Question

Topic: Strategy

Communication With Subsidiaries

Posted by Anonymous on 2/9/2009 at 1:05 AM ET 350 Points
I work in the global marketing and communications team of a leading IT services company. The company has many fully\partially owned subsidiaries and also joint ventures. The senior leaders have realized that these subsidiaries and joint ventures are often kept aloof from whatever is happening in the parent organization and thus the employees of these organizations tend to have a lot of apprehensions about the parent organization. To overcome this gap I have been entrusted with the task to find of ways and means of effective communication with the subsidiaries and joint ventures. Please suggest how can the objective of effective two way communication be achieved. The motive is not just to keep them updated but also to encourage them to share their apprehensions, achievements etc.

Thanks !!

Niti
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RESPONSES

  • Posted on 2/9/2009 at 2:22 AM Accepted
    You can start a periodical with the news of the HQ and the subsidiaries aside, this would reflect the equality you are trying to communicate

    also a best practice competition to recognize people's efforts in different scopes of your business, this will get some people interested in sharing their apprehensions and achievements, it should be announced before the time frame of the assessment and it should be done using the local communication team in each subsidiary

    Good luck
  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 2/9/2009 at 8:50 AM Accepted
    Also a wiki on a company intranet (using https://www.wikispaces.com/ for example). Anyone can post. Anyone can respond. RSS feed allows people to be notified on changes.
  • Posted by mauroavello on 2/10/2009 at 6:28 AM Accepted
    It seems to me that you are talking about mistrust in one way or another. There is nothing better to kill a perception than by letting the information flow. However, I think that initially this trust can only be gained face-to-face with any internet collaboration tools; intranet, wiki, blogs, etc, as a way to reinforce this trust.
    You would probably need to do the rounds with these partners explaining to them what the expectations are on both sides; the goals, why the change of heart and, generally, what can they gain from this new collaboration. I would also pick a contact window on each of these companies (with enough authority) so that they become your catalyst for change.
    Keep in mind, however, that if these branches do get involved they probably expect more than just cosmetic changes. Otherwise, next time around it will be twice as hard to overcome this apprehension.
  • Posted on 2/15/2009 at 5:58 PM Accepted
    What about a rewards program? I believe rewards work for a 2 year old, as well as for 90 year old.... For every answer/feedback/comment, etc sent they get some kind of reward (it could be points, products, discounts, $$$, review points, you name it)
    Of course you have to make sure the rewards program complies with company policies, HR,etc. It might take some planning at the beginning, but it should provide you with plenty of information and interest from everybody.
    I agree with mauro in the importance of trust, I would focus on a very simple, but explanatory introduction about the importance of internal communication and how parent company is providing them with useful tools to make the communication process easier
  • Posted on 2/17/2009 at 6:11 AM Member
    Sorry for not replying earlier, I don't know how to get notifications on more reply

    Anyways it is never too late, I understand how reluctant can they be, also on the daily news, I suggest it becomes weekly, people don't read all that, plus you should have some power to force feedback from the subsidiaries management

    About the best practice competition, I am not sure how you would make it in your line of work but I'll give you an example:
    In marketing research, we used to have an annual competition on best researches done, it can be a simple product test that helped a client increase their shares or retain their consumers, or it can be a complicated segmentation study with new techniques, so you put it in IT language and shoot

    Please mail me if you need more clarifications

    Cheers
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