Transform your pub from good to great

The editor of Ink, the employee publication at JPMorgan Chase, reveals his secrets to success

Creating an employee publication is easy, but creating a great employee publication can take lots of work—and, sometimes, courage. Here’s how to do it.

Define your audience strictly

Is the publication aimed at employees or management? If you think the answer is “both,” then you’re going to have problems, because employees and management often want different things.

Whether you’re writing about a new product rollout, a new business strategy or anything else, management likely will want to focus on how the initiative is a best practice in the industry, is the result of strong leadership across different business units or involved successful negotiations with vendors.

Employees, on the other hand, will be more interested in how the initiative will help them do their jobs better, what changes it will bring to their work processes or—if it’s a new product—whether they can get a discount if they buy the product for personal use. In other words, the “Why should I care?” factor.