Utility Stakeholders
Stakeholder Engagement: Build Bridges Before You Hit Walls
Stakeholder engagement is a mindset as well as a specific business practice. Energy companies are gradually accepting that their ability to conduct business requires the consent of critical constituencies, including customers, investors,...
Blog, Utility Communications, Utility Stakeholders
The Perils of Pursuing Profits Over Purpose
Craft beer is huge in Colorado, where I live and work, as well as many other places. When I travel, I always try to sample local craft brews. So it was with some dismay I read recently that one of Colorado’s largest craft brewers, empl...
Uncategorized
Gifts for Energy Communicators: Our Best-Read Content from 2019
Gifts for Energy Communicators: Our Best-Read Content from 2019 EEC Perspectives gained dozens of new subscribers this year, many of them in the last few weeks after I hit the conference circuit. For that reason, and others, we’re re-g...
Effective, Employee, Employee Communications, Employees, Organizational Culture, Utility Leadership
Changing Your Organization’s Culture One Minute at a Time
In last month’s blog, I discussed the wide gap between words and deeds among Colorado energy companies on the issue of stakeholder engagement, and how that disparity finally caught up with them in last year’s election. Sooner or late...
Effective, Utility Community Relations, Utility Stakeholders
Earning, and Keeping, Your Company’s Social License to Operate
April 16, 2019 was the day that social license to operate (SLTO) became real for Colorado’s energy companies. That’s the date that Colorado’s governor signed into law Senate Bill 181, which is transforming the business environment ...
Crisis, Digital, Utility Communications
Energy Crisis Communications Made Easier
My blogs on energy company crisis communications have consistently drawn high readership, possibly because of the spate of crises that have hit energy companies, their communities and their customers in recent years. See here. And here. ...
Blog, Efficiency & Conservation, Renewables, Utility Communications, Utility Marketing, Utility Stakeholders
Environmental Communications: When Green is the New Black
In recent years, a growing number of electric utilities have added “sustainable” or “environmentally responsible” or “cleaner” to their longtime vision of providing electric service that is safe, affordable and reliable. That...
Blog, Utility Media Relations
Media Relations: 10 Tips from Two Pros Part 2
This month’s blog post on media relations is a continuation of last month’s post, Media Relations: 10 Tips From Two Pros, Part 1, where we interviewed Jeff Lane and Randi Berris, media relations professionals for Salt River Project (...
Blog, Crisis, Utility Communications, Utility Media Relations
Media Relations: 10 Tips from Two Pros Part 1
The utility media relations function can help turn stakeholders into advocates, producing a wide range of benefits: lessened frictions, lowered costs, enhanced customer relations, increased customer satisfaction and improved brand equity...
Blog
One More Time: Why Do Utilities Need a Brand?
“Why do water utilities advertise?” my son Jack asked me the other day, more or less out of the blue. “I mean, it’s not like I have a lot of choice.” Since Jack doesn’t work in a utility marketing department, he’s not privy...