Communication Planning

I have been posting a few bogs on communication recently, mainly focused on differentiating reporting from communicating.

Reports have a definite value but it is limited, ‘The Value of Reports’ posted on the PMI ‘Voices of Project Management’ blog defines their key uses.

The step beyond reporting is managing stakeholder perceptions. This was the topic of ‘Stakeholder Perceptions Are Paramount’ also posted on the PMI ‘Voices of Project Management’ blog.

These two posts and more were brought together in my paper ‘Beyond Reporting – The Communication Strategy’ presented last week at the PMI Asia Pacific congress.

What all of this feeds into is the process of developing an effective communication plan. Communication planning is more than just developing a report distribution list. It must involve the full spectrum of communication options deployed to engage effectively with stakeholders ranging from ‘lift meetings’ and coffees through to formal presentations.

This is one reason why our workshop, ‘How To’ develop a Communication Plan is separated from our SeminarsWorld® workshop The science and art of communicating effectively. Whilst communicating without a plan can be counterproductive, the communication plan itself needs to canvass both the efforts needed to ‘communicate for effect’ and the routine distribution of reports.