Highlights from my podcast with Virgin Media O2's Chief Comms Officer Nicola Green
Nicola shares her tips for influencing the C-suite and engaging employees and customers during a mega merger and a company crisis
Nicola Green is Virgin Media O2's Chief Comms and Corporate Affairs Officer and an active campaigner for women in PR. Nicola has Type 1 Diabetes and is now a passionate advocate for raising awareness and understanding around invisible illnesses.
These were the headlines from our podcast conversation.
Click here to hear the full podcast interview.
On the evolution of her personal comms style and the need to be direct….
Nicola describes her communications style with her peers and team as ‘personable’ but it has also, out of necessity, become more direct and more succinct as she has moved through the corporate ranks.
On flexible working and work life balance….
Nicola is one of the 13.5% of women in the UK that holds an exec director role and is an active campaigner for women in PR. Because leading a comms function is a 24/7 job, she believes that organising home life is as important as organising work life to ensure a positive work life balance.
On invisible illness….
Nicola has Type 1 diabetes and hid it for a number of years as she was told when still a PR grad that revealing it to employers would hold her career back. Her experience and position has prompted her to play a key role in raising awareness and understanding around invisible illnesses like diabetes and depression and invisible disabilities like ADHD and autism so that they can provide better support and ensure people can thrive and not suffer in silence.
On the critical role communicators play in supporting the D,E&I agenda….
Nicola believes communicators have a vital role to play in raising awareness and building understanding around D,E&I and can provide a more rounded perspective by listening to customers, shareholders and stakeholders, and then making a “judgement call on what and how to communicate.
Because of its importance, she shares that communicating D,E&I in the right way is the one thing that keeps her up at night and cites big companies like Disney who have got themselves “into a bit of a mess” on the subject.
On influencing the C-suite….
Nicola believes a critical component of managing upwards is by bringing the outside in when advising the CEO and C-suite. She does this by listening to what the business and employees are saying and also by listening to what journalists and the relevant social media channels are saying. Building a good relationship with a CEO and the C-suite is also listening to what they have to say, considering their viewpoint, even if you don’t agree.
Nicola also believes that timing is everything when managing upwards and relies heavily on her emotional intelligence to determine when and how to influence an individual and situation; including when not to initiate a conversation and how to build support by galvanising others.
On the best comms advice she’s ever given a CEO…
Nicola’s single most important piece of comms advice for CEOs is to only speak when you've got something important to say and to make sure you take the time to listen. She suggests that a CEO in a panel discussion who dominates the conversation to get their point of view across doesn't come across well. Nicola’s advice is to sit back and listen and pick the right moment before jumping in.
On the importance of authenticity and personality in leadership comms.
Nicola believes CEOs should be given a framework when speaking at events but should also be encouraged to add their own personality and substance to any presentation. She also believes that they should keep things simple and stick to a maximum of three messages.
How she engages and motivates her own comms team and the importance of giving people a voice and opinion.
As she’s climbed the corporate ladder, Nicola has greater appreciation for the need to delegate and understands that teams will stay motivated and feel needed when they are empowered to make decisions and to speak up, have a voice and share their view if they have a strong opinion on any comms or business-related matter.
On engaging employees and keeping the comms team focused and galvanised for change during the Virgin Media O2 merger.
Nicola said, as O2 prepared to merge with Virgin Media, she chose to ‘mourn the death of O2’ and say goodbye to the brand and encouraged her team to do the same so that they could treat the merged company as a new job and a new opportunity to do something special. She feels that when bringing teams from different organisations together it’s essential to avoid the “this is the way we used to do it…..” philosophy.
She encouraged the team to focus on delivering outstanding work and being “the best they could each be in very difficult circumstances”. She also recognised that as an exec member, she was a little further along the change curve than her team and this helped her to help them navigate the change.
On losing long-term team members and helping people depart as ‘positive leavers’.
Nicola believes in never leaving an organisation in a bad way and helped those who were leaving the business to find new roles or to take time out and took the time with each of them to celebrate all of the great work they had done together.
On leading comms while on holiday during O2’s biggest crisis.
Nicola was on a family holiday when O2’s had a two-day network outage and had to empower her team to deliver during the crisis while she wasn’t “on the pitch”. Nicola shares that at times like this it’s essential to empower teams and provide psychological safety when making decisions. She encouraged the internal comms team to step out of their comfort zone and man the PR phone lines. And she cites the agile, honest and often witty responses that the social media team gave during the crisis as helping to turn the crisis into a positive that turned many potentially disgruntled customers into fans. The other challenge was to brief the CEO, Ronan Dunne, to ensure he was on the front foot in media conversations.
On comms lessons learned from the pandemic that remain relevant today.
The main comms lesson for Nicola was the realisation that, with face to face impossible, it was important to think creatively about how to create and employ digital channels to enable people to connect and stay informed. Post pandemic, they’ve decided not to bring 600 people together physically for the last leadership event. She also believes that as we’re now entering a recession businesses need to be “cost effective” people events and conferences.
The CEO did a weekly live update during the pandemic and that’s something that VMO2 has continued now that the new CEO
On the leader that has most inspired her and why they’ve inspired her approach to comms mentorship.
Nicola cites her former boss at Orange, Denise Lewis as a mentor, guide and her dedication to bringing through young talent is something that Nicola is trying to “pay on '' with her work to encourage more women to see a successful career in comms and PR as something to aspire to.
Coming on Thursday 21 July:
The next episode of my Delete Delete Engage podcast features Lloyds Banking Group’s future of work expert Tom Kegode who shares his tips on running successful hybrid events and why coming into the office on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays isn’t the way forward.