Less Chatter, More Matter: The Communications Podcast

#81 A case study on how to communicate globally (ft. Cassandra Thurston)

August 21, 2024 • Mel Loy • Season 1 • Episode 81

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Welcome back to another episode of the Less Chatter, More Matter podcast and this week, we have a big treat for you! The incredible Cassandra Thurston, Global Communications Manager at Flight Centre Travel Group, has joined us to shed light on all things internal comms and a global workforce.

She shares her expertise on managing internal communications for a global workforce alongside over two decades of experience in PR and employee communications. Cass discusses the challenges of reaching a geographically dispersed and diverse employee base while highlighting the strategies her teams have taken to unify their communications platforms, leverage data and AI tools, and create concise and targeted messaging. 

Cass also talks about her journey into internal comms, the impact of COVID-19 on Flight Centre, and the innovative programs that helped the company navigate the crisis. 

So... tune in for practical tips and insights on effective internal communication practices and get into it! 

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Mel:

Here's the situation. You're responsible for internal comms at a large company, and we're talking big - anywhere from 5, 000 to 10, 000 to 50, 000 employees. And there's more. Those 10, 000 plus employees are based all over the world in different countries, different time zones, speaking different languages. But that's not all. The added complication is that many of those people aren't in front of a computer all day. Or if they are, they're certainly not looking at their communication channels. They are busy doing their jobs, supporting your customers. So, how do you communicate effectively in this situation? In internal comms, this is a tale and a struggle as old as time... how to reach hard to reach people. But today's guest is going to lift the lid on how one global organisation is tackling this challenge head on. Cassandra Thurston is the Global Communications Manager for Flight Centre Travel Group. Flight Centre Travel Group is a homegrown success story here in Australia, having started with just one tour bus called Argus in the late 1980s. And under the leadership of its founder, Skroo Turner, it is now one of the world's largest travel agency groups with over 30 brands, company owned operations in 25 countries, and a corporate travel management network that spans more than 90 countries. It employs more than 15, 000 people globally and has twice been judged as Australia's best employer. Now, before joining Flight Centre Travel Group in early 2019, Cass held senior global communication, change management, and PR roles for international mining and premium horticulture companies, as well as global retail jewellery giant, Michael Hill Group. Cass is an ex journalist and PR and communications veteran of 23 years and lives in Brisbane with her partner and her two children and her two cats, in this episode, Cass gives us a peek behind the curtain into how they manage internal comms at Flight Centre, what they found works well, what to avoid, and how insights gathered from data is helping them continuously involve their comms. This was a great chat. You will get so much out of what Cass shares. So here it is. Enjoy the episode. Well, hi Cass and welcome to the show.

Cass:

Thanks, Mel. I am super excited to be here. Um, I've been listening to your podcast since day one. Um, so I am fangirling a little bit

Mel:

right back at you. Um, so tell us a little bit about you. Who are you? What do you do? How did you come to develop your expertise in that space?

Cass:

Yeah, sure. So look, like a lot of employee comms professionals, I accidentally fell into this world after some time working as a newspaper journalist. Um, so at the time I was in my early twenties, I was working for Zespri International, um, which is the world's largest kiwi fruit exporter based in New Zealand, and I was part of the media and investor relations team. So I was given employee comms one day to look after, um, in the role of comms coordinator. And it's really corny to say, but I just instantly fell in love with the discipline, and I've been working in this space now for over two decades. So during that time, I've had a number of roles in public relations and change management and investor relations, but I've always been involved with employee comms in some way. And it's just something I can't let go of because I enjoy it so much. So in my current role with Flight Centre Travel Group, I look after internal comms for our global group, um, so that includes comms support for our task force team made up of our global CEOs and our founder, Skroo Turner.

Mel:

Oh, awesome. And it's funny, isn't it, how, uh, I was reflecting, um, I was journalism background as well and did journalism as my undergrad degree, but Never thought in a million years I'd end up in internal comms. So we didn't even know what it was.

Cass:

No, no, I mean, it was just literally communications and it just happened to be where you would communicate with your employees. Yeah.

