My Top 10 Internal Communications Principles

Midsummer brings those inevitable "best of" lists flooding our feeds, top novels of the century, best ever films, you know the drill. Taking advantage of a quiet moment, I thought I’d add my contribution.

So here are my top ten internal communications principles. What's your top 10? Tell me what I've missed.

1. Demonstrate your business impact. Stop talking about communication and engagement and continually demonstrate how your work drives revenue, retention, and results.

2. Listen don’t talk. It is not enough to ask employees how they feel, to turn the hearing into listening, show you are doing something with what you hear.

3. Create conversations that matter. Design opportunities where employees can genuinely discuss change, ask questions, raise concerns and share ideas, and, crucially, build understanding.

4. We know employees filter messages through the lens of “what does this mean to me”. Help them connect the dots between their role and organisational priorities.

5. Stay professionally uptodate. Our field is evolving rapidly. Will you be able to answer the question about the latest AI announcement? Invest in your learning or risk becoming irrelevant.

6. Employees crave realism. They know what works and what doesn’t, and whether the business is going well or not. Acknowledge challenges, celebrate genuine wins, and avoid relentless positivity (dare I say spin) that nobody believes.

7. Speak truth to power. When you know something won’t work, speak up. Your role isn't just execution, it's strategic counsel. Offer solutions that you know will work.

8. Be timely and show respect. Employees should never learn important information from external sources first. Control your narrative or lose your credibility.

9. Less is more. Be aware of your priorities and the resources available to deliver them. Doing three things brilliantly will always beat doing ten things adequately.

10. Measure what matters. Set measurable outcome-based objectives. Leaders’ won’t care about the output numbers that might be more easily to hand.