Organizational Listening II

List of Tables

Table 2.1 Types of listening discussed in various literature

Table 3.1 Characteristics of strategic communication: Traditional and emergent approaches

Table 4.1 Organizations studied in the three stages of The Organizational Listening Project and cognate studies by the author

Table 4.2 Data sources accessed in The Organizational Listening Project and cognate studies related to listening conducted by the author 2013–2019

Table 4.3 Sample breakdown of Stage 1 of The Organizational Listening Project

Table 4.4 The most frequently used terms related to listening and speaking

Table 4.5 A comparison of listening orientated and speaking orientated terms used by interviewees

Table 4.6 Sites of research in Stage 2 of The Organizational Listening Project

Table 4.7 Summary of key listening activities in Achmea operating companies in June 2019

Table 4.8 Summary of Greater Sydney Commission engagement stages and activities

Table 4.9 Examples of community engagement and consultation activities conducted between February and April 2019 as part of planning Sydney 2050

Table 5.1 Theories and concepts informing organizational listening

Table 6.1 Research methods and other methods for organizational listening

Table 7.1 The percentage of young Americans (18–29) who say they trust the above institutions to do the right thing all or most of the time

Acknowledgements

One arrives at writing a book like this supported by many helpful and inspiring colleagues – too many to name. But special acknowledgement and thanks need to be recorded for a number of researchers whose work contributed to my thinking and this research. These notably include Nick Couldry, Professor of Media, Communications and Social Theory at the London School of Economics and Political Science; Stephen Coleman, Professor of Political Communication at the University of Leeds; Maureen Taylor, Professor of Strategic Communication at the University of Technology Sydney; and Anne Gregory, Professor of Corporate Communications at the University of Huddersfield.

I also acknowledge researchers who have journeyed with me into this emerging field of research including David Brandt;¹ Luke Capizzo and Meredith Feinman;² Cecilia Claro;³ Howard Krais, Mike Pounsford and Kevin Ruck;⁴ Laurie Lewis;⁵ Marlene Neill and Shannon Bowen;⁶ Rita Men and colleagues;⁷ Katie Place;⁸; Hanna Reinikainen, Jaana Kari, and Vilma Luoma-aho;⁹ Surabhi Sahay;¹⁰ and Jeffrey Yip and Colin Fisher.¹¹ Their contributions to understanding organizational listening is deservedly cited and discussed, along with findings from my own research.

While writing this book, I reviewed journal articles that promise further valuable contributions to the field, and I look forward to their publication.

While its focus is mainly on interpersonal listening, the work of the International Listening Association¹² also should be acknowledged, along with the research, consulting, and training conducted by its members and associates including Graham Bodie, Debra Worthington, Andrew Wolvin, Sandra Bodin-Lerner, Corine Jansen, Avraham Kluger, and Raquel Ark.

For production of this book, I thank Peter Lang, New York and particularly Senior Acquisitions Editor for Media and Communication, Niall Kennedy, his replacement Elizabeth (Lizzie) Howard, and Group Publishing Director, Lucy Melville, who supported the project.

Finally, and mostly, I acknowledge and thank my closest colleague in work and in life – my wife, Dr Gail Kenning, with whom I share a marvellous journey of learning and discovery.

Jim Macnamara

The Author

Jim Macnamara is a Distinguished Professor in the School of Communication at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS). He is also a Visiting Professor to the London School of Economic and Political Science, Media and Communications Department, and the London College of Communication.

He is an internationally recognized authority on evaluation of public communication and a pioneer in the study of organizational listening in and by government, corporations, and non-government and non-profit organizations and institutions.

In addition to leading The Organizational Listening Project over the past decade, his research has included evaluation of the World Health Organization’s COVID-19 and World Health Days communication globally from early 2020 to 2023.

He also has advised the UK Government Communication Service (GCS) and the European Commission Directorate-General for Communication (DG COMM) on evaluation of public communication and conducted studies of community engagement and consultation by government departments and agencies in Australia.

Jim has received numerous awards in recognition of his work including The Don Bartholomew Award¹ in 2017 for “outstanding service to the communications industry” presented by the International Association for Measurement and Evaluation of Communication (AMEC) in London and The Pathfinder Award,² “the highest academic honour” awarded by the Institute for Public Relations (IPR) in the USA for scholarly research.

Before taking up an academic post in 2007, he was the founder and CEO of a leading computer-aided research company specializing in media content analysis.

He is the author of more than 100 academic journal articles, book chapters, and conference papers, and 16 books including the first edition of Organizational Listening: The Missing Essential in Public Communication (Peter Lang, 2016); Evaluating Public Communication: New Models, Standards, and Best Practice (Routledge, 2018), and Beyond Post-Communication: Challenging Disinformation, Deception, and Manipulation (Peter Lang, 2020).

Introduction – Why Organizational Listening II?

