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Patty Ewy wondered how to revise the company staff newsletter to make
it more palatable. Tough call, Patty. What are the objectives of
those who dumped the job on you? How large is the company and what's
the prevailing atmosphere (i.e., does everyone know everyone else,
and enjoy insider jokes)? What do the staff like and dislike about
the newsletter? How radically can you change things without stomping
hard on the toes of those originally responsible for the job? Without
knowing these things, you're on shaky ground. In general, the goal of
a staff newsletter is to build a sense of community and keep everyone
up to date on what's going on in the lives of their colleagues. That
being said:
>From the example you gave, it sounds like you want to make the
newsletter sound a bit more conservative or professional, but you may
be going too far in your suggestion "no more weddings and births".
These are always popular. The solution is probably to treat these as
a monthly (or whatever) column, and strip them of the cutesy phrases
that annoy you ("what put the sparkle in Cindy-Lou's eyes?")... but
don't lose the announcements themselves or the accompanying photos,
because people love them. Other material that's appropriate: suitably
neutral jokes (e.g., no blond jokes unless you're the only blond!),
amusing stories that have implications for staff, creative writing
and essays (held to your minimum standards and screened for corporate
political correctness), cartoons... the sky's the limit. One other
thing that's useful is the sort of stuff I submit for our own staff
newsletter: useful general-interest Web sites, consumer reports
articles, training resources and opportunities, newspaper or
magazine articles that bear directly on FERIC's business, etc.
Although it's common to include corporate business (e.g., info. from
human resources dept.), I think that's generally inappropriate; let
management send this stuff around by memo, not in your newsletter.
Good enough for a start?
--Geoff Hart @8^{)}
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca
Hart's corollary to Murphy's law: "Occasionally, things really do work
right."
