The Challenge

The Air Canada Pilots Association (ACPA) was in the process of creating its first formal communications strategic plan. Communications to that point had been done on an ad-hoc basis and the new Director of Communications had a strong desire to create a formal structure for the function, set goals and achieve objectives to support the organizational direction.

The Solution

Strategic Communications was engaged to conduct a thorough audit of the communications function from the leadership, management, member and public perspectives. Stratcom completed key informant interviews, a telephone survey of the membership and an online survey of a representative sample of the Canadian public. The report-backs and recommendations from this process guided the development of a full-scope strategic communications plan and resulted in a number of changes and improvements within ACPA, including:

• A refinement of the internal communications infrastructure, including printed and electronic newsletters;
• Media relations and relationship building strategies with key public stakeholders, including reporters and analysts;
• Integration of media and government relations efforts to improve flight safety;
• A website redevelopment;
• A crisis communications plan and issues management protocol; and
• An organizational rebranding.

The Results

Follow-up research, also conducted by Stratcom, concluded that the membership, leadership and public all had increased favourable perceptions of the organization a year later.