Devolution. You heard about it but do you know what it really means for you and your area? If you’re a local government communicator it’s going to become a pretty big deal.
by Darren Caveney
Read moreabc – the 3 drivers of great motivation
What gets you up in the morning? What really energises you? Know that feeling? That’s motivation.
By Carole Appleby
Read moreit’s a big ask. could we be cheeky and ask for your vote?
We’ve been shortlisted in the super prestigious Digital Leaders 100 for 2016. We’re rather chuffed. And we’re asking, well begging, for your vote…
by Darren Caveney
Read more5 gems of learning from winning communicators
The curtain has finally fallen on the UnAwards15. What have we learned? And what next?
By Darren Caveney
Read morecommunicating in a digital world: from social media to virtual reality – and why you still just need a bloody good comms strategy
Good communications can be a hard nut to crack. The explosion in digital channels, tool and platforms has provided communicators with brilliant ways in which to engage with customers, residents and patients. Has this made our jobs easier? Well, yes. And no. Which is why a good strategy is more important than ever.
By Darren Caveney
Read moresurviving and thriving: how managing stress can make you a better, happier communicator
From time to time it really is necessary to take some time out to concentrate on you. It's easier not to, and most of us don't, but it will catch up with you in the long run and trip you up if you're not careful. An all new workshop aims to help you manage stress, change and work pressures effectively to ensure that you can deliver your creative best and not go home from work unhappy after troubles, tears and toil.
By Carole Appleby
Read moreit’s the most wonderful time of the year: unawards 2015
There was real celebratory feel about the UnAwards15, which we’re pretty pleased about because that’s exactly what we hoped to achieve.
The UnAwards15 saw 140 colleagues from across the industry descend on the very cool Everyman Cinema in Birmingham last Thursday. The mood was one of big event excitement - Christmas party meets trip to a posh cinema mixed with lashing of great communicators celebrating one another’s work.
Holding the UnAwards at Christmas is deliberate too – we wanted to add a little festive sparkle to the proceedings.
We’re a tad biased but we felt the whole day was a little bit special.
Sitting watching the fabulous Planes, Trains and Automobiles with what felt like a great big group of pals was pretty amazing. The film had a whole bunch of relevant messages and takeaways (and if you have ever watched the movie remember – ‘never assume you are cuddling a pillow’)
#unawards15: a public vote, the shortlist and attending one cool event
The #UnAwards15. It's a chance to celebrate some fabulous work and people across our industry. There's lots to tell you so read on...
Wow.
We are just getting our breath back from working our way through the mountain of UnAwards entries we’ve received. And we thank each and every one of you for that.
The standard of your entries this year is very high and it has been fascinating looking through your work - the challenges you face and the creative solutions you have found to tackle them. We’re impressed.
We have entries from as far afield as Norway. And, interestingly, the top four most popular categories were ‘best creative comms’, ‘best internal comms’, ‘best use of video’ and ‘best low cost/free work’. The creativity and sheer breadth of your work has been a real treat to be able to delve into.
Shortlisting...
communications academy 2015 - why you should be there
Next week hundreds of communicators from local and central government as well as other parts of the public service will gather over three days in Coventry for the second Public Service Communications Academy. The event, which is being organised by LGcommunications and GCS, is the most significant local government communications event of the year.
by Cormac Smith
The theme of this year’s Academy is set around the future of public service communications, the challenges we face and our response to those challenges.
The agenda this year includes some of the best practitioners from the public and private sector. We will also be joined by a number of influential leaders from the public sector including Solace president, and Chief Executive of Birmingham City Council, Mark Rogers and a one of Whitehall’s most outspoken civil servants, Louise Casey CB, will give a view from Whitehall talking about how effective comms needs to be at the heart of meeting the current challenges.
talking business – are you missing out on great stories about local growth?
A question:
Encouraging local growth: who is responsible for 56% of the sole contacts your council has with its business customers?
Answer
Your regulatory teams.
If you didn’t know this, you could be overlooking a great opportunity to engage with your business customers.
And you could be missing an important narrative about how your authority is working for economic growth and local prosperity – a story your council leaders dearly want to tell.
Are you clear how your regulator colleagues can give businesses the confidence to grow by helping them comply with the law?
What are regulators talking to your business customers about?
And what are your business customers saying to them?
For an already stretched communications team you might be wondering what you can do to make the most of this opportunity and why this should be a priority.
Here’s where to start: You are invited to attend an all-new workshop in Coventry on 10 November at the three-day LGcomms/Government Communications Service Academy.
know someone brilliant? nominate them and make their day
We know that a common complaint from comms folk, and others for that matter, is a lack of recognition for their work.
Whether it’s a brilliant campaign, managing communications through a crisis or just turning up every day of the year and being the best you can be it’s not a lot to ask to get the odd ‘well done’ or ‘thank you’.
But it doesn’t happen often enough and that is the ultimate reason behind the comms2point UnAwards 15. To shine a light on the colleagues proudly flying comms flags across the sectors.
Now there’s only one thing better than being shortlisted for an award and that’s being nominated by someone else for an award. It’s a special thing. It means you’ve caught someone’s eye, demanded their attention or impressed them with your creativity, doggedness, enthusiasm and skills.
Know someone like that? Then why not nominate them in the UnAwards 15.
All you need to do is complete this dead easy entry form here.
the UnAwards are back
Following their huge success and popularity in 2014, the comms2point0 UnAwards return on 3 December 2015, even bigger and better than last year but still remaining true to their original ethos.
The UnAwards are our opportunity to showcase great work and celebrate a hugely creative and dedicated community.
Why ‘UnAwards’, you ask? Well they’re a deliberate alternative to the £300-a-pop, black tie, swanky London hotel event awards machine which exists in our industry.
