When writing a communication plan, what are the elements that should be included? How will your plan look and what are the important information that need to be highlighted in your strategy?
While plans, outlines and formats can vary, here are some of the important details that you need to include in any internal communication strategy template:
What You Need to Address
There are several points that you need to address in any plan, including:
- Where you are in your workplace communication right now.
- Where you want your communication to be, or your objectives.
- How you plan on getting to your objectives.
- How long will your plan take, and why you think it will take as long as you think it will.
- What is involved in your plan.
- Why you think your chosen approach or methodology is the best one.
- How you know you have reached your objectives.
Be Clear About Your Purpose
When coming up with your ultimate purpose for coming up with a communication plan, remember to always be clear. Be clear about which area of the organization your plan will affect, how you believe your plan will enhance and boost employee engagement and morale, how the actual plan and internal communication strategy template are aligned with your company culture and vision, and others.
No matter how you answer any of the questions above, what you must always remember is that at the heart of any communication plan is your workforce. What do you want them to think, say, feel, or do following your plan? What are the resources and costs that you need to take into consideration once you push through with your plan? What will the end result of your plan look like?
Recommended Format and Length
When it comes to format and length, plans may vary. It will depend on the protocol of the company, and the typical type of presentation and format it has opted for.
However, if you want to create your own internal communication strategy template, take into consideration its accessibility and ease of navigation. In this case, a Microsoft Word or PDF file would be recommended.
When it comes to length, you may find yourself opting anywhere from 10-15 pages, depending on your plan. While some may want to go the shorter route to make sure that the plan is read, some may want to do longer plans because more information will be needed to back up recommendations.
The Template
When writing your plan, here is an internal communication strategy template that you can use:
- Title – This self-explanatory section is useful for internal reference, especially if you are suggesting more than one plan.
- Issue or Purpose – This is where you explain how your plan aligns with the objectives of the business.
- Executive Summary – This is the overview of the plan, which includes the resources you need, timeline, and others.
- Structure – Where the company is regarding communications in the workplace, where it wants to be, how it plans to get there, and how the organization will know that it is able to achieve its objectives.
- Objective – This is the reason why the plan was developed and what it is trying to achieve.
- Measurement – This features how the strategy will measure success.
- Key messages – This is for the whole organization, or particular parts of the company, and should be kept short, succinct and consistent.
- Audience Segmentation – This is the group you are planning to communicate with.
- Channels – Here is the section wherein you detail the methodologies and platforms you are planning to use to implement your plan.
- Approval Process – This includes who the authors of the plan are, and who needs to sign off on the plan.
- Timeline – This is particularly helpful as it outlines when tasks should be done, and includes important dates and events.
- Appendix – This includes additional information that aren’t in the main document but are also relevant to your strategy.
