U-LEAD with Europe held an info session on the principles of building internal communications in local self-government bodies. Experts from Internews-Ukraine NGO — Diana Ishchenko, Diana Ihnatenko and Milena Komar — worked with the municipalities.
“Today’s event is developed based on our last year’s experience with the training initiative on the development of communication plans. Municipalities show great demand for high-quality internal communication to ensure the effective performance of certain tasks. Having studied this issue in detail, we saw a pressing need to systematise communication processes between certain departments and employees of local self-government bodies. That is why an event on a similar topic is being held, offering its participants tools and knowledge that will help them develop high-quality internal communication,” said Halyna Khrushchak, Head of the Working Group on Communication and Head of the Regional Office of U-LEAD in the Lviv Oblast.
According to Diana Ishchenko, Creative Director of Internews-Ukraine, internal communication is a process of interaction and communication within the team, and its effectiveness can be improved if you know how to use the necessary tools.
She told the participants of the event about the basic principles of internal communications and explained their role in the overall management system of local self-government bodies:
“The cornerstone of the development of internal communications is the organisation’s mission. A mission is a clearly worded reason for the existence of an organisation that defines its expected impact on society. Basically, every organisation has a mission within which it operates, including local self-government or the public sector.”
The expert emphasised the main differences between the mission and the goal of the organisation’s activity, noting that the goal is more specific, time-bound and measurable. The participants were introduced to the international best practices of creating missions for local self-government bodies.
The expert presented studies showing that effective internal communications could increase team performance by 20–25%.
“If organisations have a streamlined internal communication system, they are 3.5 times more likely to achieve success and ensure smooth performance. High-quality communication directly affects the results we will achieve with our teamwork.”
Diana Ishchenko spoke about the differences between a group and a team, stressing that a group means a gathering of people who coordinate their work, and a team means a group of people united by a common goal.
According to her, the internal communication system consists of many components, including meetings with the management, exchanging data between departments, emails from colleagues, informal communication or personal communication with colleagues. She spoke in detail about the basics of business etiquette for online correspondence and the structure of emails.
Milena Komar, Communications Expert at Internews-Ukraine, addressed services that can be used for productive team interaction.
According to her, when choosing a service for communication, you should pay attention to its level of security and data protection, especially now, given frequent cyber attacks on state or other services.
Municipal officials were presented with basic task management software, which will help to clearly plan the activities of certain departments and identify responsible persons.
In a separate section, we addressed the use of internal communication of the team of various information resources and analysed popular messenger apps for their level of digital security for internal communication.
At the end of the event, the experts together with the participants discussed tools for monitoring and evaluating communication.