Happy New Year to all my blog readers, I hope you’ve had a jolly festive season so far.
As the first day of 2016 draws to a close, I thought I’d look back at 2015 and give you a peek into what to expect from All Things IC communication consultancy in 2016.
Apologies for the abrupt end to my Christmas Countdown, I’ve been offline for personal reasons.
Coupled with celebrating my twin sons’ first birthdays on Christmas Day, it’s been a little hectic! You can catch up with the whole Countdown series by searching the Advent tag.
What went well for you in 2015. What will you be doing differently in 2016?
I spent the majority of the year on maternity leave, and returned to work in September. Thank you to my existing and new clients for hiring All Things IC.
I’ve had the privilege of working with some fantastic professionals to help them, their teams and organisations achieve communication excellence.
This has included working alongside the communication teams at PRS for Music, Harrods, Hammersmith & Fulham Council, Heathrow Express, The Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea and Westminster City Council.
From running one-day training courses to consulting on recruitment, intranets and conducting internal communication audits, I’ve continued to enjoy the variety of my work.
In November I delivered a course I wrote on social media strategy for the Institute of Internal Communication (IoIC). I’ll be running it again in July 2016.
Enjoyed running course on social media strategy for @IoICNews today. Excellent discussions & queries from Comms pros pic.twitter.com/1MFVBksds7
— Rachel Miller (@AllthingsIC) November 17, 2015
All Things IC’s 2016 diary is filling up fast, and I’ve got some plans up my sleeve. I can give you a peek into something I’m plotting.
I hired Emma Williamson to oversee the creation of some mini booklets on crisis communication and am delighted with the result, thank you Emma and the team at Iguana. More info to come on how I’ll be using them.
My 2016 plans for All Things IC are shaping up. Thank you Emma Williamson & @IguanaCre8, just received these ? pic.twitter.com/edM9mDxQ9M — Rachel Miller (@AllthingsIC) December 24, 2015
Judging awards and supporting the industry
I enjoyed judging industry awards in 2015 including the CIPR Inside awards, the Public Sector Communications Awards (which I’m pictured presenting at) and Comms2Point0 Unawards.
Don’t forget there’s still time to nominate an IC Hero as part of the CIPR Inside awards. The closing date is 8 January 2016.
All Things IC was a media partner or sponsor for various events including PR Week’s Strategic Internal Communications conference, Internal Communications Europe 2015 and PR Week 360, plus Transform Magazine’s Employer Brand Management conference.
If you are organising an event and can offer my readers a discounted rate, please get in touch.
New features
In 2015 I introduced two new features to my blog. One was a free app so you can read articles on the go, plus my Sunday column What’s On This Week.
You can download the app from the App Store for free.
Thank you to everyone who linked to my blog during the year and to Alive With Ideas! who transformed my How to write an internal communication strategy article into an infographic.
All Things IC on the road
My speaking schedule included chairing a panel at the Public Sector Communications Academy in September, and presenting at the CIPR Inside annual internal communication conference in October.
It was good to catch up with lots of comms pros at these events after being on maternity leave. If you’d like to hire me to speak at your event, do please get in touch.
Further reading: One of the most popular articles on my blog from 2015 was Why women don’t speak at conferences.
That was fun. Thank you to my panel guests for sharing their thoughts on employee engagement #CommsAcad #lovemyjob pic.twitter.com/Z8CFrqq06j
— Rachel Miller (@AllthingsIC) November 10, 2015
Life with three very young children is proving happily hectic, and one thing which I won’t be doing in 2016 is my All Things IC podcast.
My thanks to the FIR network and its founders Shel Holtz and Neville Hobson for their encouragement and I wish you both continued success. I’m sad to have to stop recording, and hope to dust off my microphone in future should time allow.
Find a new role and plan your time
What are your plans for 2016? January is typically the time of year when thoughts turn to careers. Keep an eye on the jobs page I introduced in 2014 to see what roles are around.
My popular communications calendar is filling up fast for 2016 – it’s the place to see what awards, conferences and courses are happening for comms pros globally. I highlight the list every Sunday in my What’s on This Week column.
The year ahead
My thanks to everyone who guest blogged , I featured 20+ writers during my Advent series in December, so hopefully you got to discover some new voices and enjoyed reflecting back.
I would love to continue featuring comms pros during 2016. Do please thoroughly read my guidelines before getting in touch with an idea of how you can feature.
You can subscribe to my blog to never miss a post.
Finally I’d like to thank you as ever for stopping by and being loyal readers and wish you a healthy and happy 2016.
Rachel
Post author: Rachel Miller
Published on All Things IC blog 1 January 2016.
