Five ways to do internal comms discovery when you have no time or budget

“We know we should do discovery… but we don’t have time.”

Every internal comms team says this at some point. And it’s understandable. There’s always something more urgent – whether that’s BAU workload, stakeholder demands or platform timelines that won’t move.

So discovery gets pushed back. Then eventually dropped. Not because teams don’t believe in it, but because they assume it has to be big, slow and expensive.

It doesn’t.

You can do meaningful discovery in the margins of your working week. If you can find time to run a campaign, you can find time to understand whether it should exist or not.

Skip discovery and you design on guesswork

When discovery doesn’t happen, the work doesn’t stop. Content still gets created. Channels still get redesigned. Platforms still get launched. But everything is built on assumptions. And that’s how teams end up creating intranets and communications that look right – but don’t work.

You can’t fix comms if you don’t know what’s broken.

Even a small amount of discovery is enough to challenge those assumptions and change direction.

Read more about discovery versus audits, and why internal comms teams keep building the wrong thing.

What ‘guerrilla discovery’ actually looks like

Discovery doesn’t have to be a formal phase with a research plan and a budget line. It can be lightweight, continuous and embedded in your day job. Think of it as guerrilla discovery. You’re using the same core techniques – interviews, analytics, inbox sampling – but in a more practical, accessible way.

You don’t need to be a UX researcher, but you do need to get closer to how work actually happens. 

Here are five practical ways to do internal communications discovery using lightweight, real-world techniques that fit into your working week.

1. Inbox sampling: understand the real comms experience

If you want to understand internal communications, start with the inbox. Look at what people are actually receiving. Check your own inbox, those of your colleagues (with permission, of course) and any shared team inboxes you have access to.

Pay attention to:

• volume and frequency

• duplication and overlap

• conflicting messages

• competing calls to action

This shows you the real comms experience – not the carefully planned version. It’s often where the problems are most obvious.

2. Shadowing: see how work actually gets done

Sit with someone while they do their job. That might be in person or virtually. It might be an hour, not a full day. What matters is what you observe.

Look for:

• where they go to find information

• what slows them down

• when communication helps – and when it interrupts

This is where theory meets reality. You’ll quickly see whether your comms are supporting work or getting in the way.

3. Watch Teams or Slack: the gaps are already visible

Your organisation is already telling you what’s broken. You just need to listen. Spend time observing conversations in Teams, Slack or other channels.

Look for:

• repeated questions

• workarounds (“does anyone have the latest…”)

• informal knowledge sharing

These are not edge cases. They’re signals that formal channels aren’t doing their job.

4. Track repeated questions: your clearest signal of need

For a week or two, keep a simple log of questions you see more than once in meetings, chat channels and email. You don’t need a tool. A notes doc will do.

Patterns will emerge quickly – and those patterns point directly to gaps in your comms.

If people keep asking the same questions, your system isn’t answering them.

5. Search data: what people need but can’t find

Search behaviour is one of the most honest sources of insight you have. Look at your intranet or search analytics and focus on:

• zero-result searches

• high-frequency queries

• terms that don’t match your content language

These are unmet needs, clearly expressed. Not opinions. Not feedback. Actual behaviour.

Bonus: five more ways to spot problems quickly

If you want to go further, there are plenty of low-effort ways to build a richer picture:

1. Calendar analysis: where are people spending their time? What meetings exist because processes aren’t clear?

2. Content ‘dark matter’: what content exists but isn’t being used, or even seen?

3. Heuristic reviews: do your channels meet basic standards of clarity, structure and usability? Are channels standardised or does everything look different – making it difficult for users to find what they need? 

4. Stakeholder eavesdropping: what frustrations keep coming up in leadership conversations?

5. Journey snippets: map one task end-to-end (for example, booking leave or submitting expenses)

None of this requires a formal project. But all of it adds up to insight.

Don’t overcomplicate what you do with it

You don’t need a polished report or a 50-slide deck. Start with what’s obvious:

• patterns

• pain points

• quick wins

That’s enough to begin. From there, you can prioritise and build a roadmap grounded in real needs, not assumptions.

Discovery isn’t extra work. It is the work.

One of the biggest misconceptions about discovery is that it sits outside delivery – something you do before the ‘real work’ begins. But that’s the wrong way to think about it.

Discovery is how you understand whether your work is needed in the first place. It’s how you stay connected to how people actually get things done. It’s how you avoid adding to the noise.

You don’t need more time to do discovery. You need to stop pretending you can afford not to.

Digital Communications at Work dives deep into discovery, and will help you to understand how it earns trust, focuses effort and helps you deliver comms that actually work.