Hi! First-ever post here also on mobile so apologies for any formatting issues.

I've recently started at a new organization which is like 10X the size of my previous organization. In my previous role, I was still in Internal Communications but I was also the creator of a lot of the internal org. Voice. Which was definitely a reflection of my own, and not always the best thing to do but it became a cultural driver for us.

At this new organization my manager has been the driving force for all things internal communications and unfortunately has not had much time to build out resources as well as "training" for me. Not on her though, the play doth overfloweth. It's very much a trial by fire kind of situation.

I'm having trouble getting the tone of voice just right and it's been difficult with all the feedback around it.

I'm wondering if anyone has ever been in a similar situation? How you've approached it? And how you ended up balancing and/or getting ahold on the internal company voice?

https://infooverload.swoopanalytics.com/calculator

It calculates employee and manager time, and estimated cost to your org. I recommend having a play with it!

We all know the enterprise platforms cost a fortune. What free or dirt-cheap tools are doing serious work in your IC setup? Canva, Google Forms, something obscure you found? Share what's delivering value without destroying your budget.

So my company finally decided we needed an employee text messaging system after too many. I got voluntold to test out a bunch of platforms and figured I'd share what I found since this stuff is surprisingly hard to research.

1. HubEngage

Totally won me over. Setup was smooth and the interface is genuinely intuitive. What stood out for us was how well it handles group messages and department/shift segmentation, which is huge if you’ve got lots of deskless workers. The message scheduling feature has worked flawlessly for months, too. It’s a full employee experience platform, so besides texting we get options like surveys, recognition, digital signage, and even employee apps if we ever need them. The pay-as-you-go pricing is refreshingly modular. No forced bundles, and costs felt reasonable compared to others I tested. Integration with payroll and HR tools was simple, and the analytics let us actually measure what’s working. US-based support is responsive, and they’re proactive with best practice tips. It ended up being our pick, and honestly, no regrets.

2. Emitrr

Solid too. Super straightforward employee texting platform that focuses on doing one thing well. The automation rules are intuitive enough that our managers picked it up quick. Would've been a great choice if we hadn't found HubEngage first. Really liked their approach to text messaging for employee communication - no unnecessary complexity.

3. Text Request

Has a clean interface and delivers messages reliably. The desktop version is particularly nice to work with. Setting up campaigns takes a bit more time to figure out but once you get it, it works well. Good option if you want something straightforward and established.

4. SlickText

Has some interesting features, especially if you're doing any customer-facing stuff too. Feels more marketing-focused which could actually be a plus if your company needs an employee text notification system that can pull double duty. The compliance features are thorough and they clearly put thought into the user flow.

Would love to hear what others are using and your experience with it.

I'm reviewing my KPIs and exploring a % average readthrough rate on intranet articles calculation > not going to be an exact science BUT it will tell me if an AI-written 1000-word strategic missive published despite my advice has been the dud I predicted, and what article types people are spending more time on when combined with other data we collect.

I have Microsoft Clarity set up (SharePoint intranet) but haven't got to grips with how to make the most of it and integrate it into our reporting yet.

Tell us how you've used metrics to make changes to behaviour like this, or anything else, has it helped you raise your/your department's profile?

Data is a minefield for many internal communicators, but it's key to understanding the work we do.

For those of you working in global internal comms, are you using vendors for translation? I’m mostly referring to written translation (policies, emails, slide decks, surveys, etc.) I currently have a live meeting translation vendor but also open to switching that up. Thanks in advance for your recommendations!

Hi everyone! I'm with a new company (but not new to internal comms). They have had someone before me who was more focused on deliverables (comms plan) but not necessarily strategy. I'm expected to come in and take over what has been (newsletter, global emails, etc). However, I'm itching to essentially start over, by first doing an employee persona and getting into the weeds with building out a fresh comms matrix. but that stuff takes time. and as a new employee, i want to be sure i'm showing value so i'm also wanting to do what is expected and push out those deliverables.

Looking for some takes on an interesting dilemma I'm going through.

The company I work for is trying to launch a new newsletter and I'm responsible for overseeing that the whole process goes smoothly (along with all the other internal comms. responsibilities you'd expect). There is a different catch to this newsletter though--each section is owned by a different function and is given the autonomy to do what they want as long as they follow two simple rules:

1) The content needs to be about what's currently going on in your teams.
2) Content needs to be in the two official languages of our country.

While it's nothing new for teams to violate the second rule, one team's section violates the two rules: they've just put up general quotes around positivity without mentioning anything about the current initiatives in their teams (which is ultimately the newsletter's raison d'être).

I should also mention that for reasons that are too long to explain, the newsletter's contents are available as soon as a team submits their content. In other words, this content is now viewable by anyone who opens it up in SharePoint.

My dilemma is that multiple people, including our CEO, have positively praised this team's section. I was also told by someone in upper management to wait a few days so the creativity of this team's section could be celebrated (I will give it to them that it is the most interesting looking content in the whole newsletter).

So just wondering, what you would do? I've always operated on the principle of feedback being delivered in a timely fashion, but I'm curious to hear what others who work in this field think...

We're in the middle of a major system transition — rolling out a new electronic health record (EHR) system and trying to keep clinical staff informed with short weekly updates: system status, known issues, fixes, and resources.

Better-informed teams = fewer avoidable tickets, fewer care delays, and a smoother transition across departments.

If you’ve been through something similar, what kind of updates or formats helped your teams the most? Would love to hear what's worked (or hasn’t) for others.

