Issue - meetings

Report of the Director – Finance and Corporate Services

The Communications and Customer Services Manager presented the Council’s External Communications Strategy to the Group.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager explained that the Council would usually develop five to ten year strategies but that this was a three year strategy to allow for further adaptation in line with resident and Councillor behaviour and expectation. He explained that this was in some part due to adaptation to a post covid-19 era and also due to the rapid nature of change in the communications and customer services arena, impacted by the wider financial landscape.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager explained that there were a variety of channels through which residents could feed back to the Council, one of which being the Residents’ Survey which would take place in 2025, before the Strategy expired which meant that it could be taken into account.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager said that external communications needed to be timely and engaging, clear, accurate, inclusive and informative, and to utilise a variety of channels and mediums to ensure that as many residents as possible were informed. The Group was informed that whilst there was an ever growing digital audience who were engaged with the Council, there was also a large percentage of residents who didn’t engage, perhaps who were digitally active but chose not to, or perhaps who were not digitally engaged at all.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager said that external communications were critical to strengthening the Council’s relationship with residents and communities in delivering the Council’s vision for the Borough and in communicating the Council’s priorities and activities which had been designed to meet the needs of the community.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager said that the internal communications strategy focussed on internal stakeholders such as Councillors and staff and was particularly important during and post covid-19. He explained that it required continual review to ensure that the methods remained effective in keeping internal parties feeling integrated and connected to the Council’s internal objectives.

In relation to the Action Plan, the Communications and Customer Services Manager said that education about Council services was important, including the ways in which this could be done. The Group was informed that social media development, adapting to new channels and new trends in channels and advocacy and behaviour change would be important. The Group was informed that the Council’s email subscription service which was sent out on Sunday mornings had circa four thousand subscribers and the Council was committed to developing this as a means of reaching residents in a convenient way. The Group was also informed of the importance of aligning both digital and non-digital communications, with Rushcliffe Reports circulated three times a year to every household in the Borough, as potentially the main direct communication that the non-digitally engaged had with the Council.

The Communications and Customer Services Manager added that the team would look at conducting a skills survey to assess who read what survey to ensure communications were  ...  view the full minutes text for item 30