In addition to being one of the 2008 NorthCoast 99 winners and requesting to be considered for this award, all finalists for the Communication Special Category Award must meet the following criteria before being considered for the award:

• They all share their mission statement with ALL employees
• They all share financial information with ALL employees
• They all regularly communicate ALL of the following information through a newsletter or other form of media:
• Changes (i.e. new products/services, changes in policy, staff, systems)
• Special organizational awards and recognition
• Strategic goals and objectives
• Innovations within the company
• Employee anniversaries
• New hires
• They all have an employee suggestion system.
• They all conduct employee opinion/engagement surveys at least once a year AND share the results of those surveys with their employees.
• They all recognize excellent performance.

Winners are chosen based on the company that demonstrates the most unique and innovative practices aimed at attracting, retaining, and motivating top performers. 

Communication Winner & Finalist Summaries

Communication Winner: Time Warner Cable

Unique to this company: Time Warner Cable’s Strategic Communication Plan is driven and championed directly by the President. The President and senior management team take executive bus tours to communicate with all of their employees at 40 employee locations over three days to give all employees a chance to meet with the top management team, ask questions, and learn about the organization. The President has also initiated month-end hallway meetings where he steps into the main hallway outside his office and is joined by employees of all levels and functions. He then updates everyone on how the company and the division did the prior month, clarifies the objectives for the month ahead, and invites each of his direct reports to do the same. The meeting is informal as employees stand around the hallway, applauding and laughing. Once a quarter, the President performs a live video-cast for employees, updating them on business objectives and the division’s community presence and accomplishments. This approach is interactive, including live feeds from other locations, question and answer sessions with the employees, prerecorded interviews, occasional live guests, and advance viewing of new company commercials. The President also holds monthly supervisor luncheons and meets with managers regularly to update the management team on business results, successes, and challenges. In addition the President publishes a letter to all employees entitled "Our Values – Our Strengths,” a brief, straight-talk letter reflecting on organizational values and how employees can apply them to their daily work.

Communication Finalist: Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland

Unique to this company: The Federal Reserve Bank launched a communication plan exclusively for top executives this past year including widespread efforts organization-wide that recognize the importance of face-to-face communication in this process and provide employees access to top executives. What’s on your mind? meetings, held three times a year, are hour long events that enable the President and First Vice President to personally answer questions with assistance from other senior officers as needed. In addition, 20-25 employees are randomly selected from department management submissions to attend ice cream socials with the President and to participate in the Octoberfeast with the President. Now We’re Talking is a program for 15-30 employees of all levels to attend lunch with the First Vice President and share feedback, ideas and participate in Q&A about topics and concerns. The Federal Reserve Bank also instituted Leadership Dialogue Quarterly themed breakfast or lunch meetings that are expanded to three hours to allow for good discussion as well as Early Bird Breakfasts and Food for Thought Luncheons for small groups of officers to informally share accomplishments and news about their functions. The Federal Reserve Bank also instituted the President's Window Series featuring two programs: Sandy's Voice, which features the President presenting to employees on major speech that been presented to external audiences and Sandy's Sightings, a monthly photo gallery highlighting President’s schedule of events in the organization. Employees also receive personal correspondence from the President including congratulatory notes for special accomplishments, graduation acknowledgments, and expressions of sympathy.

Communication Finalist: FedEx Custom Critical

Unique to this company: FedEx Custom Critical's President has made it her primary objective to initiate more frequent communication throughout the organization, particularly between top management and employees. Once a month Virginia (The President of the organization) hosts 10 randomly selected team members in her office for an informal discussion, entitled Visits with Virg. This is a time when employees can ask the President whatever they wish, propose ideas on how to improve procedures, or inquire about an issue that has arisen. Take it to the Top is another program that allows team members to be personally addressed by the President and members of the Executive Leadership Team. Boxes are placed around the building and emptied out once a month. The comments are discussed at an Executive Leadership Team meeting and the President personally addresses each comment or suggestion with the team member that submitted it. FedEx also produces Virginia in the Hot Seat, a quarterly video featuring team members sitting down with Virginia and having an open discussion about the topics at hand which is sent to all team members. The video features team members sitting down with Virginia and having an open discussion about the topics at hand. The Friday Wrap Up is another video that features the Executive Leadership Team members reporting on updates from Friday Manager's Meetings and also includes team members discussing hot topics of the week through interviews and on-air discussions with managers and team members. FedEx Custom Critical also uses print forms of communication to convey important updates to employees. The Daily Bulletin, a daily online morning newsletter, keeps all employees informed of company and employee news. Team Expressions is another internal newsletter that features information on company events, departmental and business updates, employee spotlights, and photos. The newsletter solicits input from team members for its story selections and editorials which are written by representatives from various departments. Even, independent contractors at FedEx receive ongoing communication about new developments within the company including an electronic newsletter, a quarterly audio CD (The Road Report), and a quarterly DVD highlighting news and updates from the President and leaders at the company.