IoIC Member Spotlight: what I'd tell anyone starting in internal comms

I was recently featured in the Institute of Internal Communication's Member Spotlight, and it felt like a good moment to share a few thoughts here too.

You can read the full spotlight on the IoIC website. Below are the parts I think are most useful if you work in internal comms, or are just getting started.

I didn't take the usual route

I never studied communications, and I didn't go to university. I learned the job inside organisations, starting with an intranet at a large bank where the site I worked at barely existed online. That taught me early on to look at everything from where the employee is standing, and it is still where we start every project at The Comms Guru.

Strategy only counts when people can feel it

A strategy nobody experiences is just a document. That is why we pair strategy with hands-on delivery: intranets, campaigns, channel governance and Microsoft 365 work. It is also why every project gets a core team plus trusted specialists, chosen for that piece of work.

Why the IoIC matters to me

Membership connects me with people tackling the same problems from different angles, and it is a regular reminder that internal comms rarely has one right answer. I want to give something back, which is why we share practical tools for nothing, including our free internal comms templates.

Advice for anyone starting out

• Be curious about how the organisation works. HR, operations, leadership, technology and data all shape what lands.
• Ask why before you send. It is fine to challenge a request to just get a message out.
• Experiment with AI, but keep your judgement. It can speed up the work. It cannot understand your people for you.
• Remember the job is people. Everything else is a channel.

Thank you to the IoIC team for the spotlight. If you would like to carry on the conversation, join it on LinkedIn.

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