digital
magazine, an online portal
for recognition, an online
repository for information
Messaging apps -
Microsoft Lync is being
extended to all countries
Intranets –
Sharepoint
Office 365
New integrated intranet linking
formerly unaligned parts of the
organization. Leadership video
and written blogs and
messages (tweets) for internal
audiences. More
collaboration groups online to
connect geographically
spread out teams. More online
newsletters. Also moved a
magazine to a digital format
w/ rich content and
interactive tools and links.
More use of Google
Hangouts with our
executives
Social networks -
Yammer, Chatter
Email -
Newsweaver
Social Media
Apps
Shorter,
professional
video
Webex -
Townhalls

20. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q4: How helpful have these new
technologies been in helping you to
engage with new or existing stakeholders?
20

21. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q5: What methods do you use to measure the
strength of your communication activities (internal
and/or external)?
21
Website/Intranet
analytics
Survey results Social media
monitoring
Number/growth of
Twitter followers /
Facebook likes
Email open rate Reputation
benchmarking
Award programs
(won/entered)
Employee
retention rate
PR "Advertising
Value Equivalent"
Sales & profit Organizational
productivity

22. Q6: What would you say is the biggest obstacle to
improving the performance of your organizational
communications?
“Lack of Management buy-in, lack of investment
in new channels.”
“Too much noise/too many initiatives both in the
business and communications teams, internally
and externally.”
“Getting line managers to become better
communicators.”
Time - people just don't have time to read, absorb
are where necessary act on the communications.
The sheer volume of messages also doesn't help.”
“1a) Apathy/participation amongst audience 1b)
"I'm good at it, it’s everyone else".”
“Most members of the Communications and
Social Media teams have no background in
Communications; they've been simply growing
inside the company. The age-range is also older,
and non-updated, leaving most of the team
counting on outdated tools and strategies.”
“To prove the ROI of communications to
executives, managers and investments decision
makers.”
“Head of organisation dismissive of involving staff,
senior advisers not trusting staff.”
“Managers who think they are doing a good job
of communicating but in actuality, they have a
different perception of themselves than what
others have. Also, outdated technology plays a
part in ineffectiveness. (We still use pagers, flip cell
phones, computer based telephony that is not
very reliable...)”
“Even our communications team-leader and
director don't understand the need for
communications planning. We just do stuff. Even
for advertising, we buy ads without any sort of
goals in mind or understanding what the need
might be.”
“As a board member for a not for profit - lack of
easy communication KPI's”
“Seeing the opportunities not obstacles. Most
discussions end up repeating what is wrong or
what won't work rather than trialling solutions. We
need less pilot programmes and more
experiments.”
“The complexity of our organisation often
means we have to communicate to the
masses vs. communicating clear messaging
to the right audience, this will improve as
we implement a better process for
managing our people data. Change
fatigue is also a challenge, we've had so
much change over the last 3 years people
are growing weary.”
“There is not enough belief in the purpose
this would serve, it can't be expressed in
extra income..”
“Lack of exec buy in, not enough face to
face comm.”
“Capabilities and talent of our
Communications team.”
“Having everyone on the same level of
technology. Not everyone was given the
tools at the same time. While some are
enjoying the great benefits, others are
frustrated.”
22

23. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
23
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
Lack of buy-in -
Budget, resources,
vision
Leadership does
not value comms
Complex and
siloed
organisational
structure
Capabilities and
talent
Competing
messages and
initiatives
Social, digital &
technology
adoption
Lack of time
Q6: What would you say is the biggest obstacle to
improving the performance of your organizational
communications?

24. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Q7: Finally, compared to the strategic goals for the
year, how would you rate the overall performance
of your organization in the last 12 months?
24

25. #11ways Benchmarking Report
Michael Ambjorn, Dana Poole and Stephen Welch
Copyright
25
 A note about how to use this content:
 This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-
NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. In plain language
this means you’re free to:
 Use the outlined concepts – including excerpts in blog posts,
presentations, podcasts etc. as long as you share alike – and attribute
accordingly.
 If you want to use it commercially, please get in touch with the authors.

26. More about #11ways
Twitter
Search for hashtag #11ways
Articles
2015
• 11ways Part 2
• We are all storytellers
• 11 ways to get comms wrong and achieve
underperformance
• Do you really make a difference?
• Are you dazzled by comms bling?
• 11 ways strategic communications impacts
organizational performance
2014
11 ways session at IABC 14
Do you create or destroy value?
Video
26
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