Case Study: A First Project with Unifor

Constant, clear communication

In January, Unifor hired me to make a video for WestJet contact centre workers in Calgary. Unifor was organizing them, and the video was meant to help build support for a union vote. It was our first project together, and communication throughout the project took place primarily over email.

Now, despite most of the correspondence taking place over email, this was one of the smoothest and most efficient projects I've ever worked on. It went well because both sides kept in constant, clear communication throughout the process. And clear in this case meant saying as much as needed in as few words as possible. While a project like this might have a producer's full attention, it's usually one of several projects a communications team is managing at once. Respecting their time means communicating clearly and getting to the point.

I demonstrated this through a short summary at the top of my email in my very first reply to Unifor's request: "TL;DR version: Yes, I can do this, I'm familiar with the issue, I can get the requested shots, and I can do it so that final deliverable(s) fall within the requested timelines." In one sentence, I covered whether I was available, whether I understood the issue, whether I could get the shots, and whether I could hit the timeline. The rest of the email contained information on my understanding and personal connection to the subject matter, my experience with these types of shoots, and some follow-up questions to get the ball rolling.

State the purpose up front

Within a day of that reply, Unifor's national representative for communications and its national representative for organizing had sent almost everything I needed to build a treatment. They gave me the theme of the interviews, the questions Unifor wanted asked, the b-roll they hoped for, the length (four to four and a half minutes), and where the video and its derivatives would run. They gave me Unifor's account of what had happened at the call centre: about 400 Calgary jobs had been outsourced in the past year and they wanted to protect the jobs of the remaining Canadian contact centre workers through unionization. And they told me the videos were to help build support for the union vote.

All of that arrived before I sent a quote. Purpose, audience, length and expected deliverables are what a producer needs to price a job and plan it. I wrote back with what I took the message and the goal to be. The message, as I understood it from Unifor: WestJet's shift from employee ownership to private equity, the outsourcing that followed, and why workers banding together could help protect Canadian jobs and services. The goal: give workers clear information about how these changes could affect their work, and a way to learn more.

That evening I sent the treatment and an estimate. The treatment was the live reference document for the project. It held the audience, the message, the locations, the deliverables, and what success looked like. In this case, workers who watch the video should feel informed and respected. If anything changed, I updated the document, so everything important stayed in one place and I wasn't hunting through an email chain to figure out what we had decided.

Everyone knows what they own

Unifor's comms representative introduced the rest of the team in her first detailed email. She copied the organizing representative and Unifor's comms director and named their roles, so everyone was in the chain from the start. After that, each person had a job. The comms rep handled approvals and releases. The organizing rep coordinated the workers: who was available, when, and where to meet. The Local 531 unit chair was the on-site contact at the airport. And lastly, the comms director reviewed the cuts before final sign-off.

For an outside producer on a first project, that clarity streamlined coordination and saved a lot of guessing about who to direct questions through.

Short doesn't mean thin

A short email can still carry a lot, as long as the details can be stored somewhere other than the email chain. On this project, this was the role the treatment played. A treatment can be written once and signed off before kick-off, but I keep mine open through delivery. On a project run by email, decisions get made in the chain, and the chain is a poor place to keep them.

In the days leading up to the shoot, I sent Unifor several questions covering final scheduling, setup time, the on-site contact, the b-roll location, and how the interviews should look. All questions were addressed promptly and clearly by the team on Unifor's side.

Unifor had sent seven interview questions, and I told them I'd be expanding on those. I built them out to 22, grouped by theme from each worker's own job to the outsourcing to the decision to organize, so the answers would line up with the video's purpose.

How it turned out

The full video and its social media derivatives were released on September 9 and on September 18, Unifor announced that WestJet contact centre workers had voted to join the union. Nearly 750 workers were eligible to participate, and the vote was 88.7 per cent YES. The video was one piece of a months-long campaign, and the result belongs to the workers who shared their stories onscreen and those who mobilized tirelessly behind the scenes.

If you're hiring an outside producer for the first time, tell them up front why you need the video and when you need it. Describe the video: what kind, how long, and where it'll run. Introduce your stakeholders and their roles early and be ready to answer follow-up questions and review the treatment with the people who sign off, so everyone is aligned before kick-off.

If you're a communications team that hires outside producers and want a partner who works this way, I'd be glad to talk, or email me directly at ryan@ryansauve.com. For the quickest reply, give Rocky a click/tap on the right to catch me on WhatsApp.