Mel:

That's it. Yeah. Yeah. So to end up in that stream is, um, I agree. I, I wouldn't have it any other way now. I actually, I love internal comms. So tell us a bit about the Flight Centre travel group. How many people do you have? Where are they based?

Cass:

Yeah, sure. So for many people listening, you'll be familiar with Flight Centre. So that's our flagship retail brand. And these are the red and white shops that you'll see in your local Westfield shopping centre or on the main street of your town. And for those in Australia and New Zealand. You've probably got that really famous television jingle with the captain in your head about now, but we are so much bigger than that. So Flight Centre travel group, you know, we call ourselves a homegrown success story. We started with just one tour bus in the 1980s and that was top deck travel. So under the leadership of our founders, Skroo Turner is now one of the world's largest travel agency groups. We've got over 30 brands. We've got company owned operations in 25 countries and a corporate travel management network that spans more than 90 countries. And so our brands range from Flight Centre to corporate business travel companies like FCM and Corporate Traveller. We have hotel chains and tour operators in Southeast Asia and that goes all the way through to retail companies such as 99 Bikes. We employ over 15, 000 people, um, around about now before COVID we had over 20, 000, uh, and our global headquarters are based here in South Brisbane. Uh, and that's where the majority of our senior leadership team is based.

Mel:

It's so much bigger than I think most people realise as you would be well aware. Like I actually had no idea you had hotels. Yeah, there you go. Um, and I do want to sort of, you know, mention COVID there because Flight Centre is quite. Uh, I guess famous in the right way for, you know, what happened during COVID in terms of obviously the travel industry was completely decimated and yet Flight Centre has come out the other side. Could you tell us a bit about that journey?

Cass:

Yeah, sure. So I had started with flight Centre travel group a year prior to that. So I was looking after PR and communications for our corporate brands at that time. Uh, and it was around, I can remember sort of that November, uh, time in 2019. And we'd started to sort of hear about this virus making the rounds, but you know, to be honest at the time, uh, as a company, we weren't really concerned, you know, we'd survived SARS, 9 11, the collapse of ANSETT. These really Big, massive events that had huge impact on the travel industry at the time. So we were sort of prepared to kind of ride it out. And then, I mean, the rest is history. Um, the actual devastation to the travel industry at that time. Um, it was almost overnight where a billion dollars in refunds, um, that we had to make to customers, uh, we went from.... 20, 000 employees down to, I think it was just over 3, 000 at the time. Um, so it was a lot of work and heartbreaking work, obviously having to communicate to our employees that they were either being put on stood down, stand down, hibernation. Um, in some cases we had to make people redundant as well to try and survive the massive impact it was having to us. Um, We were very fortunate going into COVID. We had a very healthy cash balance at that time, but we quickly, you know, made our way through that cash reserve and, you know, there are moments, it was literally hour to hour, where we're going to survive, uh, as a company. Um, so you know, a very tough, uh, 12 to 24 months in that regard. Um, but one of the, the smartest things that we did as a company at the time was to create an alumni program. Uh, and we've won awards, uh, for this program since. And when we were making people, uh, go in to stand down, um, we created a external facing website where people could sort of keep in touch with us because they were locked out of company systems, unfortunately, uh, and through there we would send weekly emails out to them. We kept all their benefits going to try and help them financially. Um, we would put job postings. So as soon as we were able to start recruiting, we would go to our alumni, um, network first. And that actually enabled quite a number of, um, really positive stories where say someone was working in our corporate travel brand before, they would come back as a personal trainer, um, in our health company, Healthwise. So some really great success stories have been able to bring our people back. And, you know, I think the numbers sort of between three and 4, 000, um, people we were able to bring back into new roles, um, within the company, which has been great.

Mel:

Yeah. And I guess, oh, a couple of things I take out of that one is, um, you know, that need to pivot the way we think about internal comms and employee comms differently. So in terms of setting up that external facing website to be able to keep that goodwill, but also that need to, you know, there's so much corporate knowledge that gets lost when we go through mass redundancies or whatever it is. So let's talk about today. Where does internal comms sit in the business and how does it align with other comms, like your PR, your external comms?

