Communication World articles from March 2007

Communication World archives from March 2007

What trust really means.(from the editor)(Editorial)
March 1, 2007... A business leader once told me, "I never want to get too close to my employees. If they fear me, I know I have their respect." I can still hear the alarm that went off in my head. I couldn't disagree more. Not only does fear not build respect,...

Jazz up your career at the IABC 2007 International Conference.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(International Association of Business Communicators)
March 1, 2007... Communicators will have the opportunity to energize their careers while falling in love with New Orleans, Louisiana, when the IABC International Conference comes to the Big Easy 24-27 June. The conference kicks off with a literary and...

Clarification.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(Correction notice)
March 1, 2007... In our review of Leading People Through Disasters ("The Human Side of Crises," CW, January-February 2007), co-author Liz Guthridge was presented as an HR practitioner. To clarify, Guthridge is a consultant in strategic employee and change...

Katrina offers lessons in leadership and communication.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(International Association of Business Communicators)(Brief article)
March 1, 2007... Hurricane Katrina struck the Gulf Coast on 29 August 2005, becoming the costliest and most destructive natural disaster in U.S. history. Almost two years later, the legacy of this storm lives on in New Orleans, Louisiana. At IABC's...

E-mail overload survey strikes a nerve.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(Survey)(Brief article)
March 1, 2007... The results of IABC's survey on e-mail overload, which appeared in the November-December 2006 CW article "Too Much E-Mail!" by Tudor Williams, ABC, and Ryan Williams, have garnered significant interest from the business media. The survey...

Professional communicators will find an advocate in IABC group.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(International Association of Business Communicators)(interview with Michael Zimet of International Business Machines Corp.)(Interview)
March 1, 2007... One of the IABC executive board's initiatives for 2007 is to explore the role of advocacy in the profession and in the association. Michael Zimet, who will lead the group investigating this issue, spent 24 years in communication at IBM and...

Mark your calendar.(inbox: IABC NEWS & EVENTS)(Calendar)
March 1, 2007... 28 March Web seminar: Handling Avian Bird Flu and Other Mass Casualty Situations 28 March-10 April Online course: Designing and Modeling Communication Systems and Infrastructures 29 March Teleseminar: The Human Connection: The Keys to...

Storytelling.(CW BULLETIN)
March 1, 2007... December 2006 | Volume 4, Issue 12 These days, corporations are using the power of stories to help connect employees more closely with the brand, to convey meaning to their customers and to differentiate themselves from the competition....

What makes a story a story?(CW BULLETIN)
March 1, 2007... When I review internal publications, company or product endorsements, case studies demonstrating customer successes, and other print and online communications that purport to convey stories, I find they're often missing crucial story...

Story scrapbooks: tools for engagement.(CW BULLETIN)(Brief article)
March 1, 2007... Story scrapbooks have a dual purpose in organizations: to create a conversation piece that encourages open communication; and to capture key stories, examine the connections between them and transfer knowledge within a group or organization....

Timeless tips for telling stories.(CW BULLETIN)(Brief article)
March 1, 2007... Staff meetings. Project presentations. Company events. Industry conferences. Community gatherings. Training sessions. The list of places to tell stories is as endless as your imagination. Do you need to be a great storyteller to use stories...

Creating corporate histories.(CW BULLETIN)(Brief article)
March 1, 2007... Every company has a story to tell--a story about people and passion, about vision and hard work. A corporate history tells these stories, but it is also a sophisticated marketing tool that presents your message and history in a professional,...

Transparency under attack: before you write off blogs as dead in the water, there is such a thing as a code of ethics in this mercurial space we loosely refer to as buzz marketing.(tech talk)
March 1, 2007... The issue of transparency is increasingly coming under the microscope in the blogosphere, as companies, politicians and even nations address it. It's as if code red has been declared in PR, corporate communication and branding. There's the...

Words of the year: lexicographers and word lovers select the words and phrases that best summed up 2006. Do their choices agree with yours?(editor's angle)
March 1, 2007... With all the hundreds of thousands of words in the English language, can you choose just one word that truly represented the past year? According to U.S. dictionary publisher Merriam-Webster, the 2006 Word of the Year is truthiness. ...

Brand delivery starts at home: authors Sartain and Schumann argue that successful companies develop loyalty among customers by first engaging their employees.
March 1, 2007... "Any business, in any corner of the world, must create an experience to engage its employees before it can expect those employees to deliver the brand to customers. The key to employer brand is tapping the emotional essence of the company and...

