Tips for working in the open

Giles Turnbull spoke at our Communicating Digital Community of Practice in November 2021. Giles is the author of ‘The Agile Comms Handbook’; a no-nonsense, straight-talking book about how to clearly and creatively work in the open. He shared his top tips for communicating in an agile way.

It’s one of our Digital Service Standards which says that ‘teams should communicate in the open about the decisions they are making and what they are learning.'

Being creative is sometimes hard, especially when you’re busy with the detail.

Making time for expansive thinking is so important.

The CDPS Communicating Digital Community of Practice was set up to bring together comms professionals involved in communicating digital transformation.

‘Give yourself the freedom to write something terrible and not worry if your teammates and colleagues also write bad first drafts.’   

This is hard as a comms professional, but also liberating – not letting perfect be the enemy of good.

Reading other people’s bad drafts isn’t about red penning, but the start of a conversation about

• what you liked/understood
• what you didn’t
• how you think it can be improved
• if it’s on message or not.    

There needs to be a culture of psychological safety within the organisation for this to work and we should encourage this behaviour. 

Less is more when it comes to presentations and what’s on your slides should complement what you say and not be one and the same.  

This makes it easier to comply with Welsh language and accessibility standards, while also communicating pertinent points in an engaging way.  

In March 2021 we did a short piece of work to explore some of the challenges for organisations when it comes to communicating digital and agile projects.

In partnership with Perago, we worked with the local authorities involved with our digital squad project on accessing adult social care. We wanted to: 

• understand the barriers to communicating digital service delivery 
• explore how communication teams can support ‘working out loud’ in digital change 
• test the concept by providing hands-on practical support 
• share good practice 

Many of the priorities for communicating digital are the same as for any other topic or campaign.. You must have:

• clear objectives
• an understanding of your audience
• transparent planning
• measurements
• a clear delivery approach

Some of the additional themes we found are:   

1. Communicating digital change is difficult, with different terminology, roles and ways of working that are new to some organisations. This is an area that’s also new to many communications professionals who are now focusing their personal development in this area, seeking advice and guidance.  
2. Working in the open doesn’t always come naturally for organisations and is often a new way of thinking.  This shift needs more interaction across teams. It can be useful to start with smaller groups or projects, learning from this and adapting as you learn. 
3. Positive and clearly defined relationships between comms teams and digital teams help when experimenting with new channels and new ways of communicating.  
4. Communicators need to have as clear an understanding of their users as the service owners and broader digital teams do. Who is your audience, what do they need to know, when and how? 
5. Audiences generally prefer to hear from people, particularly about things they don’t yet trust or understand. Sharing content so that people can attribute information to an actual person, or group of people, helps keep attention and build understanding. It also builds trust and opens up conversation.  
6. Digital and communications teams will need to become more comfortable in using two-way communications channels to encourage conversation, ideas and challenge. Their input actually becomes part of the progress. Providing the audience with a way to directly engage with the delivery teams, service owners or stakeholders helps the audience have a sense of ownership or involvement in the change and this will help drive real behaviour change. 

• The agile comms handbook by Giles Turnbull
• Benefits of working in the open by Jamie Arnold
• Why we should work in the open by Co-op Digital