How to Communicate with Remote and Unwired Employees Off the Grid: How to Communicate with Remote and Unwired Employees

Panelists Felicia McLemore, APR Global Senior Director Corporate Relations Marriott International, Inc. Shannon Lopez Global Director Internal Communications Marriott International, Inc. Kate McClain President McClain Media LLC Meagan Price Communications Manager Marriott International, Inc. Thanks for joining us! We’d like to introduce ourselves: your moderator for today’s presentation is Felicia McLemore. [Felicia’s bio here]. Your panelists include Shannon Lopez [Shannon’s bio here]; Kate McClain [Kate’s bio] and Meagan Price [Meagan’s bio]

Off the Grid: How to Communicate with Remote and Unwired Employees Session Objectives Examine the evolution of our workplaces and work practices Discuss diversity in the workplace and accommodating the needs of multiple generations while maintaining employee engagement Recognize and understand the struggles of off-the-grid colleagues Group discussion - best practices and innovative solutions for communicating with this audience

Communicating Off The Grid Challenges Abound! To get us warmed up, we’d like to share this YouTube video of how the world looks to those of us who are faced with the challenges of working off the grid every day

Workplace Evolution It’s worth spending a few moments to talk about how the workplace has evolved since the industrial revolution.

Today This probably looks more familiar to most of us. Much of our sales force; those who work from home – or a remote location, such as a coffee shot. Could we see a show of hands of those of you who work remotely – at least part of the time? Gallup statistics estimate at least 37% of US workers telecommute – some on a regular basis.

Generational Diversity in the Workplace We don’t like to paint groups of our colleagues with a broad brush, but since we’re talking about changes in our workplaces and work practices, we would be remiss if we didn’t mention the fact that most of us our working with four – sometimes five generations.

Engaging Difficult-To-Reach Audiences We’re interested in knowing how many of you are responsible for engaging employees who don’t sit in front a computer all day – likely, don’t have a company email address, and probably don’t have easy access to your company’s intranet.

Group Discussion: Best practices, tips, tricks and communication magic When possible, face-to-face is still always best Live and broadcast Town Hall Meetings Live and virtual lunch and learn meetings Spend time with your off-the-grid colleagues Where are the gaps? What are most effective ways to engage them? Though face to face communicating is and probably always will be best – it’s the most consuming and therefore, expensive solutions. Town Hall Meetings are fabulous, especially when the message comes from the top dogs. Lunch box – or departmental meetings is an alternative, but cascading information is legendarily inaccurate. As a communications professional, make it your business to do some primary research – in order words, ask your remote and field employees about what works and what doesn’t. And lucky for us, we have Meagan Price here with us today to offer some insight.

Group discussion: Best practices, tips, tricks and communication magic Make the message sizzle Make it worth the employees’ time Make it worth the company’s investment Other considerations: Multiple languages Multiple geographical locations Company culture, standards and policies As communicators, we have a responsibility when engaging employees to make sure that the time amount of time we’ve called them away from a task is commensurate with the value the message provides

Group discussion: Tips, tricks, best practices and communication magic Make technology work for you. Consider using: Mobile devices, apps Skype for Business Text, Twitter – other social media solutions Electronic message boards Third party

How do you know you are successful? From the beginning, set goals Use benchmarks Collect feedback - talk to your audiences Do some primary research – in order words, ask your field employees what they think?

Questions and Discussion We want to hear from you. What are your thoughts? Questions?