Now THIS is a blog post! Rock on!

You have, in five short paragraphs, described all the streams of information entering an employee's mind. It's hard to say on any given day which one might weigh in most strongly. So you're right, at least when it comes to communicating with employees: lots of internal communication stuff doesn't take a rocket scientist.

UNLESS, of course, the communication is trying to put forward B.S. to counter what the employees REALLY know from all those data streams. Then it gets difficult. And I've done it myself, mea culpa: gotten so sucked in to the tasks and deadlines and strategic plans that I forgot to ask myself if it was worthwhile or just bullshit. And if it's bullshit, do the execs KNOW it's bullshit or have they been sucked into the same mind-numbing vortex as I?

How do I fight this? I remind myself to be humble; I don't save lives or lead a nation. I do what I know as well as I can. And I try to step back occasionally--as you did in this post--to see reality as it looks from there.

To me, Jane, the best test is for the employee communicator to ask him or herself: If I were reading this, would I believe it? Does it lend weight to what I already know is true about this organization?

Or does the message seem, as so much employee communication stuff does, "aspirational"?

And the moment an employee communicator starts to think his or her interests are significantly different from, education greater than, tastes better developed than those of the average employee? As Larry Ragan used to say, "He is in more trouble than he knows."

But isn't thinking we're better than, smarter than, and more in tune than other employees just a downside of having designated "communicators" rather than a CULTURE of communication? If it's my job to "facilitate communication," it means it's NOT the job of the other employees. It means I get to censor some things and promote others; I get to step back and consider the "big picture"; I get to decide what's in the company's and the employees' best interest. The other poor non-communication schlubs just get to pay attention to their world and do their vastly more do-able job.

If there's an entire culture of communication, though, we all do the right things as easily and unconsciously as breathing, on the whole. Every aspect of your data stream works the way it's supposed to. Problems are opened to the light of day and dealt with responsibly. Employees feel that they get the real deal from execs, and they turn around and behave accordingly when they're talking to their neighbors.

Utopia? Sure, but we could get a lot closer than we are.

This may shock you, Dave, but I agree with you -- for the most part.

And the reason I mostly agree with you is because every communication audit I've performed for clients has revealed this truth. Employees will find out what's going on -- or what they think is going on, which sometimes isn't accurate -- regardless of whether or not the organization's leaders communicate with them.

Part of the role of communication is to help build a productive working relationship between the organization's leaders and its employees -- a relationship that, hopefully, is built on mutual trust. In order for employees to trust management, they do need to hear what's going on and what's being planned straight from the horses' mouths. If that information is credible, makes sense, jibes with what employees already know from their other myriad sources, then employees might trust management and therefore invest themselves in the organization's effort. If not, then they will probably choose to divest themselves from it, causing all sorts of problems.

And, as Jane points out, another important role of communication is to facilitate the conversations that must take place between leaders and workers -- to create the opportunities, the means, the (pardon me) infrastructure that enables the sharing of knowledge and information. In that way, I believe we ARE able to influence people's behaviors.

Let's not sell ourselves short. No, it's not rocket science, and no, most of us aren't going to save the world through what we do. But let's face it -- many business leaders simply don't understand how to facilitate the exchange of information and knowledge. They don't see why building relationships based on mutual trust is so crucial.

And as long as that is the case, we communicators have a lot of value to offer.

I agree that employees know most everything about the company they work for, but I would argue that precisely BECAUSE they have their own jobs to do, and they are mostly focused on that priority they either don't remember or don't fully notice some of the things they know.

THAT is where I see my role. To highlight and bring back to people's attention things that may help them remember why they can be proud of the company we all spend a LOT of hours at every week. To make certain that they do in fact know what they think they know. Because I have certainly had personal experience THINKING I know all about something, and then a single brief incisive comment from someone smacks me right in the face with how dumb I actually was.

Not that I'm suggesting employees are dumb, I'm absolutely not, but we all have a tendancy to get really focused on some things and therefore not really see and hear other things. With the right kind of simple, honest "highlighting" of bits of information they may not have noticed, we communicators can help with that.

Jane is right, it's not brain surgery, but I do think we can make a difference in our little corner of the world. Hell, if we can't then I've REALLY been wasting my time the last 15 years and that would be depressing!

Jane, Robert, Kristen--I agree with you 100% when you describe the good and important work communicators CAN and MUST do. (And--let's give management some credit--were more or less hired too do.)

I think it's important to keep this in mind, though, so that we focus sharply our incredibly limited resources on doing what we can (and not what we can't).

May I add that I love it when the comments are better than the blog item itself? I get this feeling that others are doing my work for me. Thanks, "others"!

Feel free to share a portion of your paycheck, David. ;-)

Seriously, that's what a good blog entry does -- elicits thoughtful comments from readers so we all end up learning something from each other.

Plus it's freakin' FUN.

I look at my job differently...I think my goal should be to connect the employees to one another - telling their stories, reminding them of why they do what the do - much more than communicating what administration has in mind. Maybe I'm missing that "strategic" chip in my brain, but that's just how I roll.

Well, Eileen, I think your focus is a much-overlooked job of communicators. As I often say, "Since when has management struggled to find a way to tell employees what's on its mind?"

But management struggles everywhere to do so in a way that encourages employees to actually hear and accept and respond intelligently.

I do think that's a big part of our job, though as you point out, not our only job.