Cass:

Yeah, sure. So, like many companies, internal comms has had many different forms within Flight Centre. It has sat in so many different teams over the years. You know, it's reported through to marketing, we've had it into finance at one stage, HR, you name it. It's tried to find a home. So where we are at the moment, we're currently at the tail end of a very big globalisation project as a company. So the good news is internal comms now has representation in each of our four pillars, or we call them divisions. So we have a leisure brand, corporate brands. our supply and then our global business services, which is sort of also known as support or head office. So we have a comms manager in each of these pillars and they have responsibility for both PR and internal comms, uh, as well. So this is relatively a new structure, um, that has been put into play. And, um, And the good thing about that is it's shone a light on internal comms and the need, um, you know, to make sure that we are effectively communicating with our people and giving them the right information at the right time as well. So it has been a big success for us to get internal comms up to that level. So to ensure that we are all aligned across those four divisions, we have a global community of practice. So this is where all our communication teams across the globe come together and we facilitate information sharing. And we're working on what's called a one best way for internal comms for the company.

Mel:

Oh, that's awesome. So I guess that takes me to my next question. What are the main goals of internal comms at Flight Centre?

Cass:

Yeah, sure. So our main goals are pretty simple. We want to ensure our people, no matter what role they're in or what brand they are in, that they have easy access to the information they need to do their job and they feel a connection to our company purpose, which is to open up the world for those that want to see. We want to ensure that our people feel that really true connection to our core values of irreverence, ownership, and egalitarianism as well. So we have a saying when it comes to internal comms at Flight Centre is we want to meet our people where they are at. So this means not actually mandating information in just one spot, say the intranet, we recognise that everyone has a different preference in the way that they consume information. And that's changed drastically with the use of social media and as new generations enter the workforce. So we will ensure that the information is actually available in a number of channels and different styles as well. So this means that our people can get the information on email or workplace or the intranet, SharePoint or Teams. And since bringing that model in, we have seen a big improvement in engagement rates, um, which has been, yeah, fantastic to see. So during my time leading, yeah, internal comms at Flight Centre. We've also introduced what's called a marketing mindset to the way that we create and send our comms. So this involves really understanding who our target audience are, the way that they prefer to consume the content, and then finding really creative ways of getting that messaging across. And as part of that, you know, we've seen for a first time the focus on collecting and reviewing data on a regular basis as well. So a couple of years ago, I introduced HubSpot to send our internal emails across all our brands globally. So for those that know HubSpot, it has a fantastic analytics engine powering it, and we're making sure that we are analysing that data to see how our people are consuming the information. So we see how long they're reading it for, are they just glancing, are they spending a decent amount of time, you know, working their way down. We can see heat maps of where they are clicking, how many times they go back and read the email. Um, we've also introduced user journeys and AB testing too. So these are all marketing tools that have adapted incredibly to our internal communications world.

Mel:

Yeah, I love that. And I think it's something that, uh, internal comms is kind of lagged behind. Definitely up until recently in terms of that data gathering and that... a B testing, you know, a lot of that stuff. Yeah. It's been done in marketing for years. Why are we doing it internally? Yeah. You know,

Cass:

it's interesting. So when we first started having a chat with HubSpot, um, about bringing in, uh, you know, software like that. And, you know, we spoke to Unily and StaffBase and so many other companies. Um, and we're actually one of the very first companies to adopt HubSpot internally. So we don't use it to send externally to our customers. We use other software for that. Um, but yeah, they were really interested to kind of watch what we were doing. And because it has been such a success, um, there are, they're using us as a user case now for other companies to follow the same path.

Mel:

Can you give me any examples from the data that you've been able to gather from that, that you've found an insight or something that's changed the way you've approached something?

