Tactical Communication Plan for complex organisation a rewarding challenge

The trust has a vision for Te Pātaka o Rākaihautū/ Banks Peninsula that by 2050 native biodiversity is thriving throughout the region, acknowledging that native ecosystems underpin resilient communities: “When nature thrives, we as people also thrive.”

An essential tool for achieving the wide support needed to achieve the BPCT vision is effective communication. The more organisations, communities and individual people who know about, and care about, the work BPCT and its partners do, the stronger support and participation is likely to be.

Convergence developed a Tactical Communications Plan for BPCT setting out an approach to communications to ensure it is planned, consistent, on-message, targeted, and effective.

One of the challenges for Convergence was that the BPCT is a complex organisation. While it has its own vision, objectives and communications needs, it also comprises seven programmes and/or partner organisations, each with their own, sometimes independent, communications needs and outputs. This was further complicated by the fact that some of the BPCT partners, especially Pest Free Banks Peninsula (PFBP) and the Biodiversity Hubs programme, have, in turn, multiple partners and stakeholders of their own.

There was a need for BPCT to develop a plan that allowed for the independence of the trust’s multiple partners, setting out what could be achieved through a consistent, and shared, approach to communications objectives and key and messaging. The result was a Tactical Communications Plan that BPCT could use for itself, but that also contained strategies and ideas that the constituent organisations could dip into to assist their own communications, ensuring they are aligned with the overarching trust’s vision and objectives.

An essential component of the plan Convergence developed, was ways to help BPCT staff identify communications opportunities and target them effectively.

So, in addition to the plan, Convergence Consultant Steve Attwood – who has extensive conservation-related communications experience – participated in a communications workshop for staff where the focus was on practical things they could do to produce engaging communications outputs, especially for social media.

“The teams under the BPCT umbrella do amazing things in a beautiful and sometimes challenging landscape,” Steve says, “including pest control, native vegetation restoration, and working with landowners to protect natural areas on their properties. They have wonderful every-day work stories. It was really just a matter of helping the team realise how really interesting their jobs were to external audiences, and then give them some tips on how to take video clips and photos and put them together in engaging social media clips.”

General Manager of the Banks Peninsula Conservation trust Maree Burnett said: “Working alongside Steve was such a pleasure. He quickly understood the complexities of our organisation, and the intricacies we face managing multiple, divergent programmes of work, respecting our corporate sponsor and funding network, and collaborating with multiple partner organisations - some of whom we essentially 'compete' with for funding.

“The tactical communications plan enabled us to cut through all this 'noise' and really focus on where we could best direct our very limited comms resources. It reflected the needs of our partner network, but was agile enough for us to undertake planned, strategic comms, as well as reacting to issues and opportunities as they arose.”

Recalling the communications workshop, Maree notedthat most of BPCT’s staff are out in the field all day, so talking about comms strategies and approaches was very new for them.

“The reality is, we are all communicators in the work we do. Much of what BPCT does is on private land and our work relies on building trust with our communities. Steve gave my team the confidence to build on those relationships, and to take a different look at what they might see as 'an ordinary day'. We work in one of New Zealand's most scenic and biodiverse regions, and now our whole team is confident to share stories of their day on social media.

“The stories we have generated and the content we've been able to create thanks to Steve's support, have certainly increased awareness of, and engagement with, BPCT. We are tangible proof that great comms strategies that are actionable, really do deliver positive results.”

Image above is Convergence Consultant Steve Attwood (second from left), who took the Banks Peninsula Conservation Trust staff out on a guided nature tour of Te Waihora/Lake Ellesmere. This was in addition to his comprehensive communications work and as a part of his own business capacity for Auldwood Birds.