Creative employee engagement campaign for Workday rollout recognized by Canadian Public Relations Society
Southlake Health has earned national recognition for its creative approach to employee engagement, winning Gold at the Canadian Public Relations Society (CPRS) National Awards of Excellence. This spring, Southlake’s Workday communications rollout was named Employee Engagement / Internal Communications Campaign of the Year, recognizing the strategy used to engage and support staff through the launch of Southlake’s new integrated human resources and payroll platform.
The CPRS National Awards of Excellence recognize outstanding public relations and communications programs from across Canada. Southlake’s award-winning campaign stood out among submissions from major organizations nationwide for its creative approach to employee engagement, change management, and organizational transformation.
“The entry presented a strong internal communications and change-readiness plan for a complex implementation affecting staff across the organization,” said the CPRS National Awards of Excellence Committee. “The creative use of a consistent character provided a recognizable campaign thread and helped make the new platform more approachable.”
Southlake’s internal campaign was designed to support employees and leaders through the transition to Workday, a new platform that centralized recruitment, onboarding, learning, payroll, benefits, and professional development into one easy-to-use system. To make the change approachable and engaging, Southlake introduced “Wink,” a character who guided staff through key Workday milestones across an entire career journey, from applying for a role and onboarding, to leadership development and retirement.
“Implementing a new HR and payroll platform is a significant change for any organization,” said Cristina Amaral, Vice President, People and Chief Human Resources Officer, Southlake Health. “We knew success would depend not only on the technology itself, but on how we supported our people through the transition. This award recognizes the thoughtful, employee-centred approach our teams took to ensuring staff felt informed, supported, and confident every step of the way.”
The campaign included a dedicated microsite, demo videos, leader resources, staff newsletters, digital signage, training supports, and a Workday Scavenger Hunt to encourage hands-on learning and adoption. The initiative was delivered entirely in-house through collaboration between Southlake’s Corporate Communications & Public Affairs and Change Readiness teams, with support from Human Resources, Finance, Information Technology, and frontline Workday champions from across the organization.
“This recognition reflects the power of storytelling in helping people navigate change,” said Derek Rowland, Chief Communications Officer and Director, Public Affairs, Southlake Health. “By taking a creative and human-centred approach, we were able to turn a complex system implementation into an engaging experience that resonated with staff and leaders across the organization. We’re incredibly proud of what our teams accomplished together.”
The campaign achieved record-breaking employee engagement, with Workday communications generating the highest all-staff email open rates in Southlake’s history and strong participation in training and adoption activities.
Photo caption: Members of Southlake’s Corporate Communications & Public Affairs and Change Readiness teams, left to right: Caitlin Macdougal, Lindsey Furlanic, Dan Levesque, Jessica Thorpe, Sandra Divalentin, and Cheri Tredree.