Cass:

Yes, so for us, definitely length of emails. Um, so there's always been this massive push to just include everything and every picture and every graph and every hyperlink you can think of because there's this sort of fair base of, well, you're only going to get them once, right? So let's just throw it all in there. But what the data is showing us is the amount of time they are either glancing at Um, or fully reading the email too. So by going back over and just looking at that trends, um, we cut it right down. So, you know, we're talking just a couple of paragraphs using bullet points and then a massive read more button. So that will take them through to the intranet or it will take them through to workplace as well. So it felt quite counterintuitive to begin with. It's like, well, why are we, yeah, why are we restricting it so much? But through that testing process, we were able to show, well, look, no, they get interested because we are only giving them a little snippet or a little taste of what it is. And then they are clicking on that button and going through, you know, to read the information.

Mel:

I love that. Uh, and it's one of the benefits of being in a big company too, right? Um, you do have a huge number of staff and a lot of them, you know, they, of course, they're sitting in front of computers all day, but they're busy. They're serving customers. They're doing their job. How do you reach people... who are hard to reach effectively?

Cass:

Yeah. So look, as you say, as a fact, we've got 30 brands. Um, I think we're up to 31 now with the introduction of cruise about, which is our dedicated, um, cruise company. You know, each of their brands, it's got its own personality. They've comms channels, different tone of voice and ways of working. And also just the location of where they are, whether that's in Australia or around the world too. So that really complicates things. So it can be sort of hard to work out what is that one best way to operate internal comms, particularly with, you know, people who are either in front of a computer or they're working from home, you know, they aren't based in an office. You know, I'll be fully honest. It's still a journey that we're on and we don't have the answers yet, but we are working through that. So, you know, when we look at a workforce and customer facing roles, um, you know, they don't have time during the day to check emails or the homepage of the intranet. Their inbox, you know, we've gone through and done an audit. We've sat with them in store. It is hundreds and hundreds of emails just filling up, um, that inbox every single day, so we've been working super hard on trying to reduce that noise, um, that is hitting their inboxes. So. You know, we've achieved this. Um, one of the most recent examples is a new comms channel called the huddle pack. So this gets sent to team leaders, um, on a fortnightly basis. So the team leader will then take their team through this important information and their am planner. Uh, and this is a meeting that teams have every single day before the doors open in store. So our people have now been trained to know that the information in this Pack is very crucial to their job, so they will sit there and they will listen and then act on the call to action that we're asking them to do. Another couple of ways we've sort of tried to improve things for our regional teams, we've worked with our IT team to mandate the home page of our intranet opening up. Very first. So when you log in, it is the first thing that smacks you in the face. Um, our SharePoint page, which is called Landine. Um, so that has helped immensely. Um, we also control the screensavers across all computers in Australia. And we've just rolled this out in the UK as well. So that has been one of the most simplest things to implement, but one of the most powerful. Yeah.

Mel:

How do you educate stakeholders in, in, in good communication practices and, and what your channels are there for?

Cass:

Yeah. So again, a big area we are working on sort of under this one best way banner as well. Um, so when we pulled our comms team together a couple of years ago on the back, on the other side of COVID, um, we did spend a lot of time going into senior leader meetings, doing a lot of awareness training on what all the different channels were and where you would go to post that information as well. Um, you know, so for us, our main channels are things like email, uh, workplace, and then the intranet, uh, too. So it took a lot of time and effort to do that. You know, we're talking months and months by the time that we got around everyone, but that paid dividends, uh, in the end, um, you know, to be able to see a pretty healthy increase in engagement rates and the number of times that our senior leaders were posting as well.

Mel:

Yeah, that's brilliant. So. Question. You've got, yeah, obviously we're using, still using a lot of channels that we used to use. And it's because they're effective channels, right? Like people, we can't get away from email as much as we'd like to think we could. But what are you doing to explore new tech like AI and virtual reality?