What effect do your organization's internal branding efforts have on employee attitudes and behavior?
March 1, 2007... Australia Mergers and acquisitions can create a mismatch between external brand and employee experience. Insurance company QBE Australia Asia Pacific has grown substantially through acquisition and is now focusing on using internal...

Corporate consistency, regional flexibility.
March 1, 2007... In a region of 46 countries, many made up of islands, each marked by a multitude of localized cultures, traditions and languages--not to mention vast economic and technological divides--how does one begin to deliver an effective message within...

Capitalize on local flair: implement global corporate guidelines that make sense for a Latin American workforce.(SPECIAL REPORT: Latin America and the Caribbean)
March 1, 2007... Strong business policies and procedures are sometimes not enough. For Latin America, the question is, How do we turn our "tropical flavor" into "business as usual"? Ideally, today's global companies have well-structured communication...

Politics as unusual: in Jamaica, elections are becoming sensationalistic political spectacles. How can resource-limited organizations get an accurate picture of public opinion?(SPECIAL REPORT: Latin America and the Caribbean)
March 1, 2007... Like it or not, media marketing strategies used in the business and political worlds are becoming more and more similar. Today's political consultants--entrusted with the tricky task of trying to sell politicians and policies to fiche...

Case study: changing financial habits among employees at Scotiabank Mexico.(SPECIAL REPORT: Latin America and the Caribbean)
March 1, 2007... One of the predominant features of the Anglo-Saxon culture, represented on the North American continent by Canada and the U.S., is its long-term focus on achieving financial security through retirement savings and medical insurance....

Open channels: governments have developed ways to communicate with the public. The challenge now is to help citizens find a nonconfrontational way to talk to their governments.
March 1, 2007... In any nation, there must be some form of communication between the unit that governs society and the people who make up that society. It is only when citizens have at least some information about government programs and plans that they can...

Brand rehab: how Sungjoo Group CEO Kim Sungjoo bagged an ailing German luxury brand and resuscitated it for the Asian market.(GESELLSCHAFT 65)(interview with chief executive officer)(Interview)
March 1, 2007... Kim Sungjoo, chairperson and CEO of Sungjoo Group, went from being the queen of South Korea's fashion franchising industry. to the savior of a tattered German brand. She was one of The Wall Street Journal's "Top 50 Women to Watch" in 2004, and...

Power to succeed: BP CIO John Leggate demonstrates leadership mettle by saying "the unsayable".(IABC/Europe and Middle East EXCEL Award)
March 1, 2007... John Leggate of BP PLC found himself one day on the shop floor speaking to tough guys with big muscles about a change program he planned to introduce. "Who in HR made up this idea?" asked one, a welder. "Nobody," Leggate was brave enough to...

A commitment to trust: consultant recounts a storied history of the evolution of workplace trust research.
March 1, 2007... Not long ago, a colleague sent me a two-sentence e-mail with this quote--"'Organizational trust is important because it is linked to the level of employee performance'--Gilbert & Tang, 1998; Heffes, 1999"--and a note saying, "Dick, they are on...

Where we're headed: in advance of a new Research Foundation study, IABC's panel of experts highlights the successes and the challenges for communication departments today.(Discussion)
March 1, 2007... Imagine this scenario: You head a communication department. One day the CEO walks into your office and tells you that the company is initiating a detailed analysis of its overhead functions, including yours. The communication department's...

CVRD strikes it rich: Brazilian mining giant Companhia Vale do Rio Doce digs into its myriad communication efforts and creates a unified approach that delivers a wealth of information to employees.(case in point)
March 1, 2007... For years, Companhia Vale do Rio Dace (CVRD), one of the world's largest metal and mining companies and the largest privately owned company in Brazil, lacked a single internal communication process that would satisfy the demands of its diverse...

Telling a story through human values: subtle gestures and expressions influence the viewer's interpretation by highlighting shared emotions.
March 1, 2007... As a photojournalism teacher, I have always stressed the importance of conveying ideas through pictures that express basic human values--those emotions, beliefs, traditions and knowledge that we share as human beings. Human values should...

Farcus.(Cartoon)
March 1, 2007... "Finally, a photocopier for Post-it Notes." [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

Looking beyond the surface: fresh perspectives bring new insights and ideas to this Mexico City-based communicator.(FWD Consultores )(Interview)
March 1, 2007... In this issue we hear from Maria Jose Gadsden, PR and marketing associate at FWD Consultores in Mexico City. What historical figure do you most identify with and why? It may sound like a cliche, but I actually identify myself with...