Communications Lab

British Gas – All On The Same Page

The All On The Same Page communication programme was developed and delivered in a 10-week timeframe to respond to this challenge. The objectives were

1 Help people understand the ‘One British Gas’ vision, values, strategy and brand promise.

2 Clarify the Cardiff Centre of Excellence role and position within ‘One British Gas’.

3 Help people understand the part they play in these changes and drive the behaviour changes required to make ‘One British Gas’ a success.

4 Involve and engage people in the approach.

5 Measure success of programme in terms of:

a) Movement against the Commitment Curve.

b) Employee Engagement

c) Customer Satisfaction (Net Promoter Score (NPS) – the industry standard measure for customer satisfaction).

A ‘big picture’ visual story and creative was developed which formed the “hub” of the All on the Same page programme, with the other tactics as the“spokes”.  The big picture was the tactic that translated the strategic thinking into an accessible visual metaphor for the audience and provided a useful tool for the management community to use.  At the centre of the “big picture” messages was the British Gas brand.

In order to ensure that the visual story was accepted and used, a series of stakeholder communication sessions were held. Getting ownership for translating the strategy into intended behaviour change was a critical part of the programme.

We then worked on a series of activities to make the project more than merely delivering messages, but to ensure it was about changing behaviour and increasing engagement across. We worked with three groups of people to increase engagement skills and understanding of the “All onthe Same Page” project and messages.

• The engagement champions – Firstly 12 people were selected using role profiles to perform a new role (20% of their day job) and training kicked to help develop their understanding and skills around employee engagement.  They then were tasked to support the programme, but their role went beyond that and they have gone on toprovide an important role in helping to implement the Engagement Survey and create action plans from the results.

• Secondly, a regular senior manager meeting was turned into an All On The Same Page event. Senior managers heard their leader deliver the big picture story, discussed and practiced themselves, gave their support to following up team leader workshops and the radical approach of introducing engagement reps. The measurement approach was also discussed andagreed.

• Thirdly, team leaders attended a half-day workshop and worked through both the big picture messaging, the All On The Same Page programme and most importantly worked on their own engagement and how to engage their team.

Having built these foundations, we then delivered the all-employee Touchpoint sessions.  1200 people attended 12 sessions across 6 days.  The sessions were highly interactive and used the big picture as the central theme and messages.  The event started with a ‘heritage corridor’ as an entrance device so people were immersed in the British Gas story the moment they arrived.   Then the event featured teamwork exercise on the brand promise, a values workshop where teams created youtube style videos and also a star wall was used for attendess to contribute ideas to making the changes happen. Each strand of the Touchpoint event agenda was used to sustain energy and dialogue to keep the focus on the longer-term behaviour changes needed. This was done via several mechanisms including a youtube video site, which hosted the top 6 employee- produced videos from the events.  Colleagues could vote for and comment on contributions.  We also turned the star wall event item into a full-blown suggestion scheme and developed the ‘big picture’ and brand promise messages into a workbook for team leaders to use with their teams as a way of reinforcing and discussing key messages.

Outcomes

We used the commitment curve (awareness, understanding, involvement and commitment) to develop questions that would track colleague mindset, as well as measuring their understanding. The same question set was used in July and in September to provide pre- and post-programme measurement.  Colleagues were asked to rank statements from strongly agree to strongly disagree, using a six-point scale.

The percentages shown below represent the strongly agree and agree responses.

‘I have received sufficient information about why we formed One British Gas’ – from 68%to 89%

‘I know what the British Gas vision is’ – from 74%to 93%

‘I understand the business rationale for the change’ – from 57%to 87%

‘I understand the part I play in making One British Gas a success’ – from 82%to 96%

‘I could explain the vision and values to a colleague’ - from 44%to 82%

‘I am aware of how my work affects company performance’ from 75%to 96%

‘This company inspires me to do my best work every day – from 61%to 74%

Engagement survey results:

August’s interim 64%, up from 57% in August last year

Net Promoter Score September ’08: -14% September ’09: +28

By the end of the programme we had achieved:

• strong leaders support for the All On The Same Page approach and developed a compelling  story which achieved clarity

• improved leadership communication

• put in place the foundations for change through the interaction of the Touchpoint events combined with the engagement representative role

The Net Promoter Score shows that the work has a clear business outcome as it shows that the benefits

of engaging with colleagues are being passed on to customers.

People are All On The Same Page!