Internal Communications Strategy - How HR teams build a culture that lasts

Ask most leadership teams whether they communicate well and the answer will be yes. Ask their employees and you'll often hear something different.

That gap is where culture is won or lost, and it's why internal communications deserves far more attention than it usually gets. On the latest episode of the Recruitment and Beyond podcast, Julie Moulsdale, founder of Perceptive Communicators, shared what 20 years of advising organisations has taught her about communication, trust and the employee experience. For HR managers trying to build a culture that holds up under pressure, I found her advice is refreshingly practical.

So I wanted to pull together the practical lessons from that conversation. If you'd rather hear it first-hand, the full episode, The Comms Behind Great Culture, is available here.

What is internal communications?

Internal communications is how an organisation shares information with its people, and how it listens to them in return. It covers everything from leadership updates and change announcements to one-to-ones, team meetings and employee surveys.

An internal communications strategy is the plan that ties all of that to what the business is trying to achieve. Done well, it builds trust, keeps people engaged and makes your employer brand credible. Done badly, or not at all, it leaves a gap that people fill with speculation.

Internal communications is not an afterthought.

The most common mistake Julie sees is internal communications being bolted on at the end. Decisions get made, plans get signed off, and only then does someone ask how it will be shared.

By that point, the opportunity to bring people along has often passed. When communication is built in from the start, employees can become genuine ambassadors for the organisation, even during difficult periods. When it isn't, they become an audience left to work things out for themselves.

For HR, this means having a seat at the table early. If a restructure, a policy change or a new strategy is on the way, the communication plan should be developed alongside it, not after it.

You can't over-communicate during change

Leaders hear about a change dozens of times before it's announced. By the time it reaches the wider business, they assume everyone already understands it. They don't.

Julie's view is simple: if it's an important message, decision or change, it is almost impossible to over-communicate. The people delivering the message have context that others in the business simply don't have.

A useful test is to ask: if I were hearing this for the first time, what would I think? Writing for the recipient rather than the sender changes the tone, the detail and the frequency of what gets shared.

Silence creates a vacuum

One of the reasons leaders hold back is that they can't share everything. Faced with incomplete information, many decide it's better to say nothing than to say the wrong thing.

The trouble is that people fill the gap themselves. Speculation spreads, and the organisation loses control of the message.

It's perfectly acceptable to say: this is what we can share right now, and we'll update you as soon as we know more. The key is following through. Every time that promise is kept, trust grows.

Behaviour beats values every time

Most organisations have a set of values. Fewer have values that people actually recognise in their day-to-day work. Julie's point is that behaviour trumps words every single time. Values shouldn't be handed down from the top. People need to be involved in shaping them if they are going to live them.

At Perceptive, the traditional values list was replaced with an "A-Player Manifesto": a one-page document that guides recruitment, client work, one-to-ones and business decisions. Because the team helped create it, it carries weight in a way a poster on the wall rarely does.

For HR managers, the lesson is to make culture tangible. If your values can't be used to make a decision, they probably aren't doing their job.

Internal communications best practice: little and often

There's a temptation to think good internal communications needs a roadshow, a slick weekly CEO video or a new platform. In Julie's experience, little and often works much better.

She also challenges leaders to think about return on time. A video message has its place, but the same time spent walking the floor and talking to people directly is often far more powerful. New chief executives regularly spend their first 90 days listening across the business. The question is whether they're still doing it after 365.

It's also worth remembering that people consume information differently. Not everyone reads the newsletter or watches the update. A mix of channels, with some deliberate overlap, makes sure messages land.

Close the gap between employer brand and reality

In a competitive talent market, employer branding matters. But the brand you promote externally has to match what employees experience internally, because culture is ultimately what people experience every day.

Employees can also be a "secret turbocharger" for your employer reputation. Many don't feel empowered to talk positively about their workplace on platforms like LinkedIn, or don't see it as their role. Giving people the confidence to share authentic stories can be a real competitive advantage when it comes to attracting and retaining talent.

Ask, listen, and act on what you hear

Employees are talking about their experience at work whether you ask them or not. The question is whether you're part of that conversation.

Julie's advice is to ask directly and regularly. Surveys are a good start, but the real insight often comes from getting beneath the surface of the responses. That's where an independent third party can help, because people tend to open up more when they're confident their comments won't go straight back to management. It can take one or two rounds before that trust is fully established.

Two points stood out:

• Don't wait for things to settle. Organisations often want to delay employee research during a period of change, yet that's exactly when feedback is most valuable.
• Don't let it sit on a shelf. The worst thing you can do is run a major piece of research and do nothing with it. People need to see what has changed as a result, and someone needs to be accountable for it.

You won't act on every suggestion, and you don't need to. What matters is that people know they've been heard.

Build goodwill before you need it

Crisis communications might not feel like an HR issue until it suddenly is. Whether it's an employee dispute, a customer complaint or a serious incident, employees are one of the most important audiences in almost every scenario.

Julie identified three common mistakes:

1. Denial. Assuming it will be "tomorrow's chip paper" and hoping the problem goes away.
2. Keeping a low profile. If you haven't built goodwill in the good times, there's none to draw on in the difficult times.
3. Trying to handle it alone. Even experienced leaders struggle to stay objective in the middle of a crisis. An external perspective can be uncomfortable, but it usually leads to better outcomes.

The common thread is preparation. Communicating your successes internally, so employees understand the positive impact the organisation has, is part of building that goodwill in advance.

Three internal communications priorities for HR teams

Asked for her top advice for HR teams looking to strengthen communication, Julie kept it simple:

1. Make communication central, not an afterthought. Build it into processes from the very beginning.
2. Don't be afraid to ask employees what they think. Then showcase and celebrate the good work that's already happening, rather than assuming it will speak for itself.
3. Remember it's a people business. Surround yourself with great people, involve them in decisions, and act on what they tell you.

The bottom line

Culture isn't built through a values statement or an annual survey. It's built through hundreds of everyday conversations, and through an internal communications strategy that helps leaders and HR teams communicate honestly, consistently and with the recipient in mind.

Get the communication right and you build trust. Build trust and you keep your best people, in the good times and the tough ones.

Listen to The Comms Behind Great Culture, the full Recruitment and Beyond episode with Julie Moulsdale.

If you're building a team and want to talk about attracting the right people for your culture, get in touch with our team.