Internal communications

Ask a room full of professionals what comes to mind when they hear the word “change” and you’ll get a mix of answers. In a recent Work Wonders webinar, responses ranged from exciting and energising to exhausting and overwhelming. 

We know that change isn’t neat or easy. It’s messy, emotional – and the way we respond to it is deeply human. As talent leader Alistair Antoine said during the session: “Change is not a Gantt chart.” Yet too often, that’s how organisations treat change programmes – as a timeline to manage, rather than a process people go through. 

Change doesn’t work if it’s done to people, not with them

One of the biggest reasons transformation projects stall is because leaders try to enact change on employees, instead of working with them. Whether it’s a restructure, new leadership or a shift in strategy, people need to be part of the process – not just passive recipients of announcements and comms. 

To get real engagement and buy-in, you need to create space for better conversations. That means giving people room to ask questions, share concerns and make sense of what’s changing in a way that feels respectful and supportive. When people feel heard and involved, they’re far more likely to move with the change than against it. 

Trust is built – or lost – during change

The stakes are high. The Times recently reported that 38% of leaders would rather resign than lead another change programme. That speaks to the pressure and fatigue many are feeling – but it also highlights how vital trust and belief are during change. 

People look to leaders for clarity and reassurance – but also for honesty. Communicating with openness, listening without defensiveness, and showing care are powerful signals. And they’re often what separates successful transformations from the ones that fizzle out. 

As coach and change expert Kate Oates reminded us in the session, people need time to process. Change is a transition, not a switch to be flipped. And it’s much harder to lead through that transition if you’re rushing the emotional impact or pretending its business as usual. 

Culture, safety and storytelling all matter

Communication in change can’t just be top-down messages or weekly updates. You need to build psychological safety first by making space for feedback, choosing language that’s honest and human, and shaping stories that people can connect to – stories that make sense of what’s ending and offer a clear picture of what’s next. 

Change might start with a business need, but it’s sustained through your people. That’s why the most effective transformations embed culture, values and communication into every stage – from early conversations to everyday moments. 

Missed the session?

Check out the highlights video below, featuring some of the most powerful takeaways from the discussion with Sally, Alistair and Kate. If you’re thinking about how you communicate change in your organisation – and want to lead with more humanity, not just process – it’s worth a watch. 

Want to be part of the next conversation?

Work Wonders is our growing community for people who care about improving workplace culture, communication and inclusion. If you’d like to join future webinars, access practical tools and connect with others driving meaningful change – join us here. 

Watch the highlights: Rethinking Change and Communication

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Culture change isn’t something you can just tick off the to-do list. When done well, it creates a lasting shift that shapes how people think, act and work together. Yet too often, leaders unintentionally undermine the transformation they’re trying to lead. 

 Here are three common culture change mistakes – and how to avoid them: 

1. Treating it like a one-off campaign

Culture isn’t a project with a start and finish date. It’s everyday actions, decisions, conversations, the way people treat one another. When leaders approach culture transformation as a time-limited initiative, complete with launch events, posters and slogans, momentum fades fast. People revert to old habits, and the “new culture” becomes a past-tense idea. 

How to avoid it: 

See culture change as a long-term commitment. Build it into business as usual. Keep reinforcing the vision in team meetings, performance reviews, recognition schemes and even day-to-day conversations. Leaders need to model the change every single day. 

 2. Forgetting to listen

It’s easy to design a culture from the top down. But when employees aren’t asked for their input – or worse, are asked and then ignored – they’ll see the transformation as “management’s thing.” This is one of the most common culture transformation errors, and it quickly breaks down trust. 

How to avoid it:  

Create genuine two-way dialogue. Use surveys, focus groups and informal conversations to understand what’s working and what’s not. Act on the feedback you receive and make it clear how employees’ voices are shaping the transformation journey. When people feel heard, they’re more likely to engage and drive forward the long-term culture you’re trying to achieve. 

3. Neglecting cross-functional ownership

Culture touches every part of the organisation – from hiring to customer service to finance. Yet many culture change efforts stay siloed within HR or internal comms. Without shared responsibility across functions, change is unlikely to gain traction. 

