Abby Emanuelson
Consultant
In the public and social sector, having an advocacy program usually refers to a campaign of educating individual members on a policy that impacts them and then asking them to make a phone call to their state legislator or email their member of Congress. Thankfully, today’s advocacy technology has simplified the education and engagement process for advocates. Now, an advocate can receive a text message from a campaign manager, then call their legislator, and post their action on their social network in less than 60 seconds.
When I first started running issue campaigns, volunteer phone trees and legal pads were more reliable to track engagement than the email tools at the time. In those early days and throughout my career, my coworkers’ activism has been the constant and the foundational response to any state and/or national campaign I have mobilized. Working within the nonprofit sector may have made my colleagues more inclined to act, but they voluntarily joined the advocacy program, emailed Congress, and joined volunteer advocates to share their stories. When reporting metrics for a campaign, the most active and engaged participants were often members of the organization’s staff, whether they were social workers or operation officers.
With all advocates (staff and volunteers) that request advocacy content (whether they ultimately act or not), it is critical to share the results of the campaign. Timely sharing of specific campaign results can directly enhance advocate engagement.
And in season, when surveyed employees are stating they want more “meaningfulness of work” to be retained – organizations should consider evolving their advocacy programs to increase staff involvement or create employee engagement programs that provide voluntary and creative opportunities to engage on social issues that align with their industry interests and expertise.
From my perspective, employee advocacy beyond brand marketing can provide worthwhile endeavors for current employees and recruits as well as enhance the organization’s definition of meaningfulness of work. Following an email issue campaign, sharing these results with employees demonstrates the impact of their actions:
- Breadth of Participation: Reports must provide the number of employees that volunteered to be advocates and the number of advocates that took action. When reporting participation be transparent with the raw numbers but provide context with participation ratios. Ultimately the goal is to provide a connection among colleagues, especially when employees are remote or in locations across a state or country.
- Advocacy Reach: As a part of the reporting process, employee advocates need to know which lawmakers they influenced and if there is potential for a deeper connection when another issue of interest requires action.
- Impact: Not all laws that are enacted make national or even local news, so internal communication of what the enacted bill actually will do (which is likely different than what was initially proposed) is critical. This communication and/or celebration point can give the employee a sense of making a difference beyond a job well done.
Developing a social advocacy program from the ground-up will take time, resources, and possibly a consultant to direct messaging. Moreover, there needs to be interest surveys, policy and political research, a process for employees to weigh-in on issue development, and engagement opportunities. If you are looking to get started, Jeb Ory, Co-Founder, President & CPO at Capitol Canary recently shared his “7 Steps to Build a Corporate Consumer Engagement Program.”