3 tips for building a comms plan about the return to the workplace

Even if your workforce will never return to full capacity at the office, communicators must develop a plan to explain how the new workplace will run.

From 100% remote offices to hybrid solutions, the new normal for workers requires some redesign and explanation. The office culture is forever changed—and for internal communicators tasked with protecting the employee experience, there’s a lot of work to do.

Priya Bates, president of Inner Strength Communications, offers three tips for designing a communications plan for the return to the workplace on a recent webinar titled “How to Build a Communications Plan for Returning to a Hybrid Workplace.” Drawing form her experience working with internal communicators across North America, Bates identifies three areas that require extra attention:

“People want to feel like they belong,” says Bates, and that’s tricky for a workplace where some employees might gather in person while others log in remotely from home. Belonging also touches on new mandates for diversity, equity and inclusion (DE&I) in the workplace.