In her regular column in the latest issue of Strategic Communication
Management, Angela Sinickas explains a technique that
can be used to predict how rumors might develop on a particular topic.

"When I worked at an HR consulting firm" explains Angela, "a grocery
chain planned to explain its compensation programs for the first time
in a culture where talking about pay had been considered taboo. No
actual changes were planned, other than communication."

Conducting focus groups

"We conducted focus groups to identify what people understood and
misunderstood about their pay, benefits and bonuses. Most employees
had started working at the company in their teen years and had never
worked elsewhere.

"However, in each focus group, a small number of people had worked at
competitors' stores or in other industries. They often mentioned how a
particular benefit or perk was better at a previous employer.

"We observed and noted the types of questions employees asked each
other about this topic. We also had them complete a short survey about
the relative value of their pay and benefits – both before and after
the focus group.

"We learned that opening up discussion about pay made the majority of
employees rate their employer's total compensation program lower by
the end of the focus group than they rated it at the beginning. We
observed first-hand how rumors on this topic would develop in the
overall workforce.

"We were able to use this information to draft a key section in the
communication materials ultimately distributed to employees – a
comparison of each element of the compensation program against those
of other companies in their industry, based on an external
benchmarking study. Doing this prevented people from focusing on just
one element of pay or benefits that might not be as good elsewhere and
gave them a balanced perspective of how the program compared overall.

"When actual rumors began about compensation, employees were able to
see that the few weaknesses of their own program as identified by
their peers were, in fact, disclosed by the company. This gave even
more credibility to the strengths the company put forward, which made
the entire program more competitive overall."

The full article is published in the June/July issue of SCM.

See you next week!

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