Types of Public

 Internal Public and Communication/Relations

A communication process starts with the identification of the publics that will be addressed, and
analyzing the potential interests on the issue of the communication helps to identify the publics.
Once the objectives of the communication process are evaluated, a further selection of the publics to
be involved may be accomplished.

Every company or organization has an infinite number of publics, all different one from the other,
and only a clear understanding of the fixed objectives enables to identify the publics involved, case
by case. There is just one kind of public that is present in every enterprise or organization, the
internal public. This is often neglected although it is the closest, the most clearly identified, the most
stable for its position within the organisation and therefore within the communication process.

However, it often happens that a message - the content of a communication - reaches the internal
public subsequently from the outside world, from an indirect source, rather than being directly
delivered to the internal public as first addressee.

Opinions and judgements of the internal publics interact with those of the external publics, and the
combination of the two identifies the frame of the enterprise's communication.

The "economic" link between an enterprise and its publics must also be considered: this economic
link is more or less wide and can determine a higher or lower participation and efficacy, more or
less flexibility in the dialogue/comparison between enterprise and publics. Due to the deep
economic link between an enterprise and its internal public, the internal public appears as the first,
the "easiest" public from which a feed-back is highly obtainable both regarding the definition and
analysis of the enterprise or product perception (image) and on the whole communication activity
that is carried out by the enterprise.

All communications related to the corporate image of an enterprise or organisation necessarily

involve the internal publics.

Considering the corporate image, issues and values (material and immaterial) can be identified,
issues and values that belong to a certain target: practically the corporate image is determined by
the values belonging to a target.

Looking at internal publics, basically company employees, we find some material values: salary,
career, improvement of professional skills, information availability.

Additional immaterial values belong to the internal publics, such as the sense of being part of a
team, the attribution of a status, the role and participation in the development of the business.
Considering all these elements - material and immaterial - and handling a proper internal
communication, employee satisfaction can be improved, and employee satisfaction is a general
objective proper of a mission of an enterprise or organisation, just like consumer satisfaction and
customer satisfaction..

Altogether, internal relations and external relations build up the global communication of an
enterprise or organization, a global communication that stems from a system of relations with the
totality of publics regardless of the nature of their relationships with the company, the business, the
product or the service.

Certain levels of internal communication always exists and use simple means like meetings or house
organs and so on. However, beside this planned and formal internal communication, there is a kind
that is informal, not planned, spontaneous, just because some people work together.

Consequently and first of all, internal communication must be aware of how informal internal
communication is expressed, on what subjects it develops, and try to re balance the informal
internal communication into a formal and planned communication.

The following can be considered as objectives of the internal communication process:

Developing effective connection between the different units across the organization

Encouraging cooperation, empowering and teamwork

Exploiting synergies with the external publics' systems of relations

Enhancing performance - individual and global

Improving the quality of all decision-making and execution processes

Once we agree on these objectives, the internal publics become co-makers for attaining maximum
results, and real "partners" for enterprise development.

The internal publics of a company are the organization's associates who represent:

The key resource for the company's success

The key elements of production, marketing and sales processes for services and products

A source of input, being channels of analysis/collection of internal or external opinions and

evaluations

Active and pro-active subjects

Precise targets, identified and specific publics to be addressed

Today, in many European countries, internal relations are considered as a part of the
communication process and therefore part of the basic responsibilities of a PR practitioner who is
well conscious that:
The quality of internal relations is a critical element of each organizational system

The quality of internal relations directly influences all external relations in terms of effectiveness of
the relationship itself

Internal relations enable the company to accomplish its goals in a quick, direct effective fashion,
with immediate control, less dispersion, less time and less costs.

Importance of management–employee relations

Internal communications have advanced a long way from the management-sponsored house
journals of yesteryear to well-organized systems of internal communication.These include:

1. A greater requirement for companies to inform their employees about policy and financial affairs,
including the annual report and accounts.

2. Increasing democratization of industry on the continental European pattern of worker directors,

works councils and works committees.

3. Increasing employee ownership of company equity through privatizations, flotation’s,

management buy-outs, share ownership schemes and performance-related pay schemes.

4. The availability of new communications technology, making it easier to organize and conduct
internal communications. These new techniques include intranet websites, video magazines,
webcasts, business TV, journals, teleconferencing, mobile telephones, e-mail and SMS (short
messaging service) text messaging for field personnel.

5. Increasing importance of service industries , with particular reference to knowledge-based

services, e.g. investment banking, marketing services, website design and development.