Written by Joel Durkin, PR and Communications Director, Freshfield

During the journey of growing a business, there will be times of change. This could mean a change of personnel or leadership, external investment, a relocation to a new site or a major shift in the company’s strategic direction.

Communicated correctly, changes like these can maintain good relationships with key stakeholders and elevate the company’s profile. However, if they are communicated poorly (or not at all!), it can cause confusion and create more questions than answers. Something every business wants to avoid.

Every significant change in a business is a unique scenario and requires a tailored communications strategy, but here are five common principles that should serve you well.

1) Make communications central to the strategy

Many businesses wait until after a major change has happened before thinking about how it will be communicated, which can mean playing catchup and losing a great opportunity to maximise profile.

Determining a communications strategy should be central to the planning process of any major business change. This starts by ensuring your communications team or agency is fully briefed so they can advise and plan effectively.

For example, your company may have decided to combine two regional offices into a new central hub. Having a communication plan in place will ensure employees are engaged with early (preventing unrest) and that you can control the external narrative, rather than the media, clients or competitors finding out early and shape the narrative for you.

2) Align internal and external communications

Making sure the messages you are communicating internally and externally are consistent is important when striving to control the message of a significant business change.

For example, a company’s long-standing managing director may be moving into a new chair role, and a well-known external leader from the sector becoming the new MD.

Ensuring all staff fully understand the change and its positives, including that the previous MD is not simply leaving the company, as well as the new MD’s background and expertise, will mean their conversations with customers and partners can reinforce these positive messages, rather than creating confusion if they are asked.

3) Always be transparent

Running a growing business involves tough and unpopular decisions. Even if you feel your change is not universally liked, it’s important to be upfront and honest. Remember, you won’t be the first or last business to have to make such a big change.

For example, you may be discontinuing a key product, which is synonymous with your brand, due to rising production costs. Being open and truthful about the reasons will then allow you to fully highlight the rationale of the change to customers, such as being able to offer newer, more innovative products, or sustainability improvements throughout the supply chain.

4) Ensure leaders are visible

There’s a plethora of communications channels available when it comes to communicating with your stakeholders. When it comes to sharing news about a major business change. a common thread, regardless of your channel strategy, is leadership visibility. This is especially important in B2B sectors, where leaders may have a personal relationship with key customers.

Think about how your leadership team could communicate a significant change on a one-to-one basis as well as externally. The CEO may wish to call or email customers directly. The personal, private approach matters during such situations.

5) Be consistent with communications

Communicating a major change in a business is not a one-off job. You should aim to use the company’s owned channels, as well as media channels where relevant, to share regular positive updates as evidence that the change has been the right decision.

For example, sharing regular positive feedback about it from customers will help to build trust with other customers and stakeholders and strengthen the company’s reputation for making the correct choices.

Freshfield has been supporting growing businesses for over 25 years, at every stage of their scaleup journey. For more information on our Scaleup PR and Communications service, visit here. If you want to discuss a project, contact our team today.