It’ll be a seamless transition.

I’ve been the communication officer for a technology organization for about 7 1/2 years and by far, my favorite expression related to announcements about changes to campus technology services is “It’ll be a seamless transition and the end users won’t notice a change.”

The first time I heard this statement, I naively accepted it as fact. Then, for a couple of years, the phrase “yeah whatever” played inside my head when I heard it and then ignored it while preparing internal communiques. Now, when it’ll be seamless is uttered in a meeting/discussion about changes or upgrades to technology services, the recording inside my head is b*lls**t. Calmly, I use my outside voice to say “Have we tested this?”

In general, I find that writing out the details of a change to an IT service usually uncovers something we hadn’t planned. And, most of the time, we can fix that something before the communication goes out. When we talk through the details in advance of a change, sometimes we can include something as simple as you’ll need to restart your computer in our announcements to the campus.

Communicating about techology is not easy – I’ll be saying more about that in future posts.

Going through the motions.

Too often, we go through the motions of asking for feedback from stakeholders and constituents.

I’m glad to report that nearly every campus-wide project or initiative that I’m familiar with included an up-front discussion about giving “everyone” the chance to express opinions and preferences. Sadly, too often, the implied or overtly stated comments during these conversations about involving the campus are:

• We can do a web survey. I guess we need to be able to say that we gave everyone a chance to provide feedback.
• Now that our committee has decided what we’re going to do, we’d like to go ahead and ask people what they think.
• Most people don’t have the expertise to give us suggestions and ideas that are useful.

Okay, even the most expert communicators are sometimes frustrated by feedback. But we also know that somebody might just submit a great idea or offer a much-needed suggestion.

I was cured of any occasional skepticim about the quality of feedback during the W&M web redesign project. After weeks and weeks of reviewing home page designs with a small committee of talented designers and skilled communicators, we unveiled a final mockup for the new W&M Home page. I remember getting an email from a faculty member – she asked if we might consider including a link to our People Search on the new design (Directory in the tactical navigation bar). Duh! – how did we all miss that? And, Man! – she saved us some future embarrassment.

IMHO, soliciting feedback is not to be skipped and not to be undervalued. Broadly soliciting ideas and suggestions is also a way to build consensus among your constituencies; but that’s the topic for a future post.

“Don’t get into a pissing match with a skunk.”

Twenty-five years ago, I had a boss who was a pretty odd duck – I have a lot of great stories about him. But what I remember most was a piece of advice he gave me one day. He said, “Don’t get into a pissing match with a skunk.” I’m pretty sure he didn’t coin the phrase, but it’s where I heard it first.

Serving as the IT communication officer for the past eight years has helped me grow a tough skin. I can pretty much shake off the nasty comments or unfair remarks that are sometimes directed my way. But occasionally, an anonymous blog comment really ticks me off and I’m tempted to use all the creativity and punchy prose I can muster to craft a response.

Before work this morning, I read such a blog comment. Good Susan and Evil Susan were arguing on my shoulders as I drove to work this morning. By the time I was halfway to campus, I had written several great (and sarcastic) blog titles in my head. Even as I parked my car, I thought the answer was to write a post in response to the mean-spirited comment.

By the time I reached my desk, the pissing match advice had made its way into my head and I knew I wouldn’t respond.

And, actually, this is a solid principle for communication professionals. Responding is not always the right action. To correct a factual error? Yes, respond. To correct a misunderstanding? Yes, respond. To get psychological satisfaction? “Don’t get into a pissing match with a skunk.”

NO! not keystone cops again

It’s true: a campus-wide project requires a coordinated set of communication activities. Too often on our campuses, we decide to get feedback at the end of a process (yep, your committee is about to make a decision and you need to be able to say you asked people what they thought). Or, you need to provide updates on your progress, so you have a bunch of people doing a bunch of communication-like stuff in a random and ineffective way.

When you get right down to it, people want to be informed and they usually want to be involved.  In my experience, the best way to communicate about web redesigns (or any other currently undisclosed initiative under consideration on a gem of a campus in Virginia) is to build a relationship with stakeholders and constituencies.

Here’s what you do:

• You communicate early and often. When you do, you establish trust and they hang with you for the tough and sensitive decisions.
• You divulge the good, the bad, and the ugly. When you do, you end up educating your constituents; not only that, they respect you for the candid approach.
• You take the time to explain the complexity. When you do, you make it clear that your task is not as straightforward as it appears and they are glad you’ll be the one who has to lead the effort or make the final choice.
• You tell them in a lot of different ways – you hit ‘em in the campus newspaper, the website, the listservs and whatever other glorious combination of communication vehicles you know about.

I presented these thoughts at a meeting on campus today and it went over pretty well. Left out the reference to groups making lots of mistakes after a great deal of energy and activity, and the lack of coordination among the members of the group. But I’m saying it here:

DON’T play Keystone cops. It’s tiresome and doesn’t work.

My present state of mind.

I had a lot of fun writing a response to Voltaire Miran’s Proust Questionnaire. My reflections on communication for W&M’s web redesign project appeared on the mStoner blog.

Like College Web Guy, I am encouraged that serious conversations about content development are taking place more frequently on our campuses.

Don’t make me read about it in the newspaper.

Why don’t we enlist the people who learn, teach and work on our campuses as partners in the communication strategy? Why is it that good news, bad news, plans, and priorities of the university often appear in newspapers before the internal audience “knows?” After all, a strong internal communication program means that your faculty, staff and students are better equipped to deliver your message.

Think about it. Your faculty, staff and students get the chance to talk about you – locally, nationally and internationally. I am regularly consulted informally about a W&M-related topic – in the grocery store, at the dentist’s office, or like today, while getting my hair cut. Consider that our faculty and staff travel regularly and our students go home to their own communities and often attend international universities – all chances to spread the message (if they have it). Realize how facebook, blogs and other social communities could multiply (almost instantaneously) the numbers of individuals who read what our traditional university PR outlets releases only to static print and web home pages.

We can all figure out the cumulative effect of missed opportunities to, at a minimum, reinforce the goals of our campuses. But here’s something else to think about: when my first update about an important happening at my university is delivered to me at the same time as the guy next door, I may be inclined to add a snarky comment when informally asked.

my neighbor: “So what’s going on at W&M? I just read an article about X.”

me: “You know as much as I do. I heard about it the same way you did – through this morning’s paper.”

It’s what I do.

Some people choose a career path early enough to use their undergraduate education as preparation. Others, use the liberal arts foundation and job-based opportunities to guide their path. I guess I fit the others category.

For years, I did what could generally be called communication work; but only recently do I use my outside voice when describing my field of work as communications. Over my nearly 20 years in higher education, I’ve watched from afar and from up close the intentional and unintentional communication methods on our campuses.

Effective communication requires planning, attention to detail and often, courage. I’ll use this blog for my personal reflections on why communication matters and how to do it well. I’ll also muse about why so few people are good at it.

This is it by the way – my first real post.

Coming Soon: my first real post

I’ll use this blog to say what I think about communication in colleges and universities.