How to avoid it:  

Treat culture like any other strategic priority. Involve leaders from all departments in defining, embedding and sustaining it. Give managers the tools and confidence to bring culture change to life in their teams. Because when every function feels responsible, culture is likely to change quicker and become a part of the everyday. 

Culture transformation success isn’t about one big moment. It’s about hundreds (or likely even thousands) of consistent actions, owned by everyone and guided by leaders who listen and inspire others. Avoiding these mistakes means you’re not just running a campaign – you’re creating a movement. 

Find out what’s really driving (or blocking) your culture

If you want to avoid these common culture transformation mistakes, the first step is knowing where your gaps are. That’s exactly what our THRIVE diagnostics are designed to do. 

We’ve created six quick tools – one for each of our THRIVE pillars – that give you tailored insight into what’s working well and where there’s room to improve. Each one takes just a couple of minutes and comes with practical next steps you can act on straight away: 

• Talent Diagnostic: Is your EVP helping you keep the talent you’ve worked hard to hire? 

• Human Diagnostic: How well are you tuning in to your workforce? 

• Roadmap Diagnostic: Is your strategy really landing with your people? 

• Inclusion Diagnostic: How inclusive and accessible are your communications? 

• Values Diagnostic: Are your organisational values being heard and lived? 

• Experience Diagnostic: How well do your communications help shape the employee experience? 

Take one, a few, or all six – and you’ll walk away with clear, practical actions to strengthen your culture. 

When employees feel clear, connected and supported, culture transformation doesn’t fade out – it sticks. And if your results highlight areas to focus on, we’re here to help you take the next step. 

Our expertise is wide, and it often surprises people how much we do beyond delivering effective and inclusive creative communications. Here are eight areas where we add value in different, and sometimes unexpected, ways:

1. Naming

We create names with strategic clarity and long-term value. From naming strategies to creative options, we ensure names are credible, ownable and compelling. Whether it’s a new product, service or transformation project, names might seem like small details – but they play a big role in positioning and impact.

2. SharePoint

When employees can’t find what they need, productivity takes a hit. We design better SharePoint user experiences, making navigation clearer and information easier to access.

3. eLearning

We design and build eLearning modules, and output SCORM files, so you can bring more creativity to your team learning.

4. Gamification

From quizzes and competitions to interactive tools, we create gamified content that both informs and inspires employees – helping them engage with information in a memorable way.

5. Stakeholder management

We support leaders and comms teams to navigate complex stakeholder conversations, with practical advice and hands-on support when it’s needed most.

6. Strategic partnerships

Not ready to write a brief? We can act as a thinking partner, co-creating plans and shaping clear, effective briefs.

7. In-house team personal development

From creative inspiration sessions to proven systems that keep everything on track, we can share our experience built from over 25 years running a creative service, helping in-house teams to grow their capability and confidence.

8. Building better business cases

Budgets are harder than ever to secure. Using behavioural psychology techniques, we can help you build stronger business cases that shift the focus from cost to value. 

Join our Building Better Business Cases masterclass on 23 October. Exclusive to Builder tier and above Work Wonders members. Find out more about membership here. 

How we can work together

We partner flexibly, adapting to what you need: 

• Activator – Got a story to tell? We simplify complex ideas and shape campaigns that bring everyone with you. Book a call 

• Pathfinder – Need direction but limited budget? Join our Work Wonders community for guides, tools and events. Join Work Wonders 

• Co-creator – Need a fresh perspective? We work alongside you to bring energy and insight. Talk to us 

Annual impact reports are meant to show progress, inspire trust and make the case for continued support. But too often, they turn into a long list of activities – everything you’ve done, said or funded – without focusing on what really matters: what changed, and for who? 

If you’re in charge of your charity’s yearly impact report, you already know the pressure. Multiple audiences. Competing priorities. A year’s worth of achievements. And just enough time to gather, write, design and publish. It’s no wonder so many reports end up as busy PDFs that few people truly engage with. 

But a list of good things done isn’t the same as a story well told. 

