Building a successful relationship between leadership and internal comms in 2023

In the comms world, the trends we often see aren’t really trends at all. They are perennial issues that, if left undressed, can lead to a serious breakdown in communication. The relationship between internal comms teams and leadership is a challenge that crops up repeatedly.

Internal communications professionals are not just here to write and push out updates on behalf of leadership; they are the eyes, ears, and voice of employees. They play a crucial role as trusted advisors, challenging leadership and giving them true insight into the wider organisation.

Sharing her experiences and top tips on how to build a successful relationship between leadership and internal communications teams in 2023, we welcomed Tor Goldfield. With a career beginning in the PR and Marketing world, Tor now specialises in internal comms, working for Expedia Group, where she leads an international team responsible for employee communications across Expedia Group’s three divisions - Brands, B2B and Product & Technology.

Tor was joined by Seenit CEO Emily Forbes for an hour-long conversation and live Q&A.

In the discussion, we explored three key themes comms teams need to be thinking about in 2023:

Leadership relationship with comms teams

With a changing workplace and 2023 set to be another turbulent year, comms professionals’ role as an advisor to leadership is critical. Tor shared her experience at Expedia, detailing the need for a relationship with your leadership team where they ask for your opinions and trust you.

“Know the value that you add as a comms professional, be seen as a strategic advisor and know when to challenge, disagree with leaders and ‘disagree and commit’.”

Tor Goldfield, Senior Director Internal Comms, Expedia

Building culture and connections in a hybrid world

The not-so-new hybrid ways of working have impacted relationships at work. In the conversation, Tor dug into how comms folks need to be eyes, ears, and voices of the workforce, influencing and feeding back to leadership as businesses look to help people come together and work better together, regardless of their location.

Building your comms strategy

Tor shared some areas she believes comms professionals should be focusing on no matter the time of year. She covered top tips and takeaways to execute your 2023 strategy and what metrics to track.

“We measure outputs and outcomes as best we can. […] We try and really assess whether comms has had an impact on what people think, feel and do.”

Tor Goldfield, Senior Director Internal Comms, Expedia

Reading recommendations

• The Future of Internal Communications, Seenit

• Avoiding the hurry habit: comms and leadership trends 2023, Jenni Field

• Business Essentials for Strategic Communicators, Matthew Ragas and Ron Culp

• Have Backbone; Disagree and Commit, an Amazon leadership principle

• Bring Yourself: How to Harness the Power of Connection to Negotiate Fearlessly, Mori Taheripour

• Surrounded by idiots, Thomas Erikson