📝 Creating a 90 day Internal Communications & Culture Plan with Adrian J. Hopkins
Senior Vice President, Internal Culture and Communications, Grey New York
In December 2021, I featured an article on Adrian J. Hopkins. Fast-forward a year and a half later, I’m excited to highlight him again. This edition, it’s a special feature on how to create a 90-day plan for internal communications and culture leaders. Adrian recently celebrated his first six months in a new leadership position at a new company, and we spoke about best practices to help others take on new opportunities or hit a reset in their current role.
In This Edition
➕ Consider the mantra of “BAU+” — Business As Usual, Plus
🔍 Treat your early days like a research and discovery mission
✏️ Be a student of the company
About Adrian
Adrian J. Hopkins is an internal communications and culture leader with more than 15 years of experience in the media and creative industries. In September 2022, he joined Grey New York, an award-winning advertising studio within Grey Group, as their first-ever Senior Vice President of Internal Culture and Communications. At Grey, Adrian is focused on creating content and experiences that help employees feel connected to agency strategy and to each other in a hybrid working environment. Previously, he was Senior Director of Internal Communications at General Assembly.
Earlier roles in human resources, strategy, branding, and business development have shaped Adrian’s approach to people-focused transformation. During a five-year tenure at The New York Times, he led several culture change initiatives that increased employee engagement and satisfaction. For his impact at The Times, Adrian was a two-time recipient of the Publisher’s Award, the company’s highest employee recognition.
Adrian has also been a career coach and writer whose career advice and personal narratives have been published in outlets such as The Daily Muse, TIME, and Forbes. In 2023, Adrian joined the board of directors of Artistic Noise, a New York-based youth arts nonprofit.
Originally from Richmond, Virginia, Adrian earned a B.A. in History from Yale and an M.A. in Media Studies from The New School. He lives in Brooklyn, New York with his wife and rescue dog.
How did you approach your 90-day plan?
Before I began this role, I had a lot of conversations with executives at Grey that shaped how I approached my start. My goals were to gain insights into the work that needed to be done and get perspective on what other leaders were looking for from my role.
Because I started in the fall of 2022, I had 90 days until the end of the year and I didn’t want to rock the boat in the most deadline-driven quarter for our business, so I adopted the mantra of “BAU+” — Business As Usual, Plus.
This means that I wanted to keep activities like our biweekly all-agency meetings consistent, but gradually introduce incremental changes to improve quality. Questions like “could we try…” became my most useful tools.
What’s important for a leader to prioritize when they join with a team in place?
I think it’s so important to gather as much context as you can, treating your early days like a research and discovery mission.
As the first person to hold my role, I knew I had a lot to learn and wanted the people on my team to know that I trusted them to be experts on the ways we could get better.
My wife, who has built and grown teams throughout her career, suggested that I get familiar with themes in the book The First 90 Days. Inspired by some of the core concepts, I sent a short survey to invite feedback from each member of my comms team. It started with this question:
The survey continued with inviting additional insights on their ranking, then asking for the three words to describe the team’s current state, and predicting what would be on our highlight reel a year from now. I also left space at the end for anything else that was on their mind.
Whether it’s a survey like this or some other tool, it’s critical to distill the sentiment of those around you, understand what has led to your current state, form relationships with your team, and lean into solutions from a place of understanding, which will help you build trust and gain momentum.
What is the #1 piece of advice you'd give to someone starting a new role?
Be a student of the company! Take advantage of everyone’s generosity and desire to help you get acquainted with the organization as a new employee.
It’s not a new idea to go on a “listening tour,” but try to structure your listening around understanding what people are working on, why it matters to them, and how it connects to the strategy of the organization.
As I did that at Grey, I looked for consistency in everyone’s responses to understand where to prioritize. You’re not going to solve everyone’s problems, but you can find where the biggest opportunities to be successful are and build support for your company’s strategy and goals.
What’s one project you’re proud of making happen early in your new role?
Working at an advertising agency, creative energy is constantly in the air and I’d argue that more than many other types of companies, it’s both possible and encouraged to take an idea and move quickly to execute it. That’s exactly what happened during Women’s History Month in March.
At the end of February, I was wearing a sweatshirt that had “Maggie’s Folk” printed on it when a creative director asked me who Maggie is. I explained that Maggie Lena Walker was the first African-American woman to charter a bank and how she is one of my heroes.
My colleague had never heard of her, but my story gave her the idea to tribute other history-making women whose stories aren’t well known. She created a design for more custom sweatshirts that same day and two weeks later, a dozen of our colleagues had shirts to tell the stories of women who inspired them. Those colleagues, who ranged in seniority from junior account managers to the c-suite, wore their shirts during our first quarter town hall and it was amazing to see how many conversations they sparked! A few people even shared their tributes on Grey’s weekly podcast.
I love having a job that helps bring big ideas to life in a way that also influences how we cultivate cultural value as an ad agency. I reflected on more of those moments from my first 6 months in this LinkedIn post.
What's the best way to make the most of your time and ideas in a new role?
Keep communicating about what you’re doing and the expectations you have, especially as you talk with other leaders at your company. The same way I set expectations with “BAU+” in the first 90 days, I pivoted to a different strategy in my second 90 days. I used baseball as a metaphor, saying that I was focused on swinging for singles and doubles to describe being ready to take more chances more consistently. All of this helps others understand how I’m pacing while also building excitement for where we can go.
What did you learn from your first 90 days that you can share with our community?
Just give yourself some grace and remember that whatever feels tough to figure out now will be easier in a year and you’ll be proud of what you learned along the way.
Thank you for reading The Switchboard. ☎️ Every interview edition is based on a live conversation and personally written by me — Julia Levy. Learn more about why I write. Review the Index of past posts.
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