When immediate internal communications are required

In my job, there is seldom a need for emergency internal communications. Currently, I have the luxury of relatively long lead times and suffer drawn-out sign-off procedures.

But as I sit at Fenchurch Street station, I’m reminded that there are some companies that need to get communication out to their staff very quickly when things go wrong.

Tonight, I believe, there has been a fire at Barking which has caused chaos on our c2c line as well as parts of the London Underground. Trains are delayed or cancelled and everyone is asking generally the same question: how do I get home?

The problem is that there is little information seemingly being passed from Control to the front-line staff. They are doing their best to advise people (I have to say the staff at Fen Street are pretty good) but there’s nothing being fed to them.

As an IC professional, I really feel for these people. Sure, it technically comes under “operational communications” but it’s still a branch of Internal Comms. At times when their customers at the station are asking questions of them (invariably with the preconception of “they’re all useless”), the station and train staff need to be able to give nice clear and calm messages, instead of “I’m sorry, I don’t know what’s going on,” which is what I was hearing.

How do communications get to the station staff in these situations? Do they simply rely on what comes through on the radio, or are there other more sophisticated channels such as a Twitter-like technology which could be used?

Whatever the method, it needs to be improved so that latest information can be fed to the front-line station and train staff as quickly as possible.