Before Covid-19 (and if you were lucky), you may have felt at home at work. At the best of times, your colleagues could even feel like family, celebrating your personal successes or scooping you up when you fall. 

And while many workplaces started to invest in cool office features, snacks and professional perks, to give every reason for an employee to stay, you were more like a part-time guest, contributing to a corporate mission during the workday. The rest of the day, for the most part, belonged to the you and whoever you shared their life with – at home.

Before Covid-19, your workspace, your office and equipment, and your time, were owned by the company. Coming to work marked an intentional, albeit part time, leaving behind of homelife and family for an expected, all-in focus on business success. 

IN PRE-PANDEMIC TIMES, THERE WAS AN IMPLIED COVENANT BETWEEN YOU AND YOUR COMPANY DURING THE WORKDAY. 

You could trust that the workplace would be safe and, ideally, would support your success.  When you were “on the clock,” you were expected to put in a “good days’ work” and contribute. In exchange, your employer wouldn’t necessarily bust into your after-hour moments, when an employee was otherwise off-the-clock (some companies are good at this, others fail miserably). Keeping the line between work and home clean, in theory if nothing else, was important. But it was also about respect – and respecting someone’s time and home life was just part of that covenant. 

Your family didn’t really come into the equation, unless there was an emergency, or someone was sick at home or needed to go to the doctor. Those situations were infrequent and not regular occurrences. And sure, once a year, there would be medical benefit communications that involved the topic of family. 

Pre-pandemic times, home and work life were opposite sides of the same coin, never really facing each other. Now, the cameo appearances of the son or daughter, or even a household pet during a Zoom staff meeting is increasingly expected. In fact, it injects a humanity into work life that is refreshing. 

NOW THE COIN IS STARTING TO LOOK THE SAME ON BOTH SIDES. 

When my first child was born something became even more clear to me – one of the reasons I went to work was to support bringing him into the world. So, having a child or kitty cameo on a Zoom call just helps all of us remember this shared motivation.

With our rapidly shifting work world, where an increasing number of employees now work from home, it can feel like the company is now the part-time guest in the employee’s house. While on a stroll through my neighborhood I can see these “new guest” setups proudly on display in the living rooms of my neighbors. Absent a dedicated office, the living room or dining room has been redefined as a combo space with a desk looking out the front window. The ownership of the workspace, office and equipment, and time is a bit more muddled. Home and work life seem more intertwined.

The issue of safety is also more muddled. With some notable exceptions, such those who are first responders, a majority of the workforce could expect a safe workplace. Going to work didn’t represent a risk to your health. 

I’m sure that my distant cousins who worked in the coal mines in West Virginia knew that each time they went down into the mine, their life was at risk, and there was a chance they might not return home that night. They also entered the mine with an expectation of black lung. But that is one distinct industry. But now, with a virus that we only partially understand, going to work isn’t so simple for nearly every industry. And for many it’s proven deadly. 

The Washington Post recently reported the deaths of hundreds of healthcare workers from exposure to COVID-19. “Simply reporting for work can mean gambling with your life, and the odds grow longer when masks and other personal protective equipment become difficult to get,” the article stated, noting concerns about shortages of PPE, or personal protective equipment.

Today, the issues of health and safety stretch beyond the employee and the team. For those who have to leave the house for work each day, coming home means they bring whatever they were exposed to with them. Multi-generational households take note. 

Respecting our elders takes on new meaning here. If I’m honest, the whole issue of respect needs redefining. Workplace decisions can be invasive to the health and well-being of an entire household. Child and kitty cameos aside, the line between work and homelife, indeed, just got very muddled.

I think there is an opportunity to learn about our colleagues from marketing have learned about respect and meeting people where they are at. For that, I have some clarity for you from 1998, a few years after I left a career in journalism and about the same year I took my first corporate communications job. That’s the year Seth Godin wrote Permission Marketing, Turning Strangers into Friends, and Friends into Customers – a time when newsletters were still printed, the internet was just a toddler and the intranets were very much in their infancy.

Godin’s point was that consumers should be able to choose how they were marketed to and once that choice was recognized, marketers could better understand and cater to their interests. 

From my perspective, inherent to Godin’s idea of permission was the idea of trust and respect – that if a consumer trusted a brand or company’s email and messages, they were more likely to become bigger fans and followers of the company. Good marketers don’t overwhelm and invade the life of the consumer – or bury their inbox in unsolicited email. Rather, marketers started to appreciate boundaries suggested by the consumer, meeting them where they were at.

Two decades later, marketing has learned quite a bit about the consumer. The quest for research about the consumer audience they target has only made their campaigns increasingly savvy and more successful. Arguably, the operating budgets of marketing departments are larger as a result. 

Internal communications can learn from marketing’s lead here. Clearly understanding the needs, wants and what defines our internal audiences is increasingly more and more important. We want our employees to be advocates and ambassadors of the brands.  We want them to know that we respect them. 

Covid-19 is teaching the owners and leaders of today’s workplace that coming to work isn’t as simple as punching in. The new covenant between the employee and the employer will require investments in trust and respect – both expressed and implied permission.

THE PICTURE OF THE WORKFORCE IS MUCH MORE NUANCED.  

When you see a large picture of company employees, do you see one group of people or do you see multiple teams of contributors uniquely adding to an organization’s success? Or do you now see a group of Zoom windows in an infinite Brady Bunch grid? Defining these faces as only employees is not enough. Understanding, defining and communicating with employees going forward will require understanding their unique needs and concerns and moving past a one-size-fits-all definition of who they are. 

Respect and trust. Sounds pretty good.

As internal communications professionals, we have an opportunity to do better for employee audiences. In the time of Covid-19, understanding how our companies are changing is an absolute must. That’s just the first half. Business acumen is important. But audience acumen is firmly and equally weighted in terms of importance. 

Our internal audiences will look to us for information, sense-making and explanation.  We also need to understand how employee audiences are also changing – that their kids, pets and parents may be part of the picture. 

Internal communications need to continually champion audience knowledge expertise. But like us, our subject matter experts, project managers, initiative leaders and internal clients need to have the same definition and understanding of our audiences now, not later. Truth be known, we are all guests now in the homes of our remote workforce. A company’s ask of employees leaving the home to come to work is certainly bigger and worthy of intentional respect for the employee.

As internal communication professionals, we can help champion both business and audience success and own this real-time dialogue that all companies should embrace. We can become thoughtful (and perhaps permanent) students, making sure we’re learning as much as we can about the audiences we serve. They’re changing every day. We need to change with them.

It’s time for all internal communications professionals to gain an intentional and shareable expertise – but not just on messaging, strategic guidance, engagement and culture. We need to be Audience Matter Experts. Our audiences and companies need this now more than ever.