Discovery, internal communications and interim leadership support
Reframing young suicide prevention
By Michelle Pavey, Strategy Director
When Papyrus came to us, they thought they needed a new website. And honestly, that’s not an unusual starting point, a lot of organisations arrive at a digital project because something feels off about their online presence, and a website feels like the most visible place to fix it. What they don’t always realise, until you start digging, is that the digital problem is usually a symptom of something deeper.
That’s what we found with Papyrus.
Starting with people, not assumptions
The first thing we did was listen. Really listen, not just to the leadership team, but to staff, volunteers, and people with lived experience of suicide and mental health crisis. We ran workshops across the organisation, and those conversations shaped everything that followed.
What came back was both inspiring and revealing. The people at Papyrus are deeply, genuinely committed to their mission. They know exactly why the work matters (suicide is the leading cause of death in young people under 35, and they believe many of those deaths are preventable). What was harder was translating that conviction into a brand and a digital presence that could communicate with the same clarity and urgency to the outside world.
By working closely with the marketing team and understanding goals for the future, we were able to focus on the bigger picture for Papyrus. The discovery phase gave us the evidence we needed to make the case for a much bigger piece of work. It’s one thing to say “I think you need a rebrand” - it’s another to be able to show an organisation exactly why, with the voices of their own people behind it.
What the discovery told us
A few things came out clearly. The existing identity felt dated and clinical to staff and volunteers - the people closest to the mission. The tone and language used across different communications was inconsistent, which made it harder for audiences to trust and connect with Papyrus. And the website, as it stood, wasn’t built to serve young people in crisis - the most important and vulnerable audience Papyrus exists to reach.
There was also a strategic opportunity that hadn’t been fully seized. Papyrus had grown significantly as an organisation, but the brand hadn’t grown with it. They were operating as a national force for hope and prevention while presenting themselves with the visual language of a much smaller, more cautious charity. We needed to let that internal drive, commitment and dedication to helping young people shine as brightly externally.
Keeping things moving internally
Internal communications are as important as what you say to your key audiences, and this is something I will not change my mind on. As a part of this project, we developed an internal communications strategy alongside the brand work. A rebrand only lands well if the people inside the organisation feel part of it. If staff feel like something has been done to them rather than with them, the best-looking brand in the world will struggle to take root.
We developed a strategy based on direct feedback from employees to help bring the team together not only on a new brand and website, but more critically on the trajectory of the charity over the next few years. Working in a challenging and emotionally taxing space, means it’s critical for all staff to feel supported, informed, and cared for in real and meaningful ways to keep them inspired and engaged in their work and with each other. Alongside this organisational view, we advised on how to bring the whole organisation on the journey: explaining the thinking behind the new direction and giving staff the tools and language to champion the new brand from the moment it launched. Ownership matters. Particularly in a charity where people’s personal connection to the mission runs deep.
“Projects like this are a powerful reminder of what good brand and communications work can actually do. When the people you’re trying to reach are young, vulnerable, and sometimes at the very edge of what they can cope with, getting the strategic foundation right is the difference between someone finding the help they need or not. The privilege of working with Papyrus is that you feel that purpose in every decision you make, and it impacts everything.”
Stepping in when it mattered
Like a lot of charities, midway through the project, Papyrus went through a period of uncertainty and change, which threatened to impact their teams significantly. These things happen, and when they do, the risk is that momentum is lost - especially on a project of this scale and sensitivity.
We provided interim Marketing Director-level support to help bridge the gap. That meant leading meetings, maintaining the strategic thread of the project, keeping the marketing team and project aligned, and making sure the work kept moving forward with clarity and purpose. The strong relationship we’d built with the Papyrus team meant we understood the organisation well enough to be genuinely useful, rather than just holding a seat at the table.
The project continued to have momentum and produce incredible pieces of work throughout that time, ensuring nothing that had been worked on was wasted or lost. It also meant when stability returned everything was clear and ready to go.
What I took from this project
Working with Papyrus reminded me of something I already knew, but that’s easy to forget in the day-to-day: strategy is only as good as the human understanding behind it. The workshops, the conversations, the time spent really getting to know the organisation - that wasn’t the preamble to the real work. That was the real work. Everything else followed from it. By constantly keeping the real goals at the heart of what we did, we were able to provide Papyrus with the tools to continue their most important work. Saving the lives of young people.
If you’re working with an organisation doing something this important, you owe it to them to get that foundation right. I think we did.