Data doesn’t speak for itself – but great report design can bring it to life

Strong report design helps visualise the numbers and pair them with human stories, so readers quickly see why your work matters.

Across the year, your charity might have delivered 36 workshops, supported 2,400 service users and trained 112 volunteers. But readers don’t just want to know the output. They want context, connection and a clear sense of how those activities made a difference. 

That means: 

• Highlighting the outcomes that matter most 
• Pairing data or statistics with real human stories 
• Stripping back anything that takes away from the story you want to tell 

Put simply: don’t make people work to find the so what?

See your report as a communication tool

At its best, your impact report is an invitation for readers to better understand your mission, see the difference you’re making and feel part of the journey. It builds trust with funders, shows accountability to your community and helps stakeholders feel confident in where you’re headed. 

That takes more than strong writing. Your report needs a structure that flows, visual hierarchy and inclusive, accessible language. A tone that’s confident but relatable. And a design that doesn’t just look good but also guides the reader through your achievements of the previous year. 

When it’s done well, your impact report can: 

• Strengthen future funding bids 
• Unite teams around a shared purpose 
• Turn complex work into compelling public stories 
• Become something your CEO shares with pride – not just signs off

So how do you get there?

It starts by asking one simple question: “What do we want people to understand, feel and do when they read this report?” And then shaping the report around that – from the structure and copy to the design and visuals. 

At Something Big, we help charities turn reports into stories worth telling. Whether you need help crafting the narrative, developing a meaningful visual concept or designing something people want to read, we’re here to help. Let’s talk about your next impact report. 

You’ve spotted the signs. Motivation is low, good people are leaving, energy and performance are dropping off. You know your workplace culture needs attention – but when you raise it, there’s hesitation. Other priorities take precedence. Budget feels out of reach.  

It’s a common pattern. Culture work is often seen as a nice-to-have or a long-term ambition, rather than a near-term need. But the reality? Failing to act costs far more than acting early. Poor workplace culture doesn’t just cost you engagement. It quietly drains your business, through absenteeism, turnover and underperformance. 

And the impact runs deeper than many leaders realise. 

The hidden cost of doing nothing

When culture starts to slide, the warning signs might not be instantly visible. But they show up clearly in business outcomes. Let’s look at just a few ways poor culture hits the bottom line:  

• Employee disengagement is expensive. Gallup found that only 21% of employees worldwide feel engaged at work – costing the economy $438 billion in lost productivity.

• High turnover carries direct and indirect costs. From recruitment fees and lost knowledge to onboarding processes and the knock-on effect of team instability, the costs add up fast.  

• Absenteeism tends to rise when people feel disconnected, unsupported or burned out. 

• Poor performance becomes harder to challenge (and harder to turn around) when people stop caring and stop contributing. 

However, all of this is avoidable. But not if work culture keeps being treated as a luxury. 

Reframing the budget conversation

Instead of asking, “Can I have budget for culture?”, it’s time to flip the script. Ask: “Can we afford the cost of not investing?” 

It’s a simple shift that changes the focus. It reframes culture not as an add-on, but as a performance risk. A retention risk. A strategic risk that deserves the same attention as any other. And it opens the door to a better conversation about ROI, because the return on employee engagement is real. 

Investing in culture pays back in loyalty, energy, innovation and productivity. It helps people perform better, stay longer and care more. And that matters, because good people are hard to keep. 

Time to move from instinct to insight

If your instinct is telling you something’s not right, trust it. But instinct alone won’t get the backing you need. That’s where diagnostics like THRIVE can help. 

THRIVE helps you pinpoint exactly where culture is costing you – and where to focus your efforts for maximum impact. It takes the guesswork out of culture change, giving you a clear business case.  

Because culture is never neutral. It’s either working for you or against you. 

Ready to turn this into action?

Learn how to build a compelling case for culture investment by joining our Work Wonders Builder tier. You’ll get access to exclusive sessions, including our upcoming Building Better Business Cases masterclass on 23 October – packed with practical advice on how to secure support and funding for culture, comms and people initiatives.

Sign up to Work Wonders Builder tier today and get the insight and tools you need to make change happen.