We had the opportunity to interview Aliénor Rouffet, founder ofLa Part des Anges,an agency specializing in consulting, support, and training in corporate communications. She has also taken an interest in employee ambassador initiatives and shares her views on the subject here.

Aliénor R: Ifyou want your employees to be committed to your company, the first step is to engage them. We often train employees to be committed to their company, but we forget to train the company to be committed to its employees.

We forget to train directors and managers so that they themselves are committed to their teams. Ultimately,it's a question of adoption.  For example, when we talk about adoption for children, we forget to talk about adoption for parents, even though it's a real team effort. The child is adopted, but so is the parent. It's a bit the same between employer and employee...

Aliénor R: Not necessarily. What I mean is that we often forget that it's a team effort and that it works if there issymmetryin terms ofattention andrecognition. An employee who engages in employee advocacy recognizes the value of their company, so the company must also recognize the value of its employees, in all their diversity, skills, and abilities. Because without symmetry, there is no balance. And without balance, it doesn't work. You can't engage in a viral and free initiative without symmetry of attention. The approach works on awin-win basis.

Aliénor R: Themain challengeis to move away from corporate communication, from a polished discourse that is no longer credible today. Moving away from sanitized discourse means returning to authentic communication. And ultimately, who are the drivers of authenticity in a company? They are the employees, provided they are not biased by the pressure of management policy, the pressure to deliver results, and the pressure of standardized communication.

The challenge is togive employees a voice againin order to restore authenticity in the workplace. Employees talk about their experiences, whether good or bad—that's part of the game of authenticity.

Aliénor R:Absolutely. It's like in everyday relationships: you have to be honest and transparent, otherwise it doesn't work. But to achieve this, the company must be sufficiently established and confident in its operations and practices, because it will be giving its employees a certain amount of freedom to speak their minds, without any prior control. If you open Pandora's box and let everyone speak, you don't really know what's going to come out. But if everyone is proud of each other, there's nothing to worry about, things won't get out of hand. (laughs)

Aliénor R: It alldepends on the type of company you are targeting. For a service provider, it means reaching awider audience,gaining credibility, improving visibility, and ultimately offering better services.In any case, the goal is to do business. 

In other cases, employee advocacy is part of a collective intelligence approach. The idea is to get the whole team on board so that the end result is more relevant, with more varied and broader perspectives.

Aliénor R: Initially, as with any process involving change, a sponsor is needed to champion the initiative. In this case, it is usually theHR and communicationsmanagers, as implementation remains a communications initiative. The process is often led bya joint HR and communications team.

Indeed, in order to get employees on board, to engage and convince them, it is essential to exchange ideas and communicate with them.

Aliénor R:First of all, hyper-control of messages. The idea behind employee advocacy is to let employees speak freely (on social media, for example). The company seeks cohesion and virality, without a priori control. There may be some rebalancing after the fact if managers feel that employees are expressing themselves a little too vehemently.The other obstacle iscontrol before people express themselves. If you restrict their communication too much, you restrict their speech, and that goes against the whole approach.

To avoid these pitfalls, it is recommended that you implementan employee advocacy charter. Thiswill set out the framework for the initiative, like a contract of trust on which freedom of speech will be based. The charter specifies the channels through which employees can express themselves, such as social media, internal media, etc.

Another thing that can prevent the process fromworkingisa lack of feedback. Theprocessmust be supported before, during, and after. If employees commit their time, expertise, and authenticity and receive no feedback, it is very demotivating. Ultimately, as in any relationship, if there is no return on investment, the relationship will not last long, and that is normal.

And finally, I would saya lack of recognition. When you have employees who voluntarily participate in this process that benefits the company, and at no point is their individual and collective commitment valued, it doesn't work. Valuing your employees and teams is not that complicated, really. HR and communications teams know exactly how to do it. It's almost as simple as saying thank you! It's also possible to consider gestures of gratitude in the form of gift certificates, for example. In any case, this process is free for employees, it takes up their time, and if there is no recognition, it leads todisengagement.

Aliénor R : If you want to engage your employees, put yourself in a position where they can engage you too. This approachcreates more balanced managerial relationshipsbecause it also allows managers to get to know their employees better or to see them from a different perspective. We move away from the prism of annual results to focus onthe human angle. Employees can also reveal themselves during this type of approach. It brings a littlehumanitybackintomanagerial relationships, which are somewhat strained today. We are driven by results, figures, and performance, and we tend to forget the humanity in relationships. That's partly why the whole system is falling apart, actually (laughs).

The great benefit of this approach would be toreclaim interpersonal relationships by putting a little humanity back into results and objectives.

Thanks again, Aliénor 👍👍

for sharing this vision with us in this interview, and thank you for this wonderful collaboration. We hope you enjoyed it and that it has enriched your knowledge of employee advocacy. To round things off, we recommend continuing your reading with the article:Engaging your employees: a long-distance race for the company -> available here.

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