Improve Go-to-Market Execution with a Cascade Communications Strategy.

Steve Soltis, the group director of employee and leadership communications at The Coca-Cola Company, once said …

“A business cannot generate sustainable value and growth without employees understanding where it’s headed, why, what it’s going to take to get there, and why each employee matters.”

A recent McKinsey article also states that …

 “Achieving real alignment, where strategy, goals, and meaningful purpose reinforce one another, gives an organization a major advantage because it has a clearer sense of what to do at any given time, and it can trust people to move in the right direction.”

For companies to execute at a high-level they need to develop and deliver clear, consistent messaging in support of the company’s purpose, vision, values and go-to-market strategy. For those messages to stick, internal communications leaders must also develop and manage a cascade communications strategy that ensures the story is delivered consistently at every level of the organization.

The cascade strategy should include the building blocks of the story, mandatory messages that must be shared, supporting visuals and communication tools. The story should then be tailored, packaged and delivered to specific stakeholders across the organization. Functional and role-specific messages should address why the strategy and story matters to each audience, how stakeholder groups are expected to participate in the strategy and what’s in it for them.

The strategy should also define who is responsible for executing what and when along with expectations for each individual involved in the cascade communication process. Then internal communications leaders must proactively manage the cadence (weekly, monthly and quarterly) by which the execution team will meet, review and enhance the plan based on feedback from the frontline.

Developing, implementing and managing an effective cascade strategy in support of your go-to-market strategy and story takes time, but it is worth it. In fact, according to McKinsey & Company, when people understand and are excited about the direction their company is going, the company’s earnings margin is twice as likely to be above the median.

(This is an excerpt from the full article that appeared in CEO Communicator magazine. To read the entire article go to ceocommunicator.com.)