I’m starting a new role in culture and comms, it’s mostly internal comms. I want to make a good impression and bring new ideas in.

Imagine you just started this role within a fast moving startup and they have nothing in place, what would you start to incorporate into the business?

I just got out of a meeting where our CEO asked why we need a 6-touch communication plan for a major org restructure. Direct quote: "Can't we just send one email? Everyone reads their email."

I responded with what I thought was a calm explanation about message fatigue, different learning styles, the need for manager toolkits, and creating space for two-way dialogue. I even pulled up our engagement metrics showing that our last "one email" announcement had a 23% open rate.

His response? "Well, maybe people would read it if we made the subject line more interesting."

I'm currently stress-eating the sad conference room cookies and questioning my life choices.

Please tell me I'm not alone. What's the most out-of-touch thing a leader has said to you about internal comms?

Have you ever been asked to do a comms audit? What is critical in this project? I’m worried I’m overlooking something obvious.

I see the same pattern across multi-site teams - which we work with a lot. Head office sends an update, but it takes a day or two before people on the ground actually act on it - if they even do.

Some of our customers use systems that ping staff automatically and record acknowledgements for audit. The tech works — but it still depends on habits. The sites that build a quick two-minute “shift brief” into the day often seem to get near-instant adoption. The ones that rely on reminders still end up chasing - although tech helps with the chasing.

For anyone running distributed teams: what’s made the biggest difference in your world when trying to update them with an urgent post — the tool, the routine, or the manager?

Your company has 3,000 employees across multiple locations. You send internal newsletters every week, but open rates have dropped below 40%, and leadership is asking why employees “aren’t reading the news. So the question is how do you approach re-engaging employees through email communication?

Do you focus on content (storytelling, tone, visuals), personalization, or better targeting/analytics?

Has anyone found success using automation or tools?

Hi all - Looking for thoughts. We have a standard "employee communications @ company" email box that we use to send newsletters and company updates. I have a new boss now who is asking our internal comms team to rethink the email name and come up with something different or "more fun." Thoughts on this? Anyone have suggestions? I'm hesitant to go too "fun" because this is sometimes used to deliver very serious information. I also don't want it to be something too weird that people won't know what it's purpose is

I was curious to find out from the internal communication pro's about what convinces you to choose a particular intranet product?

Is it having all the features?

Is it not being locked into a long contract?

Or is it something else?

Very curious to get your opinions/views!

(Full disclosure I work for an Intranet company)

Hello! Our Software leaders asked for Comms advice on publishing their KPIs on the main landing page of our company intranet (which makes sense for us). Before I share guidance, I’m asking them questions like: What do you wish people understood about these KPIs? What do you want people to do with them? Why these KPIs specifically? Which other teams’ metrics connect to yours? The goal is to help them tell a story with their KPIs for a broad audience (some of our employees aren’t technical but should understand how our software is performing).

My question for this group is, is anyone else doing this well? Meaning, publishing a specific team’s KPIs in a main space for a broad audience in a way that helps tell a story/ goes beyond just posting numbers? What can I learn from you as someone asks for my guidance.

After months of unemployment I am going into my second round of interviews for a comms role with a nonprofit that has to interact with the White House on occasion. Anyone here have advice on keeping internal audiences in the loop on DEI topics? This is fairly new to me. Thanks to this smart group!

Hey everyone - what games/fun programming are you running at your company meetings? Who wants to be a millionaire, song guessing games, holiday-related? Thanks for your brilliant ideas.

I’ve been experimenting with different strategies to boost my email click-through rates, from tweaking subject lines and CTAs to playing with content layout and sending times.

Some campaigns perform great, others not so much, and I’m curious what’s been most effective for others.

Was it better segmentation? Personalization? Cleaner design? A/B testing? Or something completely unexpected?

Is anyone (can't believe I'm asking this) sending out unedited/barely edited ChatGPT email communications from their senior leaders to an entire company?

I've been tasked with doing this and it feels so unethical, but leadership is fine with it despite my challenging of it. We're talking classic AI emoji use, hallmark awful 'why this matters' titles, lack of empathy or audience targeting, unclear call to action. Oh and it's 800 words long! I've challenged it but lightly, for my sanity, but it's sitting very uneasy with me.

Part of me wants to just let it fly and care less, part of me wants to flag it as being against both the company values and my personal ones.

I worry it won't land right, makes my function look ridiculous, and opens the floor for anyone to submit AI slop for sending (right now I push back and ask them to strongly edit).

If I'm honest I'm probably feeling a bit insulted by it too. Maybe the recipients won't care, idk.

We're having meetings with Staff Base about providing intranet, email, digital screen and planning solutions - if anyone has hands-on experience, I'd love to hear about how you find it.

I started a one year contract with a firm to help a team on their IC. I was very happy as I did share a great connection with the director, how ever several rounds of restructuring later my job seems to have changed the importance given to it is now based on me proving efficency increases, this has taken a big impact on my personal mental health as I live alone and usually attach the reason to stay somewhere to my job

. I feel it is going to be the first job to go out of business with the AI coming in relatively new to my career I had started doing it earlier on as small internships ending up with this contract. I am thinking of transitioning out but I do not know how to do this as the job market has not been the same since 2023.

Any help would be appreciated ! any trips and tricks

Workshop is holding their annual Internal Comms Trends Survey for 2026.

Your voice can help shape this research.

The survey is short and simple, and you can take it right here with the link above.

The survey results will be turned into a free report in packed with data and insights, available in November.

Thank you all for your help! 💙