Cass:

Yeah. So this is a world that we are monitoring so closely. And so already our comms teams are using AI tools. So look, we use chat GPT, we use Google Docs. All the time to assist with writing with some of our comms. And quite often, it's just that moment to get things going. So we've all been there. You know, you're sitting in front of your computer, you've got to smash out an email that needs to go out from this leader, you're brain dead, you're tired. Quite often, I will just put something into BARD and it will give me an email. Just that little prompt to get going. Um, so of course we still need to fact check and closely edit the copy to ensure it is meeting our tone of voice. And we do have quite a particular tone of voice here at Flight Centre too. And most importantly, to make sure that it's accurate as well. Um, and another area we're looking at is online video editing solutions. And we're talking to a company called Vouch, which is a fantastic Australian company. It has an amazing AI engine powering it. So we can. Um, upload a video that we've recorded on our phone. We can easily add in other languages to that video, um, at a touch of a button. So before we were sending scripts to our teams in Singapore, um, you know, in Europe as well to get them to translate it for us. And this would just take so much time because people were doing that on top of, of their jobs. Um, so quite often, you know, it would take days if not weeks to get those translations through. So companies like Vouch are just awesome. Um, so yes, we're very excited about that partnership and we really hope to get that across the line soon. So yeah, look, it's certainly an area where we're actively embracing rather than shying away from.

Mel:

And I think you've spoken to, you know, the, yes, there's risk with AI, there's risks with any technology. And I mean, there's risks with email, anything you put in writing is a risk to a degree. But with AI, I think that the real potential that, I see. And you're obviously seeing as well is a, that thought starter creativity piece where you just go, as you say, brain dead, or, you know, I used it the other day, I was trying to come up with a name for a course that I'm running and I'm like, this is what the course is about and I need a fun name. That's, you know, and it came out with some really good ideas. I'm like, great. Like, cause I just, I had nothing., One more question on your world. So, what would be your three to five tips for organisations who do need to communicate with team members who are geographically dispersed?

Cass:

Yeah. So probably the first one, and I understand It is a big cost for companies to wear, and I'm aware of the privilege of working for a big global company that does have a lot of resource and budget to be able to do this. But to have that one unified comms platform somewhere, so whether this is SharePoint, as your Intranet, or you're using a social media platform such as Workplace, which is soon to be Workvivo, it really can help those team members in other regions feel connected and build that community as well. The, um, the second tip, uh, we really embrace town halls as one of our main communication channels to get everyone updated in one go. So we run these, um, both in person and virtually at the same time wherever possible. So we have one here in Australia.

Mel:

So like a hybrid kind of event?

Cass:

A hybrid one, yeah. So we call it all Aussie bulletins. Um, we get everyone in our head office up to date. Um, and our senior leadership team will present in person. But then we have the rest of Australia joining us online as well. We run that through Workplace, uh, with the Zoom integration. And that just means, um, oh sorry, and one more point, making sure that it's at a time that works for the majority of stores too. So we will schedule that around 3pm or 4pm in the afternoon where, you know, generally the bulk of customers, um, you know, have either visited the store and gone. Uh, so people do have, have that opportunity to sit in front of their computer and join in live. But we do enable a, a playback for retail staff who can't do that. Uh, a third tip is embracing two way dialogue, so don't be afraid to include live Q& A or ask for feedback or suggestions. And this is the hardest thing, but really insisting that your senior leadership actually answers them. It is such a great way to build trust with your regional audience. So if they've been brave enough to ask the question, you know, to be able to have a senior leader sit there and address it and answer it, it goes such a long way. Um, I'm just trying to think of the last one. So, probably, getting comfortable with repeating yourself, uh, I find that it, it really does help with your communication cut through.

Mel:

Mm. And I think it is that balance. So isn't it around swamping people, but as you say, it's actually, we need to repeat ourselves in different ways to different ways. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Because otherwise it's, um, yeah, as you say, we, us, it's that curse of knowledge. So, um, one unified comms platform, hybrid town halls at a great, at a time that works and having that playback option with timestamping, embracing live and two way dialogue. But as you say, the challenge here is just getting leaders to come on board with that and, uh, you know, repackaging and reiterating your, your key messages... to make sure they're hitting the mark. I love it. Cass, thank you so much. I have three questions that I ask every guest on the podcast. Are you ready for those?

Cass:

I am. Bring it on.