The first edition of this book titled Organizational Listening: The Missing Essential in Public Communication broke new ground when it was published in 2016. It reported the first stage of The Organizational Listening Project, a research study undertaken between 2013 and 2015 that examined how, and how well, corporate, government, and non-government organizations (NGOs) in Australia, the UK, and the USA listen to their stakeholders,¹ such as their employees, shareholders, and customers, and constituents such as members, patients, students, and local communities. The findings collected from 36 organizations identified an overwhelming focus in organization-public communication on distributing information and persuasive messages (i.e., speaking) and concluded that “most organizations listen sporadically at best, often poorly, and sometimes not at all”.²

Eminent Professor of Media, Communications, and Social Theory at the London School of Economics and Political Science, Nick Couldry, described the research as “of international significance”.³

Until then, despite a large body of literature related to interpersonal listening – i.e., in dyads and small groups – there was very little published research and guidance on how organizations can and should listen as part of public communication. While many of the sociological, psychological, and ethical principles related to interpersonal listening apply in an organization-public context, there are substantial differences. As explained in detail in Chapter 3, organizations are commonly expected to listen at scale (e.g., to thousands, hundreds of thousands, or even millions of people in the case of governments). Because of scale, they are required to listen through delegated channels such as customer relations units or research departments. Furthermore, organizational listening needs to be applied to mediated voice such as written complaints, correspondence, reports of calls to call centres, submissions, and comments on social media platforms. The techniques of listening in oral-aural communication do not apply to asynchronous, delegated, mediated, listening at scale.

Since the first edition was published, The Organizational Listening Project continued to Stage 2, which examined listening in and by UK government departments and agencies leading up to and in the wake of the shock Brexit vote (2016–2017). It then progressed to a third stage that focussed on listening in and by three operating companies of a multinational group in 2018–2019.

Also, half a dozen cognate studies were conducted concurrently and subsequently, as well as an increasing number of studies by other researchers specifically examining listening to employees, consumers, young people, ethnic minorities, and other marginalized groups. Some examined listening as part of public relations, health communication, and what is increasingly referred to as strategic communication. All have continued to find a predominant focus on information distribution (speaking) and minimal attention and resources for listening by organizations.

Why does this matter? ‘So what’ is a question that researchers are trained to ask.

Nick Couldry discussed why “voice matters” in his important 2010 book.⁴ In democracies, vox populi, the voice of the people, is the basis of legitimacy for government and an equitable society. However, unless voices are listened to, they have no effect and expression of voice has no value.

Couldry’s writing on voice was among several sources of inspiration that triggered The Organizational Listening Project. The other major trigger was my three-decades of evaluating public communication of governments, corporations, NGOs, and non-profit organizations (NPOs). This consistently found that even multimillion-dollar public communication campaigns often fail to achieve their objectives. The reasons found in evaluation studies included:

• • Lack of understanding of target audiences’ interests, concerns, and needs;
• • Lack of knowledge of target audiences’ most used and trusted channels of communication;
• • As a result of the above, setting objectives that are not SMART,⁵ such as objectives that are not achievable, or not relevant to target audiences.

Each of these shortcomings results from a lack of listening to those who some refer to as publics, or as audiences, or specifically as target audiences, as noted above. These terms and their positioning of those with whom organizations seek to communicate are examined in Chapter 1. Meanwhile, for brevity, the term stakeholders is used to include all such individuals and groups.

It is now 10 years since the original pilot study in three organizations that began The Organizational Listening Project. The 10^th anniversary of the beginning of this project is another reason for a new edition. But more than symbolism, or a minor update, this text traverses new ground and expands the field of organizational listening studies. My primary research into how organizations listen, or don’t, has now taken place in 60 organizations on three continents and involved more than 300 interviews; analysis of more than 600 documents; more than 80 meetings and forums; analysis of hundreds of websites and thousands of social media posts; and more than a year of direct first-hand observation (ethnography) inside organizations.

In addition, more than a dozen studies by other researchers are drawn on in reaching conclusions and making recommendations. Collectively, this research makes a significant contribution to theory and guidelines for best practice. Beyond building theory of organizational listening, this volume contains substantial practical advice on methods, tools, systems, and processes for effective ethical listening by organizations.

At the same time, this analysis recognizes that some forms of organizational listening are problematic. For instance, while national security is an important issue in all countries, there is considerable concern that listening to gain intelligence – military, political, or commercial – can infringe privacy and human rights. Also, companies have been found to be engaging in surveillance and capturing personal data from social media sites and other sources and using it to manipulate voting or consumer behaviour. The 2016 Cambridge Analytica scandal involving misuse of the Facebook data of 87 million users was a ‘wake up’ moment,⁶ but far from the last of such scandals.

Espionage and unethical listening practices are not what is proposed in this book. The organizational listening that is described and advocated is ethical listening as part of engagement and dialogue between organizations and their stakeholders. Such listening is essential for communication to occur.

Without listening we are left with monologue that creates silence by others – and even silences others.

Without listening, organizations operate in ignorance of the views, interests, concerns, and useful feedback and suggestions of their allegedly valued employees, customers, business partners, and other stakeholders.

A lack of listening eventually leads to disengagement and disjuncture in relationships.

Disengagement and breakdowns in relationships between citizens and organizations that are central to organized societies are potentially made permanent through a loss of trust. The “crisis of trust”⁷ that currently pervades many societies and afflicts governments, corporations, and media is yet another reason for this updated volume.⁸

Conversely, active listening by the organizations that play central roles in society can yield significant benefits. Organizational listening can lead to increased employee engagement and satisfaction, resulting in increased employee retention and reduced recruitment and training costs. As one of the studies reported in this book shows, organizational listening can result in customer loyalty and retention, leading to increased profits, as well as inform the development of improved products and services. Increased listening by government can stimulate increased engagement and democratic participation to address a concerning democratic deficit,⁹ and contribute to better policy. These and other benefits of effective organizational listening are discussed with evidence in the following chapters.