CommsHero will take you out of your comfort zone & lead to success
What do 8th – 16th – 29th November have in common?
The ‘not to be missed’ events of the year ..
The dates of the next three CommsHero events
The dates when I am elsewhere and am gutted because I can’t get to and support the events…events and people who inspire and energise me!
Someone then asked me why I was disappointed and why I wanted to be part of it – ‘you’re already a CommsHero’; what can you learn? Isn’t it just for Comms staff. In hindsight I wonder if they were just trying to provoke me to write a blog … If so they dared and succeed!!
So let me bust some myths…
- Yes I’m described as a social CEO and Comms Hero (who refuses to wear the cape) but I didn’t just become one and I can’t just stay one now I have got the t shirt!. It’s a compliment; a brand that comes with attitude, behaviours, leadership and genuine values I believe in and embrace. One of my core values is learning. I love to learn, love new ideas and love the challenge of being taken out of my comfort zone, daring to fail and from this learning, developing and succeeding.
Comms is part of me and what I do. I don’t do it to get the t-shirt! I do it and the t-shirt fits!
- What can you learn?’
What is there not to learn? I learn every day and if I don’t I wonder whether the day’s been a success.
- Comms Hero events are like months of learning and new ideas crammed into one energising and inspiring day
- Comms Hero is for Comms staff.
Wrong! Maybe it started out that way and some brilliant Comms people have become genuine Comms Heroes and are making noise and causing positive disruption and being true leaders helping make change happen in their workplace and across our sector.
One of the successes they’ve achieved by daring to fail is inspiring others – people love to be inspired and motivated so having seen a colleague come back motivated, fired up and doing new stuff makes people want a slice of the cake or in CommsHero tradition, one of the Krispy Kreme donuts ….
CommsHero has created energy and brand and a space where people can dare to fail, where new ideas can be shared and more importantly where new ideas are created.
We need people at every level in organisations to be Comms Heroes. It’s not just about communicating with the outside, it about how you use the power of communication to do things brilliantly, it’s how you engage with your colleagues and customers, it’s how you brand and market what you do, it’s how you innovate and continue improving. It’s about transformation.
Communication is an essential leadership ingredient. People need to believe and buy into a vision and a leader; and to create that followship and get buy in needs great genuine communication. People want to learn and this happens best where leaders create an environment where there’s permission to play, to create and innovate and importantly to continually learn and improve.
“The art of communication is the language of leadership.” – James Humes
permission to play, to create and innovate and importantly to continually learn and improve.
Easy in current challenging times to cut costs and stop people going to an event but for £180 it’s money well spent. Not only will this breath new life into ‘Comms’ in your organisation but it energises colleagues to think differently, behave differently and by daring to fail, stepping out of their comfort zone, trying new things and learning from failure leads to success. What a amazing way to bring in change and new ideas into your business.
So, I think every Chief Executive or leader should see comms as part of their role and should nurture an environment where comms is everyone’s role and then see what a difference this small but powerful change could make ….
So, if you’ve never been to a CommsHero event, now is your time to dare to fail, to take a small step out of your comfort zone and to challenge yourself to think differently and learn from people who have dared to fail and can share their experiences and successes with you.
And if you can’t go, support at least one colleague in your business to go – the energy they’ll bring back will inspire you to want to know more and to get involved.
At LYHA …. Our Comms Officer Rio has been before and is going again!! She’s also part of our Connected change programme and uses CommsHero to think about people and culture change too! Our community officers have previously been and this time our new Sales and Marketing officer, Brogan is attending and can’t wait to ‘Dare to Fail’ again. She already dared to fail by going to a huge national conference on her own but taking herself out of her comfort zone brought some great new contacts and success. She can’t wait to become a CommsHero…
So key messages:
- Comms is everyone’s job – it needs to be a shared passion
- Anyone can go to a CommsHero event
- Always dare to fail. Never fail to dare
- And if you’re still not persuaded, then in the CommsHero paraphrased words of Benjamin Franklin, get involved and you may then understand what all the fuss is about …..!!
Lisa Pickard @lyha_LisaP
P.s. if Admiral insurance read this blog I would be high premiums with so many ‘!!’ and ‘So’s’