A lesson in external stakeholder engagement in the times of pandemic

One story that has always stuck with me and stayed relevant in a professional, social and personal setup is Postman's story from Swindoll’s Ultimate Book of Illustrations & Quotes. For all those who have missed it, here is the quick excerpt – 

A young man used to write love letters to a lady every week to win her affection. When she didn’t respond, he increased the number and wrote one lover letter every day. He kept writing for the whole year. However, she ended up marrying the postman. The essence of the story is that personal meeting is significant for fostering any relationship. Drawing parallels in a professional setup, for external communications professionals, is a very relevant takeaway. 

However, while the story gives an important lesson to businesses/external engagement professionals, the pandemic might have changed the narrative a bit. This made me rethink and review the narrative. In the current scenario, personal meetings are neither highly encouraged nor are very much appreciated. There could be lasting implications for how companies/professionals connect and communicate with their external stakeholders. The post COVID world is likely to bring new opportunities to connect to a wider gamut in a range of ways in which the newer relationships could be forged beyond physical distances and a consistent rhythm of engagement with focused strategy could change relationships for good. Here are some ways which could help evolve external engagements: 

Creating meaningful connections– The pandemic has given an opportunity to build deeper and more meaningful connections with virtual engagements beyond physical boundaries with different stakeholder groups. Thought leadership - The pandemic has created an atmosphere of uncertainty in almost every industry. It is therefore likely that your stakeholders will highly appreciate expertise about the current landscape and how it could evolve.

This gives businesses and opportunity to become a trusted source of expertise and provides content that adds concrete value from reports and expert opinions. Create forums – Virtual forums have become a good tool of engagement. Create niche virtual forums leaning on the expertise area and bringing people together who could create a meaningful dialogue. Staying connected – A number of projects may get cancelled due to the pandemic, strategies might change, however, stakeholders not relevant in the moment would still be relevant in the longer run.

The situation will be better, but if connections are not maintained, reconnecting would be an uphill task.  The pandemic may give opportunities to create real and meaningful relationships with stakeholders, but those who don’t act to adjust their engagement strategies risk losing their network. Stakeholder engagement has changed radically over a year and a half, and will likely never return to exact pre-COVID practices.

So here, connecting back to the postman story, in-person meetings are difficult to replicate completely, and the connections gained from them are invaluable. However, evolving engagement strategies suiting the current situation will help not only fostering relationships but creating a brand image and positioning as a thought leader while requiring less time and costs. That being said, one needs to focus on strategies to ensure these engagements create the same level of impact as face-to-face meetings.