I’m sure you must have heard about the popular ‘bunch of sticks’ story in which an old man teaches his sons about the gravity of staying united.
It’s always easy to break a single stick but difficult to break the whole bunch, isn’t it?
The folklore applies to every business situation.
When you are building a team, you need like-minded people to come together and work from strength to strength.
That’s possible only if they work on something they believe in.
If the team feels the same way as the owner and has the same vision they would not need external motivation to work harder.
If they do, your organization will come out much stronger, grow much faster.
If your employees can relate to your vision they are inspired to work harder and innovate at every step.
Simon Sinek, in his book ‘Start with Why’ explains how your business communication should always start by talking about your larger purpose - for example, ‘how do you wish to change lives of your audience’ with your business.
What you are selling, at what price, and where it’s available, is all secondary.
The same goes for employees (internal audience) as well.
When you tell them about your larger goals and why you are chasing those goals, you will be able to get their consensus on it.
The ones who believe in your vision will automatically stay with you and join you as a result of a common belief system.
Employee engagement plays a key role in bringing your team to a common platform, retaining the right set of people and aligning them with your vision.
Millennials and Gen Z are known to have an attention span less than that of a Goldfish (just about 8 seconds).
Their typical office day goes away in hustling between facing hurls from a superior or a client, and the indispensable smoke breaks.
Their brains are literally into pieces - one on the floor the other one inside the meeting cabin and another one dreaming of the next holiday.
They’re habitual of instant gratification - from the high-speed internet, their smartphone and the overflowing caffeine.
In a scenario like that, you can’t really expect them to go through a text-based newsletter, a training presentation or a company policy document even if it was for their career growth.
54% of internal communications professionals say their employees expect video. - (Source)
A whiteboard presentation can help you to tell stories to your employees and makes training, skill development programs, orientation programs and team building activities more fun and fruitful.
Stories add life to training content making everyone come together and learn in a happy friendly environment - something your teams would always look forward to rather than shy away from.
With video content, you can address a larger group and communicate to them in a short span of time.
Our client Clif Bar recently created (ongoing) a 4 part whiteboard video presentation series to not just train their employees but also to align them with the larger mission of the organization and to help them grow.
Clif Bar is a young and energetic company that produces healthy energy bars.
Gary Erickson, the founder made the first energy bar in his mom’s kitchen and later named the brand after his father Clifford.
With Clif Bar, Gary envisioned a healthier, more sustainable world. The brand targets not just sports enthusiasts but also those who are passionate about a variety of stuff - everyone who believes in a healthy, organic way of life.
The primary target audience for the videos was a young team of sales guys at Clif Bar.
As we discussed earlier the sales crew was a consistent mix of Millenials and Gen Z.
They have revenue targets to meet and a busy schedule to manage.
At the same time, they have diverse interests and passions that go beyond their routine job.
The client wanted to improve the overall consumer experience and engagement at the point of sale.
To achieve this objective, they wanted to train their sales team with a series of whiteboard presentation.
These video presentations would be played privately and would be meant only for the sales crew.
The following two objectives were highlighted by the client:
The client wanted the tone of the video presentations to be very youthful, vibrant, techno, upbeat and friendly.
They wanted the team to enjoy and watch the videos wholeheartedly.
A brand that takes care of its people, they wanted the mood to flow from the videos.
The objective was to create short, snappy, engaging, and easy to understand videos.
Since this communication was primarily for sales crew training, the consensus was to develop a whiteboard video presentation.
The communication type would be easy to understand, story-driven and yet cost-effective as well.
“The idea behind whiteboard being the best for Clif Bar was the fluidity of the medium.
You can jump from one topic to another and use a character’s environment to weave a story and connect the dots.
Since we’re educating them, it’s also important to make sure they don’t lose their trail of thought and whiteboard really helps maintain that.
There is nothing distracting the viewer, the visuals are minimal, they clearly convey the story and the voiceover is descriptive.
We can also change the mood for whiteboard videos with different kinds of music and art styles, like for Clif Bar, we chose young upbeat music and casual characters”- Akriti Sinha, Creative Lead, Broadcast2World.
Dr. Richard Wiseman, a scientific-award-winning professor of psychology, revealed whiteboard videos outperform ordinary videos in problem-solving, memory tests, engagement, and shareability and in the overall impact.
The study shows that whiteboard videos put the audience in a good mood ensuring their undivided attention.
Such videos help the audience to grasp the ideas quickly and effectively. They make the audience feel like they are in a classroom (with a whiteboard) and yet the creativity ensures they are happier and hooked.
A whiteboard presentation works like a compatible marriage of classroom learning and watching a movie.
The Clif Bar case shows how the format comes as a pleasant surprise, an inspiration for employees.
The video series not only work towards taking team skills to the next level but also makes them aware of why the company exists - about its larger goals.
The videos make use of relatable characters to carve stories to inspire the crew and make them feel the Clif Bar way, taking the effort out of their daily work - making it more fun and worthy.
A video with life-like visuals, music, and real-life examples can be quite a joyride.
It can take the audience to different life situations - a welcome change that helps them absorb and learn easily and effectively.
What are your thoughts about creating whiteboard presentation videos for internal communication? Please feel free to add your inputs in the comments section below.
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