Communications, External Relations and Financial Education
4-day intensive residential programme, 11 September
- 15 September 2005
Venue: Christ's College, Cambridge
Course Chairman : Wolf-Rüdiger Bengs, Deutsche Bundesban
Series Adviser: Charles Goodhart, CBE, Professor Emeritus, London School
of Economics, Financial Markets Group
COMMUNICATIONS, EXTERNAL RELATIONS AND FINANCIAL EDUCATION
Good communications is the essence of good central banking.
What is not so well known is that it is becoming equally vital for financial regulators.
Let me illustrate each in turn.
Good communications for central banks –
Making the right judgements about monetary policy measures is important. But the difference between good and inferior outcomes is often determined by how effectively the decisions are communicated to markets, governments, the media, and the public is just as vital.
This is not just about monetary policy, but goes much wider.
How is the Federal Reserve System managing the communications issues connected with the impending retirement of Chairman Alan Greenspan? From time to time all central banks have to deal with such transitional periods; none are straightforward.
In the past year, leading central banks have been preparing their public for a probable increase in interest rates. Has the strategy been successful?
Why has the reputation of the Bank of Japan improved so much since the arrival of Governor Fukui? The BOJ’s monetary policy is much the same as before, but its presentation has been transformed. This course will consider what general lessons can be learnt.
When should a misleading or inaccurate story be denied or contradicted? Recently, financial markets were watching closely when the People’s Bank of China had to manage the fallout from a (misleading) story reporting an imminent revaluation of the Renminbi. How should such mis-reporting be handled?
– and for regulators
Many lessons can also be learnt from regulatory authorities that have had to deal with bank failures and depositor panic. Again, communications play a key role in the success or failure of regulatory action.
Right now, currency markets are fragile, credit and property markets jittery and corporate governance under the spotlight.
At such a time, what regulators and other policy-makers say can be more important than what they do.
Regulators often have to react very quickly, almost instantaneously, to new development. But equally, public messages must be carefully considered: getting them wrong can have startlingly adverse consequences.
Contingency planning
This course, designed for those with immediate, overall responsibility for external relations as well as press officers themselves, distils the lessons of effective management of the organisation's communications policy. Participants learn to think strategically in order to manage the risks inherent in communication, and to create and maintain contingency plans for those emergencies which recent history has shown can materialise all too easily.
In today’s high-risk environment, communication policy must be approached strategically and coherently. Central banks and regulatory agencies must communicate with a host of very different audiences. Each of these requires distinctive treatment. The wide range of audiences faced - financial markets, the press, governments, parliaments, the international community, television, the general public - all have radically differing information needs.
Case study format
To encourage this strategic approach, key elements of the 2005 programme
follow a case study format: throughout the week delegates will split into
small working groups to consider particular communications challenges
and create strategies to address them. Experienced facilitators will critique
and challenge their work in order to equip delegates with practical real
world approaches to critical challenges such as crisis communications,
and dealing with troubled banks.
Educating the public about finance
In addition, the 2005 course will examine the need for central banks and
supervisors to provide essential financial education to the public. Such
initiatives encourage better decisions regarding savings and pensions.
In many countries, they reach out to “unbanked” communities.
All contribute, in the long term, to safe and robust financial systems.
A key session this year examines how such “financial education”
initiatives can be undertaken successfully.
Against this fast-changing background, the four-day seminar will allow
delegates to examine their current strategy against those of other monetary
and regulatory authorities, so as to create all the critical elements
of a successful communications strategy. Delegates have the unusual opportunity
to draw on tried-and-tested experiences of similar institutions around
the world.
A distinguished panel of presenters who are experts in all aspects of
communications and the media, as well as veteran communications officers
from the world's leading central banks, will lead the group’s discussions.
We look forward to welcoming you to Cambridge.
William Clarke,
CBE, PhD Chairman
PS Other training courses are also held in this Autumn Series 2004, for detailed programmes and a fax-back registration form for each course, please visit www.centralbanking.co.uk/conferences.
Chairman’s
introduction
Wolf-Rüdiger
Bengs
Deutsche Bundesbank
What are the key challenges facing
communications experts in central banks and regulatory agencies? This
session offers delegates to chance to benefit from each other’s
expertise and experience in confronting common problems.
Television: how central banks can reach a mass audience
Evan
Davis
BBC
Central banks have limited television
coverage. But television allows central banks to transmit their message
to a wide audience, much of which would otherwise be entirely ignorant
of central banks. How can central banks increase coverage – and
do they always want to? When central banks do succeed in provoking interest
from television, how can they ensure that its image will be portrayed
positively and that the general public will understand its actions?
How central banks can best communicate
with financial markets
John
Calverley
American Express
Making the right judgements about
monetary policy measures is important. But the difference between good
and inferior outcomes is often determined by how effectively the decisions
are communicated to markets. Central bank communication is a subtle
art and undoubtedly an extremely vital part of the policy making process
for modern central banks.
How can central banks best communicate with financial markets? What
they should say, and how? Should central banks, for example, comment
on the macroeconomic impact of asset prices? Can they – and should
they - attempt to influence asset prices through communicating their
views in this regard?
