Why public communication campaigns must be strategic — Part IV
DAR ES SALAAM: FOR the past three weeks, I have been making one argument in different ways. A communication campaign is not a collection of activities.
We must understand people before speaking to them. And when we finally communicate, our messages, stakeholders, channels and activities must move in one strategic direction.
Today, I want to finish this series where I believe the real conversation belongs. Not with the campaign. Not with the Media. Not even with the public.
But inside the leadership room. Long before the press release is written, the television interview arranged or the social-media post published, something more important has already happened. A decision has been made.
And almost every significant leadership decision carries a communication consequence. My experience around communication, leadership, public institutions, government, regulators, media and citizens.
One thing has become increasingly clear to me: some communication problems are actually leadership problems that arrive at the Communication Office wearing communication clothes.
A decision is made without considering how stakeholders will understand it. A change is introduced without preparing those affected.
Employees hear about it from outside. A technically correct policy is announced in language ordinary people cannot understand. Stakeholder concerns are ignored until they become public resistance.
Then the communication officer receives that familiar instruction: “Please communicate this.” Sometimes it comes with another: “Please manage the situation.”
But by then, the professional may be managing consequences he or she was never given the opportunity to anticipate. That is why I believe the modern Communication Officer must be in the room before the decision is announced. And certainly not to interfere with the responsibilities of management, technical professionals or boards.
But when a decision affects employees, customers, citizens, investors, regulators, communities or other important stakeholders, communication thinking should form part of the decision-making process.
Because communication is not merely what happens after leadership. Communication is part of how leadership happens.
There is one question I would encourage leaders to ask before approving a significant decision: ‘How will this be understood by the people affected?’ That question can save an institution enormous trouble.
A technically sound decision can produce a poor outcome if people misunderstand it. The Communication Officer should therefore help leadership see around corners. Who will be affected? Who needs to know first? What are people likely to misunderstand?
Who might resist and why? What will journalists ask? What will employees say when customers call? What misinformation might emerge? Who should speak? These questions do not belong at the press conference.
They belong before it. But there is another side to this conversation and our profession must be prepared to hear it. Communication Officers cannot demand a seat at the leadership table simply because we work in communication. We must earn it.
If our contribution begins and ends with press releases, photographs, protocol, social-media posts and media invitations, management will naturally call us when those services are required.
If we want to be treated as strategic professionals, we must practise strategically. Know the institution beyond the Communication Department. Know its mandate. Understand the strategic plan. Know the business, customers, policies, numbers and risks.
Understand what keeps the Chief Executive awake. And increasingly, understand how the institution contributes to Tanzania’s wider development ambitions under DIRA 2050.
You cannot advise leadership strategically about an institution you understand only through its press releases.
That is where the transformation of our profession must begin. And we must bring something else to the leadership room: Intelligence, not just information. In Part II of this series, I argued that good communicators listen before they speak.
That listening should produce communication intelligence. Think about where Communication Officers sit. We hear journalists’ questions. We see customer complaints.
We monitor public conversations. We hear employees. We engage stakeholders. We watch rumours develop. Sometimes we notice shifts in public mood before they appear in formal management reports.
The question is: What do we do with all that information? If we simply respond to it, we are operating a communication desk. If we analyse it, identify patterns and take meaningful insight back to leadership, we become part of the institution’s listening system.
Imagine entering a management meeting and saying: “Over the past month, three stakeholder concerns have kept recurring. Media questions are moving in this direction.
Customers understand this part of our message but remain confused about this issue. If we announce this as currently planned, I believe that question will dominate the conversation. We should address it first.” That is not publicity. That is professional advice.
And leadership should want it. There will also be moments when the Communication Officer must say things leadership may not particularly want to hear. “Our employees should hear this before the media.” “This language is technically correct, but people will not understand it.” “We have not engaged this stakeholder sufficiently.”
“If we remain silent, somebody else will define the story for us.” And perhaps the most difficult: “The problem is not our communication. The problem is the decision itself.” That requires professional courage. Strategic communication is not about telling leadership what it wants to hear. It is about helping leadership understand how its decisions may be heard.
The final decision remains with leadership. But the professional advice must be given. A communication officer who agrees with everything may remain popular in the room, but useful in the room.
Leadership, however, must also listen. This relationship cannot work if leaders see Communication merely as a service for polishing decisions after they have been made. Bring communication officers into relevant discussions early.
Give them sufficient context. Allow difficult questions. Use them to test messages and anticipate reactions. And listen when they bring stakeholder intelligence back into the organisation.
The Communication Officer should not become a wall between leadership and the public. The professional should become a bridge. And bridges work in both directions. Leadership → Communication → Stakeholders.
But equally: Stakeholders → Communication → Leadership That second direction is sometimes forgotten. When both work properly, communication becomes a leadership loop: Decision → Communication → Stakeholder Response → Intelligence → Leadership Learning → Better Decision.
That is what I mean by a Leadership Communication Enabler. This matters beyond individual institutions. Tanzania’s ambitions under DIRA 2050 will require change, in technology, public services, institutions, skills, businesses and inevitably some of the ways Tanzanians live and work.
But transformation cannot simply be announced. People must understand it, participate in it and see themselves within it. That requires leaders who can explain not only what is changing, but why. It requires institutions prepared to listen when citizens raise legitimate concerns.
And it requires Communication Officers who understand that their responsibility is not merely institutional visibility, but connecting institutional priorities with people and national development.
The strategic question therefore becomes: What does our institution contribute to DIRA 2050 and what must people understand, support or do for that contribution to succeed? That is a very different question from: “What shall we post today?” Both questions may need answering. But only one starts with strategy. Perhaps, then, leaders and Communication Officers need a slightly different professional conversation.
Instead of leaders asking only, “How will you publicise this?”, ask: “What are the communication implications of this decision?” And instead of Communication Officers measuring success only by asking, “How much coverage did we get?”, ask: “What did our communication help the institution achieve?” Leaders should provide access and context.
Communication professionals should bring insight and judgement. Leaders should listen. Communication professionals should have the courage to advise.
And both should remember that institutional trust is built together. As I close this four-part series, I find myself thinking again about the campaigns that started this conversation.
Futa Delete Kabisa. Tanzania’s Digital Migration. There were meetings. Difficult moments. Doubts. Stakeholders to convince. Messages to develop. Journalists to engage. Citizens to reach.
And eventually, as happens with every campaign, the materials disappeared. Posters come down. Billboards change. Songs stop playing. Hashtags move on. The media finds another story
