New Frontiers in Employee Communications:
Current Practices and Future Trends
2004
THE
CHANGING
NATURE OF
EMPLOYEE
COMMUNICATIONS
EMERGING
TRENDS IN
THE NEW
COMMUNICATIONS
PARADIGM
SURVEY
FINDINGS
ABOUT
EDELMAN’S
EMPLOYEE
ENGAGEMENT
EXPERTISE
04
02
01
01
01
The Changing Nature of Employee Communications
Employees of organizations large and small are constantly inundated with information and opin-
ions about the company for which they work. When forming their own opinions about their
employer, employees are increasingly acting more like traditional consumers – they turn to multi-
ple sources to validate or refute a certain point of view.
In the old employee communications paradigm, corporate communications departments relied
on top-down approaches to reach their employees. In the new, relationship-based paradigm,
employees “ping” sources both inside and outside their organization for information. These
sources include messages from a CEO, a direct supervisor, a company ad in the newspaper, a
neighbor’s comment about the company, a union steward’s opinion, a stock analyst’s report, or
publicity around a corporate sponsorship.
In order for a company to successfully influence the attitudes and behavior of its employees,
internally focused communications programs must treat employees as consumers and rely on a
multitude of sources that employees deem credible. They must also be highly integrated with
externally focused efforts so employees who seek perspectives about the company from outside
sources are greeted with consistent information.
Emerging Trends in This New Communications Paradigm
Edelman, the world’s largest independent communications firm, surveyed communications pro-
fessionals across North America to learn more about the variety of information channels that
companies use to communicate to their employees, as well as to discover how organizations are
handling emerging electronic forms of communications like blogs, wiki and instant messaging.1
Our overall survey findings show:
• Communicators ar