In this session John Calverley, an economist and strategist for American
Express, explains what market analysts look for from central banks,
and how well they are served.
How to communicate with the financial
media
Chris
Giles
Financial Times
At all times, but especially when
interest rates are rising and financial distress among households and
firms is mounting, central banks and supervisory authorities have to
fight hard to retain a positive image. Some financial media may be well-informed
about monetary policy. But the general public is generally uninterested
in the complicated technical information central banks are most skilled
at explaining. Consequently the press often follows people rather than
issues, which can be frustrating. How can official sector institutions
deliver the information journalists find useful and get their case across
at the same time? This session adopts the perspective of the financial
press, and asks how this relationship can work best in practice.
MANAGEMENT
Brent Eades
Bank of Canada
A professional and actively managed website for any public organisation has now come to be expected. The quality and usability of a website will affect the public’s perception of an institution, and it must therefore be of the highest order. Recent rapid developments in use of the internet by official-sector agencies and others have “raised the bar” considerably. Central banks and regulatory authorities need to think carefully how to meet these higher expectations. A well-thought out internet policy is essential. This interactive session will examine the latest methods used to build a world-class website, and look at how group members’ own institutions have addressed these.
Best practice in central bank communication
Peter Bakstansky
Federal Reserve Bank of New York
What is “best practice” for central bank communication? How, in fact, do leading institutions approach communications policy and what do they understand to be the principal challenges in their institutions? The session aims to outline key points in “best practice” for central bank communication, drawing on the communications policies of the New York Fed (and the Federal Reserve System as a whole) and their contribution to establishing and sustaining credibility for the central bank.
Group case study: communications scenarios
Peter Bakstansky
Federal Reserve Bank of New York
Alongside long-term strategic goals, central banks and supervisors must also be ready to react to emergencies. The ability to do so can only be established by careful contingency planning and training. This case study will challenge delegates, working in small groups, to consider how they would handle a crisis situation. They will be asked to formulate an effective response under time pressure. The chairman and other delegates will then critique the proposed approaches and, critically, examine the kinds of advance preparation that could in future.
Communicating supervisory policy
Vernon Everitt
UK Financial Services Authority
Communicating supervision policy is among the trickiest tasks which central banks and financial regulators face. They must warn consumers and financial markets about risks, while at the same time avoiding undermining confidence which could provoke an adverse reaction. In addition they must safeguard confidential supervisory information. Vernon Everitt discusses practical challenges he has faced at the Bank of England and the UK’s Financial Services Authority.
Communication strategy within the eurosystem
Elisabeth Ardaillon-Poirier
European Central Bank
Central banks must meet high standards for external communications. In the European Central Bank and in the eurosystem this challenge is taken very seriously as the institutions concerned operate in a multicultural environment with many different cultures and languages. It is critically important to have clear goals for communications function and to follow a proactive strategy. This session examines how the European Central Bank has approached the challenge of ensuring effective, coordinated explanation of eurosystem policy.
Communicating
as a member of the eurosystem
Wolf-Rüdiger
Bengs
Deutsche Bundesbank
What has the establishment of the eurosystem
meant for the communications and external relations strategies and challenges
of national central banks within the system? Although much of the attention
may have shifted towards the ECB in general, and its communications on
monetary policy in specific, national central banks within the system
still face specific tasks. To some extent the current system both allows
for and requires a division of labour in terms of communication and external
relations.
In this session Wolf-Rüdiger Bengs, will draw on his extensive experience
at the Deutsche Bundesbank in explaining what the communications policies
of a national central bank within the eurosystem encompasses.
Accountability and transparency: how to
talk to politicians
David
Ruffley
British MP
A crucial step in a successful strategy is to identify
key audiences and become familiar with their specific needs. This target
session examines relations with parliaments and the political realm.
Independence requires central banks and most financial regulators to account
for their actions to politicians, often in parliamentary committees. Central
banks rely on political support for their legitimacy, especially in times
of crisis. Relations with parliaments and politicians can suffer badly
is communications are inappropriate or insensitive. How in fact can relations
with parliaments and politicians best be managed? This discussion is led
by a leading UK parliamentarian.
Financial education: what central banks and supervisors can achieve
Barbara
Smith
OECD
Problem
surgery and course conclusion
Group workshop
The group will finish the week
by reviewing the lessons of the course and their applicability to participants’
own institutions. Delegates will be asked to review the week’s discussions
and formulate key points to condense into an action plan based on the
key themes and issues highlighted throughout the week.
Media training workshop
Steve
Levinson
HBL Media
Central banks and supervisory
agencies are coming under heightened pressure to provide greater media
access and interview opportunities. One way of dealing with this emerging
trend is the use of media training as senior staff may not be adequately
primed to deal with uncompromising journalists and unfamiliar situations.
This session examines how delegates can deal with the media to their best
advantage, using media training techniques to promote their key messages.
It looks at what media training seeks to achieve, how a media training
programme can be structured and analyses the differing demands of the
print and broadcast media.