What’s in Your 2026 Comms Budget?

Here’s some good news: A new poll shows that communications leaders expect their budgets — and their influence — to rise in 2026.

And now, back to reality. What are these people smoking, and how can I get some?

Eight out of 10 in-house comms leaders in the U.S. and United Kingdom expect their budgets to grow next year, according to research conducted by Mercury Analytics for consultancy Fire on the Hill. Of the 201 comms directors surveyed, one in four anticipate budget hikes of more than 25%!

I don’t know about you, but I’m not running into many communicators these days who are that optimistic about next year. Comms directors seem more focused on hanging on to what they’ve got than adding budget, staff or new technology.

I would absolutely love to be wrong about this. 

Let’s assume that the poll is accurate. The budget chiefs are looking to communicators for clear evidence of a return on their investment. How can you show them that? They want increased employee engagement and its cousin, higher retention rates. And more than anything else, they want to mitigate risk.

Communicators who can demonstrate all the above will win bigger budgets. Your budget proposal must address these topics, not just detail how many writers you need and what it will cost to upgrade the intranet. To that end, we have three suggestions:

1. Get some data.
Organizations run on numbers. What’s up, what’s down, what’s trending and what’s not helps companies make decisions about how and where to spend their money.  To win a bigger comms budget (or just to keep the one you have), you need to show what needs more attention — and why.

Communication audits are about listening to your audience and comparing what they say they need with what you’re delivering. Surveys and focus groups give you quantitative and qualitative data, and your internal analytics can tell you how well you’re connecting. To argue for more resources, identify:

· Who’s left out. Is your comms team reaching hard-to-reach employees, especially those not sitting in front of computers? This may include everyone from sales reps to nurses and factory workers. Find the gaps and propose how to fill them.

· Focus on the cascade (or the lack of one). Organizations falter when messaging breaks down between leaders and managers, from managers to their teams, and from the workforce back up the chain. Identify the comms practices — new channels, manager training — that will keep information flowing.

· Find something to cut. Wait, I thought we were trying to add budget. Precisely. Demonstrate to the chiefs that you can eliminate comms channels or practices that no longer work and introduce new channels and approaches that solve comms problems. They’ll be impressed if you can improve your metrics through subtraction as well as addition.

2. Tie communications to the organization’s goals.
It’s not enough to say that “employees come first” or that we pride ourselves on “innovation” and “transparency.” These are important topics for your leaders, but even they know that employees don’t pay much attention to intangible concepts. In your budget proposal, show the budget chiefs how you will:

· Be a translator. Take us inside company initiatives and the people who are leading them. Explain the “why” behind change and what it means to employees.

· Focus on the unheralded. Tell stories about the unsung in your organization. They’re the ones who keep the place running.

· Change employee recognition programs. It’s not about giving people awards but showing how their accomplishments, big and small, tie back to your company’s mission.

3. Think about risk and how to manage it.
This is what keeps organizational leaders up at night. How can they protect the organization from the threats, internal and external, that could sink the ship? In your budget proposal, explain how communicators will play a key role in managing these four key areas of risk:

· Be a translator. Take us inside company initiatives and the people who are leading them. Explain the “why” behind change and what it means to employees.

· Focus on the unheralded. Tell stories about the unsung in your organization. They’re the ones who keep the place running.

· Change employee recognition programs. It’s not about giving people awards but showing how their accomplishments, big and small, tie back to your company’s mission.

Budgets are not just sets of numbers connected to line items. A budget tells the story of an organization’s priorities: here’s what we care about, and here’s what we want to accomplish.

A budget is a blueprint for the future, and your comms budget is part of that story. Build a plan for the organization you aspire to become, not just the one you are now.

Jim Ylisela, co-founder of Ragan Consulting Group, loves telling a good story through numbers. If you want help crafting your budget request, email Jim.

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