EUPRIO’S ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2019
INSPIRING COMMUNITIES.
HOW TO ENGAGE KEY AUDIENCES AND BOOST YOUR REPUTATION
ADAM MICKIEWICZ UNIVERSITY IN POZNAŃ (POLAND)
JUNE 16-19, 2019

Conference 2019

The focus of the EUPRIO Annual Conference 2019 was on how effective internal communications can not only help build reputation, but also increase student recruitment and enhance the appeal of your university to students, potential staff and external partners.

Communications departments are increasingly at the center of strategic decision making across Higher Education institutions. How do we, as expert communicators, engage with our university communities to help build stronger brands and enhance value to society? How do we not only support our colleagues, but actively influence culture change and shape the future direction of our universities?
By making connections, by innovating, by inspiring.

The EUPRIO Annual Conference 2019 focused on these challenges and share expert knowledge of innovative solutions. The conference had two themes:

Reputation management and building

A university’s reputation is critical, now more than ever with social media providing instant feedback. Not only for league tables and student/staff recruitment, but when it comes to trust and transparency around social responsibility, ethics and community engagement.
Strategic planning and crisis management are critical, but we explored new approaches to protecting and building online reputation, how we can effectively use platforms such as LinkedIn, and the ethics around staff perceptions of what is appropriate for internal/external, personal/professional, public/private communication.
We also discussed establishing effective relationships between communications and HR to develop employer branding and recruitment, innovative approaches to celebrating success, how to manage expectations of international students, and how to handle internal and external relationships during times of crisis.

Internal communications

Strategic planning, informed managers and early collaboration with colleagues can effectively ensure that happy staff = happy students. Our own staff and students can be our best brand champions, so we demonstrated how to gain buy-in from audiences such as researchers and students, how to effectively engage with our internal stakeholders through intranets, social media, blogging and apps, and the positive impacts on community engagement.
We explored the importance of building communities in your university and the positive effects on achieving culture change, and the role of the employer around improved staff induction, engagement, support and development.
Completing the cycle from student to alumni and back again can harness real-life experiences using an authentic voice, so we will explore how best to achieve this and the benefits of considering staff/student concerns such as wellbeing from the very beginning.

Throughout all of these sessions, the integral role of social media and video content in current communications were supported with examples of best practice and innovation.