What is corporate internal communication?
Our work in internal communication goes beyond simply informing: we seek to connect with the people who make up Telefónica, reinforcing their pride in belonging and highlighting the value of being part of this great company.
How important is it?
What isn’t communicated is as if it didn’t exist, so I would dare to say that it’s very important. Furthermore, communication and leadership are the two essential levers for the transformation of the company. We help to create an emotional bond with the people who work here. How well or poorly we do this determines part of the team’s motivation.
What are the main tools you use on a daily basis?
The usual channels we use are email and the corporate social network Workvivo (formerly Workplace). We also have the intranet, SIETE Communicator in Teams, and screens in the buildings. On a very occasional basis, we may send SMS messages to company cell phones or print posters, stickers, etc. and distribute them throughout the buildings. But that’s up to us… in reality, any information you receive as a Telefónica employee is internal communication. That’s a challenge, trying to always address the team in the same way, regardless of where the message comes from.
What professional skills are required?
To highlight four, I would say: the ability to synthesize, empathy, assertiveness, and resilience. The first because in communication, as in many other areas of life, less is more. Empathy because you need to put yourself in the shoes of the person you are addressing so that the message comes across in the best possible way. Assertiveness because you will have to say no a lot. All departments consider their projects to be very important and will want to communicate them with great fanfare, but we have to decide at all times what is communicated and what is not. And resilience because this job can be very frustrating at times. It is common to work for weeks on events or projects that fall through at the last minute, and you have to be able to deal with that.
What are the main profiles of people working in corporate internal communication?
We are a fairly diverse team, ranging from publicists, designers, and marketing specialists to lawyers and, of course, journalists. In Spain, the team currently consists of six people, so we all tend to do a bit of everything. With enthusiasm, motivation, and the right skills, anyone can do it well.
What mechanisms can be used to make it more effective?
The first thing you need is to know and listen to your target audience. It’s essential to know who they are, what concerns them, what they value, and how they behave. The more information you have about your target audience, the better you can tailor your message.
In addition, what we communicate must be simple and useful for the recipient.
The next thing to do is measure, to find out where we are starting from, how we are doing, and what we can improve. Personalization and segmentation are key in communication. One size does not fit all. If I can address you by name, even better. If I can also tell you only what interests you, even better. If I can tell you how you like to hear it, then we are close to excellence. And if I tell you at the exact moment you need to know, then we’ve hit the jackpot. All of the above, which may seem easy, is actually almost impossible to achieve.
What role does the advancement of new technologies play in the tasks of those who work in internal communication?
Perhaps AI is the new technology that has the greatest impact on our field of communication, as it allows us to do things in a much more agile way. For example, if we need to illustrate a communication campaign with an image of a blue elephant surfing, what used to take a designer almost an entire morning can now be done by AI in a few minutes. It is also very useful when summarizing or writing texts, although we always have to review the AI’s proposal, as we provide the appropriate context and tone.