That’s not a slight on these events – if you have been to one of them, and won an award in the process, you’ll have felt pretty good about the whole thing.
But for many the cost has become prohibitive. This is making the awards landscape a bit, well, ‘exclusive’.
That’s not how we like to do things. We’re more Sundance Film Festival than Oscars Ceremony.
The UnAwards are accessible to the entire comms, pr, marketing and digital community and, importantly, will recognise the contributions of colleagues across the sectors for their creative endeavours over the past 12-months.
the weird and wonderful watching habits of the comms and digital community
The Twitter community is one of the greatest research resources in the world. If you need to know something, just ask Twitter. The results never cease to amaze.
I have watched a lot of TV in my life. And I mean a lot. I don’t mean the middle of the road twaddle that gets served up in the name of entertainment and puts me off ever checking the TV listings. No, what I mean are the real quality TV shows whose watching via ‘boxsets’ has become a bona fide pastime.
I have seen all of the classics. But now I am adrift and in need of something new to get into.
So I was after some recommendations and what better way than to ask the rather marvellous comms2point0 followers to chip in. And boy did you respond, with over 40 suggestions emerging.
And if you also fancy checking out something new this is a pretty great list from which to choose.
So what did we learn?
Well we learned that Paul Masterman’s favourite shows are Bullseye and Nogin the Nog. Well, “you can’t beat a bit of bully”.
Seeing the Brummie classic, Crossroads, on the list was a tad unexpected.
what makes a great post? learning the lessons from four years of comms2point0
We know that writing for the web is different. But what helps to make a blog post fly? Here are five simple tips to help you write your next masterpiece.
We’ve put up over 700 posts on comms2point0 over the past four years and leaned an awful lot along the way.
They cover a wealth learning, ideas, campaigns and case studies from colleagues across the communications and digital community
I have read every single one of them.
I have also monitored each one to assess what works best in terms of views, comments and shares, as well as what doesn’t work so well.
So if you’re writing with a digital audience in mind here are five simple lessons that may help you along the way to writing your next post…
awards and that loving feeling
A smidge of recognition can spark all sorts of positive vibes into a team. So why do we so rarely do it?
Last week I was fortunate to attend the UK Public Sector Communications Awards and together with a rather brilliant bunch of colleagues pick up an award. It was a reminder of how an award nomination or win can provide a welcome and invigorating dose of feel good factor. A little bit of that loving feeling, even to folks who have been involved in the industry for a long, long time.
I stopped entering awards a few years back for a number of reasons. You don’t need award judges to tell you when you’ve delivered good work, in the same way that you don’t always need a kick up the backside when you know you’ve made a mistake at work. You instinctively know these things and learn from them. But sometimes you work on a project that you know is so good it needs to be shouted about so that your colleagues can receive 15 deserved minutes in the spotlight.
branding: a simple truth
There are professional lessons all around us, literally on tap every day if you look hard enough - even on a trip to the seaside.
I love ice cream. I’ve tried them all. Compared and contrasted and, in my own head at least, decided which are the best.
The Italians are masters of ice cream. But the best of the lot is a British brand.
What adds to their appeal is the masterly way in which this product is branded. So simple, so clean, so stylish and with echoes of its past. It perfectly complements the product. And that’s the trick with branding.
The company is called Hockings, and it you’re a visitor to North Devon you may have sampled their fine good. That’s not a typo either – it's ‘good’, singular. Because this product is so good it comes in only one flavour – vanilla.
It’s been made in Appledore by the same family since 1936 and their small fleet of branded vans has been travelling the North Devonian coastline selling their vanilla-only product to locals and visitors alike for nearly 80 years.
why internal comms needs more love
Over the past five-years, through comms2point0, we’ve had a unique and rather privileged opportunity to watch the world of communications evolve.
We’ve seen first-hand how digital has become the dominant area of growth for many organisations.
We've also watched as internal comms has failed to keep pace. And for some it is languishing.
This view is backed up by our own research and anecdotally through chats with comms colleagues across the UK. Internal communications is regularly cited as the area of communications causing most concern.
Of course, this isn’t true of all organisations but it does appear to be the case for many.
How does your organisation measure up?
into the confectionery stall and out again
Like many people I was sad to hear of the death of cricket commentator Richie Benaud on Friday.
Richie Benaud defined cricket commentary for my generation and I’ll always remember his rich words during that iconic summer of 1981 and the greatest test series I think ever took place - Botham’s Ashes.
But it was Richie Benaud’s articulate, measured, soothing descriptions of events taking place on the pitch that elevated the games from brilliant to unforgettable.
And it spawned my favourite piece of sporting commentary ever when he described a huge six from Ian ‘Beefy’ Botham against a flagging Australian side:
“Don’t even bother looking for that, let alone chasing it. It’s gone straight into the confectionery stall – and out again.”
It’s been a much repeated quote since his passing but those who were around at the time didn’t need a reminder, it was tucked away in the memory bank for life. A truly brilliant and totally unplanned line.
To me he was just an incredible communicator and storyteller.
cherish the things you love for one day they will be gone
There’s a certain age and point in your life when you begin to reflect on things that little bit more than you did in your care-free twenties…
I’ve reached that point.
Reflecting.
These reflections include work life and personal life and that’s a good and natural thing. Questioning what you’ve achieved and delving a little deeper into what you really want to do with the rest of your life.
And events which occur in our personal lives add to this and can't help but remind you that nothing lasts forever.
your ‘cut out and keep' guide to saying NO to daft requests
No can be the hardest word. But often the kindest. Here's a cut and out and keep guide to saying no when you really do need to politely shake your head at someone you work with...
Read more