Mel:

Okay. Number one, what is one of the best communication lessons you've ever learned and how did it change the way you approach communication?

Cass:

So I used to say never underestimate the power of a free sausage roll at an all staff meeting. But on a more serious note. And it sounds so corny, but just keep it simple. And I talked about it before, but there's this real temptation to implement the latest tech offering or comms software that promises the world. But in two decades of working in internal comms: Email, newsletters, or just whack a poster on the wall in the break room, that is always going to outshine any other tool that you've got going. Toilet doors, oh my gosh, you've got a captive audience, you know, and we, we do. We put posters on the back of toilet doors.. Yeah. Um, and I think people, you know, some comms professionals, you know, they feel a bit weird about wanting to keep it basic, you know. We see on LinkedIn, we, we get. Promoted post all the time for the latest piece of software that promises the world and it's going to give you all these amazing Engagement rates, but you know those three things you can't beat it. The trick is to make sure you're including information that helps people with that connection piece. So you really need to have that emotional connection or the what's in it for me?

Mel:

Yeah, that's huge. Yeah, so simple but, uh, emotional. Well, not emotional, but simple but human, I guess. Thoughtful, yeah. Okay, second question. What's one thing you wish people would do more of or less of when communicating?

Cass:

Keep your emails and newsletters short. So really fighting that temptation to cram everything in. But look, people have got really short attention spans. Now you need to deliver that information so quickly. And this is actually where those AI tools we talked about come in handy. So you can run that content through a chat GPT or BARD and, and just ask for a summary of a certain number of words. And it's going to give you that. Uh, and it is just going to help you so much in your job.

Mel:

I love that. And I, it's. a use case I've used before, but also if you get something that's quite technical or jargony to just go, Hey, Um, can you explain, can you bring this, play this back to me simply in simple language? And often that's very helpful as well, especially if we're not engineers. So, you know, tell me what this actually means in plain English. Final question. Who do you turn to for communication advice?

Cass:

Yes, so I've found the IABC community here in Brisbane, uh, and globally online, just such a fantastic source of advice when it comes to communications. I am in the membership boards at least once a month asking for advice and look, I've been doing this for 23 years and I am still learning. So I found that super helpful. Um, also following, look, the likes of yourself, Mel, and other pioneers like Joanna Parsons, Rachel Miller, has really helped me immensely. Um, and I'm sure you agree, Mel, for so long now, the world of internal comms, it's been a hidden one. We've been outshined by our cousins in marketing and PR, and it's just been so fantastic to see comms professionals like yourself shine a light on our profession and really talk about the incredible impact we can have on companies. And most importantly, um, the people that work for them as well.

Mel:

Yeah, I love that. And yeah, I agree. Joanna and Rachel are great to follow on LinkedIn. They share a lot of gold and, uh, yeah, to your point around internal comms being the poor cousin for so long. I think... companies have finally woken up to the fact that your reputation starts from within.

Cass:

Correct.

Mel:

So they were always so worried about what the media was saying, what shareholders were saying. Actually, it all starts from within. If you've got a really bad reputation within your business, that's going to spill over. So get it right internally.

Cass:

That's right. You know, we talk about those barbecue conversations, you know, what are people actually saying about your company, um, when someone's asking them or how's your job going or, you know, how things going at Flight Centre, you, you want people to genuinely feel, um, happy and engaged and positive.

Mel:

Yeah. Oh, that's awesome. Well, Cass, thank you so much for your time today. I know you're a very busy woman. If people would like to reach out to you or connect with you, what's the best way for them to do that?

Cass:

Sure. You can find me on LinkedIn. So please feel free to send me a direct mail. I do read them. It's sometimes it does take me a little, little bit of time because I do get quite a few requests coming through, but I would be more than happy to help answer any questions you've got or provide some advice, uh, on internal comms. And how you build a career in this absolutely amazing profession that we're in.

Mel:

And I can speak from experience. Cass is very generous with her time and knowledge and a very good human well, thanks so much Cass.

Cass:

Thanks, Mel!