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This is one of the key findings in a new report, 21st Century Leadership Communication, produced by Melcrum and The Company Agency.

In frank interviews with 18 CEOs and senior business leaders from a broad spectrum of organizations, words like "authenticity", "believability" and "genuineness" cropped up again and again when CEOs talked about their perceptions of good internal communication.

Lori LeBas, senior vice president, strategy and business operations at ESPN, says that there is a fair amount of spin that goes on that, in her opinion, is not necessary.

“There's often a desire for the message to be positive - the business is great, or earnings are up, etc. I think employees are smart enough to understand that things aren't always going great,” she adds.

Keeping it personal

The CEOs suggest that one of the key routes to authenticity is "keeping it personal", particularly now that employees have increased access to information and communicators need to break through the "noise" to connect with and engage them.

"I think a lot of us are coming down to a sleeves-rolled-up, sit-on-the-corner-of-the-desk approach, with 20 or 30 people at a time," says Keith Butler-Wheelhouse, CEO of Smiths Group.

In addition, "even if you're talking to lots of people," advises Paolo Cavalieri, CEO of Hollard Insurance Group, "you want them to feel as though you're talking directly to them individually."

Frustration with management

The expectation that CEOs have for internal communication to play a stronger role in delivering more sincere and authentic messages was also highlighted.

"Internal communication," says Rona Fairhead, CEO of The Financial Times Group, "is about making people feel part of an organisation, rather than cogs inside a big machine who don't really know what they're moving towards."

The CEOs interviewed also expressed frustration that other layers of management are unable or unwilling to step up and "do their bit" to improve the internal communication environment, often forcing the CEO to become a ready-made communication symbol and figurehead for everything.

"I'd like to see the next two or three levels of management regarding it as an absolutely core part of their role to be a more effective channel for two-way communication, rather than the risk you often get of some tiers in management being the sticking point on communication," says Paul Gray, who stepped down recently as chairman of HM Revenue and Customs.

Other themes to emerge from the research include conflicting priorities for CEOs and internal communicators, divided opinions about the role of social media, and the desire for a deeper understanding of employee issues that goes beyond the findings of the latest engagement survey.

The report also includes a list of recommendations to help create more consistency between the communication goals and vision of both internal communicators and CEOs.

Related links

• Melcrum
• The Company Agency
• Century Leadership Communication