This policy came into effect on 20 September 2006 by HM Inspectorate of Education after
consideration by HMIE Senior Management Group and endorsement by HMIE Management
Board. It supersedes all previous versions.
COMMUNICATIONS STRATEGY 2006-10
1.
This communications strategy has been developed to set out our plans for
making a further step improvement in how HMIE communicates. How we
communicate effectively with our colleagues within HMIE and how we communicate
with our stakeholders in the widest sense.
2.
The strategy has been developed in line with HMIE’s communications policy
and covers the period 2006-10. It is informed by a review of the previous HMIE
communications strategy (2003-05), the findings of the HMIE 2005 staff survey and a
SWOT exercise carried out by members of the Communications Steering Group.
Year 4 of the strategy will be updated following development of HMIE’s Corporate
Plan for the period 2007-10.
3.
Each objective will give rise to a detailed action plan setting out the
responsibilities, clear success criteria, milestones and dates associated with
achieving the objective.
Year 1 – 2006-07
Internal
Objective 1: to establish effective communication support for SMG and Quality
Groups.
We will agree arrangements for support to SMG and each of the HMIE Quality
Groups to ensure that key messages are quickly shared across the Inspectorate.
This will establish and maintain a ‘core script’ which sets out HMIE’s position on
major themes and underpins consistency in HMIE’s dealings with all stakeholders.
Regular review of and discussions on the core script will be established as a
permanent agenda item of each Group meeting and corporate services meetings;
Objective 2: revitalise the structure and nature of internal communications
within HMIE.
We will establish effective communications as the responsibility of every individual
within HMIE and in particular we will review the roles and responsibilities of key
groups and individuals to ensure an effective communications structure is in place.
We will: establish protocols for producing communications plans for all major tasks;
develop a policy for e-mail/blackberry use; consult widely on the content of our
intranet; and establish communications champions in each directorate. We will
significantly improve our communications with associate assessors and lay
members.
1
This policy came into effect on 20 September 2006 by HM Inspectorate of Education after
consideration by HMIE Senior Management Group and endorsement by HMIE Management
Board. It supersedes all previous versions.
Objective 3: develop a fully functional establishments database.
The development of an establishments database will help improve our corporate
intelligence about inspection activity across all sectors and will help key staff plan
and monitor our engagement with education establishments. Our work in this area
will ensure that we have developed our thinking on how to best exploit such a
database and how the content can be effectively managed and maintained.
External
Objective 1: improve distribution.
We will review our methods of distribution with a view to maximising the use of
electronic copy, thereby reducing costs while improving the speed, ease and
accuracy of our distribution. As part of that we will examine opportunities to improve
our database support for distribution.
Objective 2: systematically review our website.
The existing HMIE website will be refreshed with a view to ensuring it is fully inline
with all requirements of the DDA. We will take this opportunity of redesigning the
look and feel of the website so that it retains its current ease of access to our
inspection/review reports but also adds improved search facilities and establishes
new functionality to support extended electronic communication with HMIE staff and
other stakeholders.
Year 2 – 2007-08
Internal
Objective 1: enhance the HMIE Business Planning system to better support the
capture, management and monitoring of communications activity.
A future release of the Business Planning system will include functionality that
enables more detail of the required communications associated with a task to be
gathered. This will underpin more effective planning and management of
communications activity and resources throughout HMIE. It should also allow for
better coordination of messages and activity across the various sectors.
Objective 2: improve ICT support for communications between HMIE staff.
We will examine and adopt as appropriate new and emerging technologies to identify
opportunities for improving remote access for staff when they are out of the office –
for example tablet PCs, wireless technology, extending broadband access from
home, 3G cards and peer to peer video-working.
2
This policy came into effect on 20 September 2006 by HM Inspectorate of Education after
consideration by HMIE Senior Management Group and endorsement by HMIE Management
Board. It supersedes all previous versions.
Objective
3:
increase
communications.
opportunities
for
face-to-face
intra-office
An examination of our key business tools and processes will help us establish
greater scope for increasing the time available for effective communications. We will
look to create opportunities for increasing the degree of face to face intra-office
communication. We will look to do this through staff development sessions and key
discussion groups.
External
Objective 1: review the format, content and impact of HMIE inspection/review
reports.
We will review all of our inspection/review report formats to identify how they can be
produced quicker and how we can increase their impact by tailoring them to their
audiences and targeting their distribution effectively.
Objective 2: increase electronic transactions.
Our plans to extend the use of portal technology will provide an opportunity to
increase the degree to which partners, stakeholders and those we inspect/review
can interact with HMIE electronically. We will investigate web-enabled approaches to
transactions such as questionnaire and profile completion and establish more
effective links for our staff to access systems remotely.
Objective 3: increase the contribution our capacity building and good practice
activities make.
We will review how we promote good practice and identify improved methods of
sharing approaches across the education system. We will explore ways of adding
value through mounting video footage and ‘streaming’ images on the good practice
zone of our website.
Objective 4: review media relations.
We will undertake a review of our media relations. The aim will be to identify how we
can increase the impact we make – for example, by making more use of local and
specialised media.
Year 3 – 2008-09
Internal
Objective 1: survey internal stakeholders on the effectiveness of internal
communications.
3
This policy came into effect on 20 September 2006 by HM Inspectorate of Education after
consideration by HMIE Senior Management Group and endorsement by HMIE Management
Board. It supersedes all previous versions.
A thorough internal survey will allow us to gauge the strengths and weaknesses of
the system of internal communications in time to inform the development of the
communications strategy for 2010-13.
Objective 2: develop an HMIE policy on consultation.
A policy will be developed that will set out the areas where consultation will be
undertaken, who will be consulted, and how the consultation will be conducted.
Objective 3: develop proposals for HMIE staff ‘personal portals’
An approach will be developed to tailor a personal portal for all HMIE staff which will
underpin future development of systems support that closely matches the needs of
each individual.
External
Objective 1: establish increased shared systems.
We will explore opportunities for improved information sharing with partners and
stakeholders through shared systems and system links – for example links to eCare, ScotXed and GLOW (formerly SSDN). The aim will be to effectively support an
extension of joint working and planning to make our work more efficient, effective
and less of a burden on those inspected.
Objective 2: develop new, quicker, easier ways of gathering stakeholders’
views – we will examine new ways of effectively communicating with our
stakeholders and ensure their views contribute to our future development of
inspection/review models.
Year 4 – 2009-10
Internal
Objective 1: evaluate effectiveness of new HMIE reports.
We will review how effective the introduction of new reports – smaller in size,
different format etc – has been with a view to informing further development.
Objective 2: develop new communications strategy.
We will undertake all of the activities necessary to help develop the communications
strategy for 2010-13.
External
Objective 1: evaluate the effectiveness of the 2006-10 communications strategy
in achieving its external objectives.
4
This policy came into effect on 20 September 2006 by HM Inspectorate of Education after
consideration by HMIE Senior Management Group and endorsement by HMIE Management
Board. It supersedes all previous versions.
The evaluation will help inform the development of the new communications strategy
and inform our future approaches to internal and external communications.
5