Why external and internal communication matter to non-profits
If you run a charity or non-profit organization, you’ll appreciate the need for a robust and comprehensive set of communication tools. Without effective internal communication tools, it’s impossible to properly co-ordinate the activities of paid staff and volunteers, or to enable the information exchange and employee engagement required for effective project management.
External and internal communication tools are essential for the continuing work of fundraising, and for nurturing and sustaining those key relationships with external stakeholders and the donor community.
In the current era of remote, hybrid, and mobile working, non-profits and charities require external and internal communication tools that are integrated, easy to use, and capable of deployment across a range of digital platforms.
For this reason, an intranet is often highlighted as the best internal communication tool for not for profits.
In this article, we’ll be exploring how and why this may be so.
First, though…
What is an intranet?
An intranet is a private network, access to which is restricted to staff and internal stakeholders of an organization, and on occasion, to designated third parties.
Using modern intranet software and network infrastructure, organizations can foster employee engagement and promote their corporate culture through social media feeds, employee engagement tools, and productivity apps, as well as integrations with third-party systems, e-forms and workflows, e-learning, and project management.
With intranet internal communication tools, enterprises can easily communicate their company objectives and news to in-house team members and remote teams alike, assign tasks and use project management tools that reside in the single, integrated digital workspace.
How an intranet improves internal communications for non-profits
Non-profits and charities face unique challenges, which place a specific focus on their internal communication needs. Fortunately, the internal communication tool set offered by an intranet can empower them to meet these challenges, by considering the following:
Creating a forum for communication and collaboration
With many stakeholders and multiple projects often in the mix, non-profits require tools for both communication and collaboration. These external and internal communications resources must be capable of both delayed and real time communication, and be able to create virtual workspaces on demand, to host discussions or act as repositories for information exchange and resource sharing.
Features such as screen sharing, conference calls, video calls, and an employee app that enables a remote workforce to participate in voice and video calls contribute to this.
The best internal communication tools will provide a dedicated communication and collaboration app. The Claromentis intranet and digital workplace platform, for example, makes it easy for staff and volunteers to communicate by providing tools such as corporate social networking, internal intranet messenger apps, and collaboration spaces.
Using internal comms to increase employee engagement
With an interactive intranet, charities and non-profits can improve team collaboration and employee engagement. Our intranet provides a drag & drop content management system which gives you the power to build your own personalized charity intranet, where you can choose from over 40 configurable intranet widgets to build your homepage, departmental pages, and team sites.
Using its intuitive controls, all your employees can create a personalized workspace that reflects their interests and aspirations.
To give volunteers, employees, remote workers, and field workers the opportunity to learn and develop their skills, the Claromentis communication tool includes e-learning software with customizable training courses, personalized learning paths and interactive quizzes.
Distributing content for internal communications
Blogs, newsletters and other digital content enable non-profits to broadcast company news and implement file sharing across the internal communications network. With the communication features of an intranet platform, organizations can push relevant content out to the public as well as within the organization.
For internal communications, non-profit line managers and team leaders can distribute targeted content via private channels to facilitate team communication and employee productivity.
Building a knowledge base for internal communication
Many non-profit organizations must work to specific guidelines and codes – so creating a knowledge base of the relevant information can help promote employee productivity and in achieving company objectives relating to compliance and best practices.
For example, with the policy management app of the Claromentis intranet and internal communications platform, you can automate your charity’s policy management process and add “mandatory read” widgets to your intranet homepage to ensure your staff never miss critical policies.
Planning and organizing events
Event management is a frequent task for many non-profits. In the post-COVID era, much of the challenge lies in facilitating one on one communication between attendee lists that may include remote employees, a mobile workforce, team members in the field and external stakeholders.
The internal communication tools of an intranet can enable event managers to plan and host both physical and virtual events, using a combination of technologies such as conference and video calls to facilitate engagement and foster collaboration.
Providing communication tools for external stakeholders
As well as internal communications, an intranet platform allows non-profits to provide communication tools to external stakeholders. For instance, with Claromentis you can create extranet portals to provide external stakeholders with controlled access to areas of your intranet platform such as specific documents, intranet software pages, news articles and communication spaces.
Facilitating project management
For effective project management, non-profits need an internal communication tool that enables project leaders and team members to trade ideas, access resources and do their work in the most efficient manner possible.
Using the social project and task management features of the Claromentis intranet and internal communications platform, charity teams can create interactive project spaces to collaborate, share documents, assign tasks and keep track of progress. Project co-ordinators can keep every team member apprised of upcoming tasks using dashboard widgets, which display all pending tasks and projects on your intranet homepage.
Extending internal communication tools to remote workers
With remote workers and a mobile workforce now a virtual part of the in-house team, non-profits need internal communication tools that users can access from a mobile device, or anywhere with a data connection.
A digital workplace solution like Claromentis ensures this. Claromentis also offers localization capabilities, with intranet software that you can translate into any language so that menus, system messages and content are displayed in the chosen language of the end user.
Enjoying an integrated platform for internal communication – without the hassle
Charities and non-profits often won’t have access to the resources available to commercial organizations. It is therefore essential that all internal communication tools are easy to use and to maintain.
Ease of use is one of the key features of the Claromentis intranet and internal communications platform. An intuitive content management system allows you to easily add targeted content to your intranet, without the need for technical skills or coding knowledge.
To learn more about how Claromentis can improve your non-profit organization’s internal communications, book a demo with our experts.
