How communication between your company and the community can be decisive for the project

Has your company’s communication with the people who live around it worked?

Does your company work directly in any community?

Well, first we need to explain what this means and why communication is so important here.

Any company that is installed in a community will act directly or indirectly in it. What changes, most of the time, is the intensity of this action, and the way your business can interact with the region.

Check out the differences.

The importance of communication with the community

Your company’s communication with the community can be the difference between a successful project or a failure to interact.

This is because, depending on how you will act in the region, your decisions can be determinant in the lives of those people.

For example, the arrival of a medium-sized market in the region can improve the quality of life of the community by facilitating access to products, generate jobs and advantages for the local economy.

Obviously, it can also generate disadvantages, such as the accumulation of garbage, the increase in the flow of people and other elements that would need a more in-depth study (ideally, carried out by a consultancy. But we will get there.).

In this case, the communication could be based on specific studies of the area, turned to the sales market. However, great part of the communication work will be directed to divulge, through propaganda, the new buying option in the region.

A company that impacts directly on the community structure, through physical, environmental, cultural or social interventions, will need, besides a concrete action plan, a directed communication.

This way, it will be able to explain its function, its action plan, and how the interventions it plans to make in the area will affect that community.

And besides communicating the company’s actions, when complete consulting work is done, such as those carried out by Synergia, the company must demonstrate its potential for social and environmental responsibility.

This factor can be decisive to reinforce the company’s positive image, both for this and for future projects.

Let’s understand in a practical way?

Understanding directly how this communication works

In 2013, we had the opportunity to work with a client, Anglo American, who needed direct communication with the community.

His intention was to demonstrate that, although the company would intervene in the area, with the construction of a pipeline, the project would bring benefits and act in such a way as to minimize any negative impact for the region.

It was necessary to demonstrate to the communities involved in the project that it could bring benefits such as job generation and economic development. This included, mainly, removing the doubts of the population about the project.

Effective communication actions

The initiatives of the social communication program carried out by Synergia aimed to bring information about the enterprise to the community and to the landowners in the area where the company’s project is located.

Check out some of them:

• In the enterprises, we carry out the identification of the owners and visits to deliver informative material about the project.
• We contact community leaders, representatives of other entities and the public authorities of the municipalities in the areas of influence.
• We hold informative community assemblies with the direct participation of the community in all the municipalities crossed by the pipeline.
• We carry out actions to raise social awareness in the community, such as the Environmental Education Program.
• And, finally, we elucidate that all the actions were carried out from studies and diagnoses to understand the needs of the communities involved and restructure them in a productive way.

Check out some cases related to this project:

Integrated management of environmental programs and conditions of the Minas-Rio Project 

Mover Program: social development through the incentive to entrepreneurship and professional qualification 

The company demonstrates social responsibility by thinking about the impacts that will be caused, hiring a consultancy to minimize them, and taking care that the community is informed of all the steps.

Thus, the results are far beyond those involving the direct profits of the enterprise.

Communication beyond the current project

As we have seen, communication can be decisive for the company’s image in the community.

But it will also be essential for future projects, in which it will need to demonstrate that it has acted with social responsibility in previous projects.

How do you want your company to be seen?

All this will depend on you and the type of communication you choose.

From the greatest to the least impact on the community, the way your company will intervene can be the differential for its image. And that matters a lot.

The good news is that if you are worried about it, it is already the first step to a successful performance.

Have you felt doubts and need help in the process? Look for a consultancy!

Synergia Consultoria Socioambiental has the best projects for your company.

From communication with the community to conflict mediation, we have the best solutions for your company to achieve the results you desire.

Check out our success cases working with large companies.