Effective internal communication is the backbone of any successful organisation. It keeps teams aligned, engaged, and informed—whether they’re in the office or working remotely.
In today’s fast-paced work environment, effective internal communication is more than just sending emails or hosting meetings—it’s about building bridges between teams, fostering collaboration, and creating a shared sense of belonging, values and purpose. With so many factors and desired outcomes to consider when launching an internal comms strategy, it certainly felt like a daunting task when we first started on this journey, but also one we now feel is making good progress. At eQS we are strong believers in sharing knowledge and best practice. So, how did we create our internal comms strategy and how is it going? It’d be great to hear your thoughts and ideas as well. Follow our LinkedIn page to stay in touch with us.
How our staff shaped our internal comms strategy
When shaping our internal comms strategy, it was important that we heard from the most important people – our employees. Each year we conduct an employee engagement survey where our people can share their opinions on how we are doing as an organisation. Part of the survey asks their opinion on the current internal comms strategy as well as things they would like to see included in the future. The results of this year’s survey highlighted a desire for more content about:
Company values
This year we held the first Group Values Awards under our new company values:
Employees were encouraged to nominate colleagues who they felt had carried out work that demonstrated one of these six values. This saw high levels of engagement with nearly 60% of staff receiving a nomination. To help shape the group values aspect of our internal comms strategy we will be celebrating winners and nominees throughout the year.
This provides extra recognition but also encourages our people to engage in the Group Values Awards and nominate any colleagues now that they feel are embodying the group values.
People stories
With nearly 100 employees spread across the UK from as far north as Newcastle to as far south as Plymouth it can naturally be difficult to know who is who, outside of your own team, and what their role entails. To help bridge this gap throughout the year we have been shining the spotlight on several members of staff. Not only does this help clarify a person’s role but we also include information that helps people to get to know them on a personal level, which supports people in building real connections and sparking conversations.
DEI (Diversity, Equity and Inclusion)
Inclusion is at the forefront of everything we do at eQS, (it’s in our name!) We therefore wanted an internal comms strategy that reflected this in an engaging and informative way, as well as helping to build our awareness and understanding of topical issues of today. This led to us focusing on the nine characteristics that are legally protected by the Equality Act as our internal comms inspiration.
A brief history on the nine protected characteristics
In 2010 the Equality Act replaced previous anti-discrimination laws with a single Act, making the law easier to understand as well as strengthening protection in some situations. The Act sets out the different ways in which it is unlawful to treat someone. As part of the Act nine protected characteristics were identified. These are:
The first quarter of our internal comms strategy
Disability History Month fell within our first quarter of 2024 and with disability support being a huge part of what we do we felt this was a great place to start.
If you follow us on LinkedIn, you’ll have probably seen our monthly disability role models where we shine the light on individuals who are contributing to the topic of disability.
For our internal comms strategy we built on this and created content that celebrated activists and achievements linked to the protected characteristic we are focusing on as well as inspiring voices to brighten up social media feeds. This not only informs our people on that particular protected characteristic, but it also encourages engagement with employees adding to the conversation and suggesting further trailblazers / events / achievements surrounding that particular protected characteristic.
The next three quarters of our internal comms strategy
All internal comms content is designed to encourage conversations across teams, whether that be congratulating colleagues or contributing further recommendations of activists, advocates or social media accounts related to the particular protected characteristic we are focusing on.
I asked our Head of Marketing and Comms Bryony Steventon for her take on the purpose of our internal comms strategy, she said: “Our strategy is built around a few key themes, but at its heart, it’s about sparking interaction and empowering everyone to take ownership of the channel. We want people to feel confident and comfortable contributing.
“We’re already seeing fantastic engagement, with team members from across the company responding to the themes being shared and – more importantly – starting their own conversations. These range from discussing new government policies to sharing personal milestones, like someone welcoming a new baby, and even light-hearted moments like weather-watch updates (‘who else saw snow this morning?’).
“What’s been truly inspiring is watching connections form between people who might not cross paths in their day-to-day roles. That’s the real purpose of internal comms – bringing us closer together and making us a stronger team.
“Remote work can at times feel isolating, but when we build real relationships within our teams, it reminds us that we’re never alone, no matter where we’re working.”
An effective internal comms strategy is inclusive. It doesn’t matter where in the country you are or if you are in the office or working from home you should be able to learn something and / or engage with all the content. By having this in the forefront of every piece of internal content we produce we hope our people feel inspired as well as a true sense of belonging at eQS.
This news article was written by Richard Keeling, eQS Group Marketing Manager.
Richard is responsible for leading the development of marketing and communications content, internally and externally across our group of companies, including the management of marketing and communications campaigns, webinars and events.