From postmen to partners: Building internal communication that actually works – by Andrew Morrison

8 October 2025

I’m so incredibly proud – and really quite humbled – that the internal comms team at NICE has been nominated for the commsHERO Team of the Year award.

Not long ago, if you asked what internal communications did at NICE, the answer was fairly simple: “They send the newsletter, right?”

We were the postal service. Reliable, but not very strategic.

Fast forward to today, and internal comms is playing an ever more central role in NICE’s transformation – helping colleagues feel informed, connected, and proud of what they’re achieving.

Winging it is not a strategy

I’ve always been a big believer in internal comms’ role as a key strategic driver in an organisation. Done right, we boost performance, build pride, and give people clarity.

But belief alone doesn’t cut it. You need a proper foundation.

Transformation doesn’t happen by accident — and it certainly doesn’t happen when colleagues are drowning in uncoordinated information.

So we did something NICE had never done before: we wrote our first internal communications strategy. A three-year roadmap with purpose, priorities and a healthy dose of pragmatism.

This wasn’t about trying to fix everything at once (though the temptation was definitely there). There would be no magic wands, overnight miracles or, heaven forbid, glitter sprinkled on anything.

This was about focusing on four strategic areas where we could actually move the needle — from driving collaboration to building pride in our transformation. And we did it with sleeves rolled up.

Measure what you treasure

What’s the point of a strategy if you can’t prove it’s working?

Next, led by our internal comms manager Natalie Murray, we built an evaluation programme that went beyond vanity metrics to measure what really matters.

Yes, we still track open rates (metrics like these can be your early warning system that people are tuning out, but it seems fashionable to bash them to show just how darn strategic we are).

But more importantly, we also have lots of robust evidence on how internal communications is supporting strategic objectives.

Things like:

• do colleagues understand their role in our transformation?
• are they buying into our strategic direction?
• do they feel informed?
• are we nudging behaviour change, in line with our new values?

And guess what… the results speak for themselves in our recent staff survey:

• Trust in internal comms is 80%.
• The overall rating of communications has increased to 77%.
• Trust in leadership communications is 78%.

These are all up 7–10 percentage points – and more importantly, correlate with increased confidence in our strategic direction and stronger engagement scores across the board.

Turning down the volume

Next up: NICE’s first internal channel review. Led by internal comms executive Sophie Dannatt, we surveyed, ran focus groups and got a truckload of feedback.

And what we discovered was interesting. Plenty aligned with our thinking but an awful lot challenged our assumptions.

Turns out, our colleagues loved the newsletter. So, we made it smarter — less info dump, more essential read.

Monthly all-staff meetings? These were here to stay but we ditched death by PowerPoint and brought in external speakers, fresh formats and genuine value.

And masterminded by a new addition to the team, Edmund Lumsden, our crusty old intranet got the boot and a shiny new SharePoint site, NICE Space, emerged to widespread acclaim (not least from those of us who survived the trauma of content creation on the previous site!)

We talk a lot in internal comms about cutting through the noise, but nowhere near enough about turning down the volume. The hard truth is that building effective communications means making tough decisions.

And we made some tough calls:

• The quarterly e-magazine? Gone.
• All staff emails? Now under an iron-grip control (and yes, I will die on this hill)
• The leadership videos we thought were hitting the mark? They weren’t working for an organisation that loves the written word and detail.

The lesson? Don’t chase shiny new toys like podcasts, videos and Viva Engage unless it’s right for your organisation. Chase what works for your people instead. To paraphrase the brilliant Joanna Parsons, the idea of best practice is a bit of a myth.

Now that’s what I call engagement

Alongside all this foundation building, we also got stuck into the transformation campaign. Prioritising dialogue over broadcast led to 86% saying they have a clearer understanding of their role in our transformation, and 84% saying they have confidence in our direction.

Launching new values and behaviours reminded us that moving from abstract concepts to lived experiences takes time and patience. And even our office relocation proved that even the most logistical challenges can become opportunities to reinforce culture and ways of working.

Earning your seat at the table, one step at a time

Here’s the thing: we’re all desperate for that seat at the table. But you don’t become strategic partners by declaring it. Whether we like it or not, we have to earn it the hard way and keep earning it, one relationship, one campaign, one evaluation cycle at a time.

At NICE, there’ll still lots to do. We’re developing a line manager communications programme and deepening our leadership partnerships – because far too often, our seat is still not quite at the table.

But if there’s one takeaway from our journey so far, it’s this:

Strategic internal communications isn’t about doing everything at once. It’s about doing the right things, with the right foundations, and most important of all, genuinely putting your people first.

And yes, it’s hard work. But when you see colleagues feeling more connected and confident — that’s when you know you’re not just sending newsletters anymore. That’s when you know internal communications is making a real difference.

Andrew Morrison, Senior Internal Communications Manager, National Institute for Health and Care Excellence