Life in Corporate Communications and Engagement

The plan places importance on having a proactive dialogue with communities, listening to the public and understanding their issues. Not many initiatives can claim to do this more effectively than the neighbourhood policing consultation events, which the branch played a key role in promoting, providing the key messages, and recording each Q&A before compiling the final analysis and report for the Force Leadership Team.

Additionally, the team has been involved in each edition of Operation AVRO – the Chief Constable’s flagship operation which relies upon a highly effective comms and marketing strategy to be fully successful. The strategy comes with the key line of ‘tackling the issues that matter most to you’ so by its very nature is an opportunity to have a positive dialogue with the public.

In an effort to enhance media and stakeholder relationships, the team has organised more media opportunities this year than any year previously – often taking reporters out on warrants or offering them the opportunity to speak with officers to tell the positive stories of GMP.

Stakeholder engagement has been higher than ever before with regular progress reports, PoaP themed information booklets and strategy documents being produced and regularly shared with senior figures locally and nationally. This has also given opportunities to open up further conversations with stakeholders and get their support with ongoing campaigns and initiatives – none more so than the Police Uplift Recruitment campaign which saw weekly application figures more than quadruple after launching our campaign.

The public narrative around policing isn’t always positive and there has been challenging subject matter that the team has needed to provide detailed communications strategies for. However, the enhanced media relationships and openness which the team has approached each plan with has helped ensure fair and balanced coverage. Having enhanced stakeholder relationships has also meant each strategy has seen a more collaborative approach taken – whether that be in terms of briefing partners on key points or them speaking publicly to support us as key advocates.

Some of the notable public updates that strategies have been provided for include the CSE assurance report for Oldham, the discontinuation of PoliceWorks and an accelerated cause for concern around responding to vulnerable people.

Internally we have sought to give staff voices to make their views known. In June we organised five days of ‘Becoming Giants’ events which were attended by over 7,000 colleagues and gave them the opportunities to engage directly with the Chief Constable and vote for their preferred new uniform choice. The nature of the sessions and the attendance figure is unprecedented in GMP.

In addition to the Becoming Giants events, the branch has reintroduced The Brief newsletter as a monthly publication, designed the content/handouts for the Sergeant and Inspector’s pledge events and provided individual photos of the officers and the Chief, and refreshed the intranet.

Another key element under the Plan on a Page has been to improve staff recognition and make GMP an attractive place to work. No team in the force has played a bigger role in the efforts to improve staff recognition and the department has completely overhauled the existing system to deliver a more uniformed approach and ensure fairness across the force.

The highlight of this is undoubtedly the new ‘Chief Constable’s Annual Awards’ event which has focused on recognising those who help to deliver the new vision the Chief Constable has set out for GMP. A post-COVID backlog has also meant that the previous twelve months have seen more smaller scale ceremonies held in a year than ever before – this includes recognition events and attestations as we recruit more officers now than we have done for over a decade.

Meanwhile our Museum has recovered well from COVID closures to become Greater Manchester’s most highly rated attraction by TripAdvisor.