Strategic Communications Firm
For leaders responsible for a commitment to employees, customers, or communities that isn't landing the way they expected.
Organizations declare commitments through words. They deliver them through the whole organization.
What Organizations Commit To
Tap the ones you recognize. These are signals, not diagnoses. Each one is worth a closer look.
Decisions still do not reflect what leadership called a priority.
Mission & ValuesThe employee experience does not match the promise made to candidates.
Culture & WorkforceThe message reached the office. The people on the floor still haven't heard it.
Frontline & Non-desk ReachPeople understood the change, but some are still working the old way.
Strategic Change & TransformationThe day-to-day experience does not consistently support the brand promise.
Brand & Customer PromiseThe organization can show activity but not clearly establish what changed.
Social Impact & CommunityPatterns like this usually trace to one of three places: the message, how the commitment is carried out, or the conditions around it. The Say/Do Check takes about four minutes and helps you tell which.
The Composition Principle
The quality of the parts matters. But the arrangement governs what the whole becomes.
A commitment can be well funded, thoughtfully communicated, and widely activated, and still underperform. What matters is whether decisions, resources, authority, systems, and communication all reinforce what people were asked to trust.
A Useful Place to Start
The Say/Do Check looks at a commitment in three places. Four minutes, no conversation required.
Is the message reaching the people it is for, in a form they can use?
Could someone on the floor explain it in their own words?
Do budget, staffing, and manager time reflect what leaders said mattered?
What did we stop doing to make room for it?
Do authority, systems, and daily experience support what was promised?
Would people in different roles describe the same thing?
When You're Ready for More
Get clear on what the organization is actually promising, and what that promise requires.
Tap to read moreBuild the narrative, messages, and materials that help people use the commitment, not just hear it.
Tap to read moreHelp leaders and managers carry the commitment into decisions, workflows, and everyday support.
Tap to read moreCheck what people experienced and what the evidence supports before the next claim is made.
Tap to read moreRecognizable Situations
What was happeningA single priority had to reach more than 3,000 employees across three regions, each brand with its own voice.
What we didDesigned an internal campaign that held one core story and let each brand and region carry it their way, with manager materials built in.
Evidence status: Designed. Outcome not retained.
What was happeningMuch of the workforce worked on the production floor, not at a desk, so email-first communication left them out.
What we didBuilt the plan around where people are: printed flyers in break rooms, electronic boards, supervisor talking points with set delivery dates, and reminders.
Evidence status: Implemented.
What was happeningAn organization wanted to know whether its culture was being experienced the same way by everyone it described.
What we didCleaned and broke the data out by group, shaped the findings into a plain narrative, and built a "you said, we heard, we did" loop for employees.
Evidence status: Implemented. Performance record.
Client details are anonymized. Each example carries a label showing what it can and cannot support.
Keep Reading
Ten signs that what an organization says and what it does are pulling apart, and what to look at for each. Free with your name and email, or with your Say/Do Check.
Get the guide An ideaFrom the promise, to the conditions behind it, to the proof, to the point where people decide whether to believe it.
Read about Believability WritingShort pieces on culture, change, brand promises, and the gap between what organizations say and what people experience.
Read the IdeasWhere Compositions Specializes
Does the employee promise match the experience the organization creates?
Are people only informed about the change, or able and supported to enact it?
Can the organization consistently sustain what customers have been promised?
What should guide the organization's decisions, conduct, and identity?
What changed, for whom, and what can the organization responsibly claim?
When It's More Than One
Organizations often ask the same leaders, managers, systems, and resources to carry several commitments at once. It helps to look at what each is producing, where they reinforce or compete with one another, and who governs the whole.
"We're funding several important priorities, and none of them feel fully resourced."
Book a Consult
A Consult is a first conversation about your situation. There is no fit call and no pitch. Share what has happened so far and Dana will reply to set a time.
Want to look first? Take the four-minute Say/Do Check →
