How an organization communicates is a great way to gain perspective into the company culture; take some time to review your communications strategy and compare how closely does it align with corporate values. During my tenure with one company, a line of business was a presenting sponsor for an annual nonprofit event. I received a call one year asking me to cover the event because the most senior executive who normally attended wasn’t attending; the internal comms team no longer had band width to cover the event off so I agreed to do it; not only was it a great way to develop myself, it was the right thing to do for the business.
While the exec is part of the story, they are not the full story. Hundreds of frontline team members worked for weeks on end to ensure this event was a success and let’s not forget the worthy cause itself.. or that the company logo was everywhere as the presenting sponsor. What was so ironic in this situation was how communications + community relations resided under the same exec within a larger org built on serving the community.. yet somehow those values got watered down within this part of the organization and sent a conflicting message for the what company stood for.