All bets are off . . .

As I mentioned in my previous post, I recently spent a day with a big transportation company, taking a hard look at their employee communication programs and vehicles. A third of the day was spent with the content providers who are responsible for getting the communicators information from their different departments.

Another third of the day was spent with the company's executives—including the CEO. And the final part of the day was spent with the communications team, including the vice president, who reports directly to the CEO.

I asked blog readers to bet on which one of those groups was inhibiting good communication the most—the content providers, the executives, or the VP of communication himself.

Well . . . the answer, I guess, is none of the above. I can't blame the content providers, because they are actually into the process. They may not contribute as much as the communicators would like . . . but for a bunch of volunteers, they do a pretty good job.

And I can't blame the VP, because he was willing to go to bat for communications with the CEO—and was working hard to get the company to adopt a more candid, strategic approach to communications.

And I can't blame the 'executives,' as a group, because they were willing to spend a big chunk of the day talking about communication, and I could tell they recognized its value. In fact, the CEO himself never left. He spent four hours with me. He sat in with the content providers and the executives.

And he listened. He didn't fiddle with his blackberry or leave to make calls or stare out the window. He listened. He even—and you won't believe this—stayed for the writing exercises that I put the content providers through.

So, then, who is to blame for the communication lapses in the company—and, I should mention, there are communication lapses in the company. Two major initiatives that will change the face of the company are going largely uncommunicated. Employees are gasping for information, and not getting any.

Why? After a lot of probing and questioning on my part, I uncovered the truth. It's one man. One guy is a human bottleneck. It's the COO—and he's a Cardinal Richelieu-like figure at the company. He doesn't sit on the actual throne . . . but he wields just as much power as the CEO. And as open as the CEO is to candid, strategic communication, the COO is every bit as much against it.

He fights the CEO at every turn. He doesn't think employees should know anything. And guess what? Those two major initiatives I just mentioned? He owns both of them. So he blocks the information from flowing anywhere.

In fact, for the portion of the day where I was talking with executives, we were supposed to have 25 vice presidents and assistant vice presidents in the room. Only 18 showed up. And guess what? All seven of the missing people reported to the COO. Imagine that.

And here's the kicker. Until two years ago, employee communications used to report up into the COO's office. Then it was moved. And the guy is still pissed about it.

It's an ugly situation . . . and I still don't know what to tell my client. Her boss is willing to go to bat for her, but he doesn't want to get in a pissing match with Cardinal Richelieu. (There's a great Richelieu quote about how he dealt with his enemies: 'If you give me six lines written by the most honest man, I will find something in them to hang him.' You want that guy mad at you?).

And while the CEO believes in communication enough to spend most of a day talking about it . . . he probably has to pick and choose his battles with the COO, and he may not want to spend his energy on communications.

This is a tough one. If anyone out there has any advice, I'd love to pass it along to my client.