How can you set better communication goals?

1 What are communication goals?

Communication goals are the desired outcomes of your internal communication efforts, such as increasing employee engagement, improving collaboration, or enhancing culture. They should be aligned with your organization's vision, mission, and values, as well as your specific objectives for each audience, channel, and message. Communication goals can be long-term or short-term, depending on your needs and priorities.

2 Why are communication goals important?

Communication goals are important because they help you define your purpose, direction, and scope for your internal communication strategy. They also help you monitor and evaluate your performance, identify gaps and opportunities , and adjust your actions accordingly. Communication goals can also motivate and inspire your team, as well as your stakeholders, by showing them the value and impact of your communication efforts.

3 How to use the SMART framework?

The SMART framework is a popular and effective way to set communication goals. This means that these goals should be specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Specifically, they should be clearly defined and focused, quantifiable and trackable, realistic and attainable, aligned and supportive, and set within a specific timeframe. Utilizing the SMART framework can assist in developing communication goals that are clear, actionable, and meaningful.

4 What are some common internal communication metrics?

To measure your communication goals, you need to use internal communication metrics , which are indicators of your communication effectiveness and impact. Depending on your goals and channels, there are many types of internal communication metrics that you can use. Reach measures how many people received or accessed your communication, while engagement looks at how many people interacted or responded to it. Feedback quantifies how many people provided input or suggestions on your communication, and satisfaction measures how many people expressed satisfaction or dissatisfaction with it. Additionally, outcomes show how many people changed their behavior or performance as a result of your communication. Utilizing internal communication metrics can help you track your progress, evaluate your results, and ultimately improve your communication.

5 How to choose the right internal communication metrics?

When choosing internal communication metrics, it is important to consider your communication goals, channels, audiences, and resources. Ask yourself what you are trying to achieve with your communication, how you will measure your achievement, what data sources and tools you will use to collect and analyze your data, how often and how you will report and communicate your data, and how you will use your data to inform and improve your communication. Selecting the right metrics can help optimize your communication strategy while demonstrating value and impact.

6 How to set better communication goals?

Setting better communication goals is a continuous process that requires planning, execution, monitoring, evaluation, and improvement. To do this successfully, involve stakeholders in the goal-setting process, such as team members, managers, and leaders. Review your current communication strategy and performance to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Align your communication goals with your organization's goals and prioritize them according to importance and urgency. Use the SMART framework to create clear and realistic goals that can be broken down into smaller steps. Choose the appropriate internal communication metrics to measure your goals and establish a baseline and target for each metric. Then implement your communication plan, monitor data regularly, evaluate results, celebrate successes, learn from failures, adjust your goals and actions as needed to improve your plan. Doing so can help you enhance internal communication effectiveness and impact.

7 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?