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Here’s a new topic that Sharon Phillips and I have been exploring: employee activists. In this podcast, we defined employee activists as those who vigorously advocate for their companies and leadership to support or oppose a cause or issue.

After learning that Google’s employees sent a petition to their CEO, I recently wrote a blog about employee activists on LinkedIn, which sparked a great conversation. Here are just a few topics we discussed:

• The power of employees’ voice — and why they’re not afraid to use it
• Why employee activists are different than employee ambassadors
• Weber Shandwick’s study on employee activists’ profiles
• Povaddo’s study on the rise of employee activism in the workplace
• How communicators can respond
• And much more.

And we expect the employee activist will only increase. Just imagine those Parkland students entering our workforce in a matter of years. Sharon and I believe this will greatly affect crisis and employee communications. Do you?

About Sharon McIntosh

Sharon is president of And Then Communications. With more than two decades of communications experience, she has a passion for creating and executing new ideas to drive employee engagement at companies both large and small. Most recently Sharon served as PepsiCo’s vice president of Global Internal Communications, overseeing the company’s efforts to connect with its more than 274,000 employees worldwide.