Running with the pack

By Suzanne Huggins

Suzanne Huggins discusses how her IABC membership helps her stay current and drive communications excellence in her cross-functional team.

The networking events, professional development events, weekly Catalyst articles, and career opportunities IABC provides to members contributes to the strengths and credibility we bring to our roles as professional communicators.

I initially learned of IABC as a student and have been a member off-and-on since that time. However, only recently in my current role has the full value of my IABC membership really crystalized. The conversations I had during the IABC World Conference in June revealed there are other members in the same situation, which I found reassuring. Here is how my IABC membership delivers value to my everyday work.

I am the only communications professional on a large global operations team at Scotiabank. Everyone else on my team comes from process, operations, technology, or incident management disciplines. Our work is fast-paced, changeable, and global. We communicate regularly in English and Spanish with our colleagues in Mexico, and if a process or system fails, there will likely be an impact on our employees’ or customers’ experience.

Our executive stakeholders are keenly interested in impact. One of the most important and visible priorities for my team is ensuring stakeholders receive accurate, timely, and relevant communication from the beginning to end of an operational or technology incident. The impact statement is the centre of all our incident communications.

One of the biggest wins since I joined the team in 2019 was coaching my business partners, who work in complex disciplines of global finance, to describe what “employees and/or customers can’t do as a result of incident,” or “what additional risk is the organization exposed to as a result of an incident?”.

For a large audience of global stakeholders, who are keenly interested in technology operations, this is the straightforward business-friendly language needed to ensure our broad audience understands what is happening. No acronyms, please.

It took time, evaluation campaigns, coaching, and score-carding to build credibility and demonstrate the value a professional communicator can bring to my department. I make the most of my IABC membership by staying current on shared challenges we face as communicators, attending webinars, and leveraging articles from IABC that contribute to my department’s development and performance. IABC also boosts my credibility as a communications professional when I ask for more budget, or pitch new process recommendations to my colleagues on the senior team.

During the IABC World Conference – right from the first keynote address by Pfizer’s Sally Susman – I was reminded why I initially became a communications professional, and why I still love this work. IABC connects me to my chosen profession – to others of my own kind – who I do not have an opportunity to work with in my department.

IABC creates a pack where lone wolves can also belong and thrive.