Communication about (and for) development is a specialist discipline, but also a cross-cutting activity that all development professionals should engage with. The OPEC Fund Quarterly considers this
argument, and more, with the help of the World Bank Group’s Africa Communications and Partnerships Manager Steven Shalita. By Steve Hughes
COMMUNICATION about
TALKING D 18 evelopment
communication – and more generally, the act of communicating – is central to
the implementation of an organization’s strategy, as well as to improving internal and external understanding of that organization’s priorities and impact. This is true today more than ever, says Steven Shalita, Africa Communications and Partnerships Manager at the World Bank Group. “The importance of communication as a professional discipline has grown over the last decade, and it’s continuing to grow on an almost daily basis,” he says. This exponential growth is influenced by several factors, Steven explains, including the development of new technology – leading to an increase in the sophistication of communication tools and practices – and a better understanding of the critical importance of non-tangible assets, like stakeholder engagement and reputation risk management. “There has been a push for greater
social accountability,” says Steven, and communication underpins the move toward greater transparency. It establishes dialogue among both internal and external stakeholders, builds trust, helps share knowledge and best practice, enables understanding, and inspires innovation. Internal communication – leading
to better staff engagement – is also crucial in today’s workplace, says Steven. If an organization wants the outside world to understand its vision and values, it has to work hard to build those messages from within. “Staff have to really understand the organizational narrative and messages in order to bring them to life,” he says. Get this right, and the benefits are manifold. A recent article in the Wall Street Journal showed the biggest jumps in one particular ranking (the Drucker Institute’s) of best-managed businesses were at companies with large gains in employee engagement and development. “Our latest research shows that a company’s results are driven, to a major degree, by how well it manages its
workforce,” the authors write. Steven agrees: “Communication is defining how companies succeed and fail, because ultimately you’re only as good as your communications.” One of the main communication-
related challenges in today’s age of information overload, Steven argues, is competing for people’s attention: “Finding a space that makes you relevant to your audience is becoming far more difficult. With the rise of mobile smartphones, everybody is a communications channel; everybody is a media outlet.” This is hugely beneficial on the one hand, he argues: “I come from Africa and it’s now easier for me to send money to my mother in her village in Uganda than it is for me to transfer money from my bank account in the US to another bank within the same country.” But Steven acknowledges the downsides: “The disadvantages, apart from people becoming increasingly antisocial, is the proliferation of fake news. People cannot sift out what’s important, what’s not; what’s real, what’s not. Making sure people know your information is
reliable is becoming more and more challenging.” This fake news, argues Steven, is affecting the trust people have in institutions. “Before, institutions controlled the message. Now, it’s very challenging to do this.” A recent article in The Atlantic magazine, under the heading, ‘Some Real News About Fake News’, suggests the proliferation of fake news is not only making people believe false things, it’s making them less likely to consume or accept information. See
http://bit.ly/Atlantic_fakenews While fake news is on the rise, a near paradox is at play, with stakeholders and the general public demanding increasing accountability from organizations large and small. This is particularly pertinent for development actors, says Steven. “We are using other people’s resources – taxpayers’ money, private sector finance – and people quite understandably want to see results.” This demand for accountability is amplified, he argues, by the way in which development organizations hold other actors – governments, for example – to high standards.
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