Nick Morgan, Public Words

What Is the Secret Language of Leadership?

I picked up Stephen Denning's The Secret Language of Leadership with great interest.  It's a provocative title.  Curious minds want to know, just what is the secret language leaders use, or should use? 

Denning sets up a straw man, an uninspiring leader who tries to lead through logic.  This (imaginary) leader presents facts and expects people to follow.  But they don't. 

Why?  Because we're distracted and it takes more than facts to get us to pay attention. 

What does it take?  It takes emotion, and an understanding of our needs as followers.  Beyond that, it takes a dollop of authenticity and a sprinkling of charisma. 

Here's my take on the secret language leaders should use:  begin by realizing that followers need to be respected, and they have to decide to follow a leader, to enlist in the cause the leader is espousing.

A decision is a measurable activity.  It follows certain steps.  And it's emotional.  Here's how it works. 

First, something has to get our attention:  let's say our car breaks down on the highway for the umpteenth time.

We've had it with the old clunker!  We go through an emotional reaction to the misery of finding ourselves stuck on the highway.  That's what motivates us to change.  We wait for AAA to tow us to safety.  Time to research new models -- and our ability to pay for them.

Eventually, we close in on a model.  We convince ourselves it's the best thing on wheels.  We find a dealer, and grimly haggle over a price, expecting to get taken to the automotive cleaners. 

But eventually we end up with a new car, and leaders should use the equivalent of this secret language when persuading followers of the importance of the cause. 

Get our attention.  Get emotional; persuade us that there's something wrong, or that something could be better, or both.  Help us explore the problem and look for alternatives.  Settle in on a new way forward.  Then, talk up the benefits of that way, so we can get over the hurdle of changing our minds.  Then, get us moving on the new path. 

That's the secret language:  Attention, problem, emotion, decision-making, and action.  Understand your followers and your ideas from that point of view, and you can be a leader.  Add in authenticity and charisma, and you can be a great one. 

How powerful is a story?

Just how powerful is a story?  Jim Loehr addresses that question in his book, The Power of Story:  Rewrite Your Destiny in Business and Life.  Loehr thinks about stories the way psychologists do:  as governering narratives that you tell about yourself, your life, your relationships, and that come to have a self-fulfilling aspect to them.  If you believe that you are always fated to screw up intimate relationships, for example, you will do so because you believe it.  Or, if you believe that you will be the next Bill Gates.....maybe you will. 

I don't dispute that what we believe about ourselves often 'comes true' if only because that belief is based on past experience.  But I think a more interesting way to think about stories -- for both individuals and companies -- is to look at how they frame your experiences and thus your life.

If you tell yourself you're on a quest to build the best new little company since Microsoft, for example, then every roadblock you encounter along the way is an obstacle to overcome on your path to the goal.  You'll get past those roadblock with ease because you know the story -- that's what heroes do, they get past roadblock and win through to the goal in the end.  That's a familiar narrative. 

The trick is to psych yourself (and your employees and colleagues) into believing this group hallucination long enough for it to become true.  History is littered with folks who struggled too long, lost hope, and gave up.  In addition to a good story, you need stick-to-it-iveness. 

Yes, stories are important.  They shape how we think about ourselves, our lives, and our work.  But character is also important, and without that the greatest stories in the world will never be lived to be told. 

Authenticity -- how important is it?

The third in my series of blogs inspired by recent books on communication-related issues takes Authenticity:  What Consumers Really Want, by James H, Gilmore and B. Joseph Pine II, as its starting point.  How important is authenticity?  The authors basically say that it's everything where companies and their customers are concerned, and I agree, for the most part.  I would add that it's essential in personal communications as well, whether you're giving a speech or conducting a meeting or just chatting with your co-workers.

As I've just finished writing in my new book on the subject, tentatively entitled Trust Me:  The Art of Authentic Communication, we're so fed up with hype that we value authenticity over almost everything else.  Be real with us, if you're pitching a product, leading a company, or telling us about the next greatest thing, we say.  Don't spin me.  I get that all the time, and I'm used to tuning it all out. 

In fact, we're experts as consumers at disregarding ads and marketing.  We have to be; we're hit with ungodly amounts of it from the moment we wake up until the time we collapse, overstimulated and exhausted, into bed at night.  Of course some of it sticks; how could we help but get saturated with the stuff?  But less than you might think. 

What we remember is the heartfelt, the real, the unusual, and the outrageous.  Marketers are much better at the latter two than the former, but they should learn.  The heartfelt and the real not only stick with us, they nourish our souls, and that's what we really need today.

Storytelling as a functional business art

I read What's Your Story?  Storytelling to move markets, audiences, people, and brands by Ryan Mathews and Watts Wacker with high expectations.  Wacker has been a futurist for a number of years, and his trendspotting is always interesting and illuminating.  The book is most useful when it gives practical advice on how to tell stories that will resonate with other people, your public, your customers, or any other audience you have in mind. 

The basic point is incontrovertible, that dull recitations of facts can't compete with a good story, whether it's to a friend, an audience, or a legion of customers.  There's not much news here.  But what can stories do for you and your company?  Mathews and Wacker are strong on the how-to.  I'll give a couple of examples.

Stories can explain origins.  Did your vision begin with personal computers in a garage, nerdy and high-tech, or did you have an idea about saving money?  Don't give us the facts, give us the story.  Give us the essential Truth, in other words, not the details.  If your origin was with Bill Gates or Steve Jobs, you'll get one kind of (high-tech) story; if it was with Sam Walton and saving money, you'll get another.  Make sure your story is appropriate to the history you're relating.  Wal-Mart actually leads the way in some areas of automation, pushing suppliers relentlessly to achieve maximum efficiency from supply chain wizardry, but you'd never know it when the company talks about Sam Walton's founding vision about small town America and saving pennies. 

Stories can communicate complicated histories concisely.  One of the beauties of a good story is that it can condense a lot of messy facts into a tidy, digestible story.  And that's all most of us have time for nowadays.  We don't want the legal brief, we want to get the emotional underpinnings and the gist of it.  Mathews and Wacker used the example of Charmin and Mr. Whipple -- all of the science, if that's the right word, of making toilet paper soft is summarized neatly and memorably in the silly story of Mr. Whipple trying to stop people (and himself) from squeezing the Charmin.  Brilliant. 

Stories can model behavior appropriately.  Stories become great shorthand for telling us how to behave.  Adam and Eve, the Buddha, the Tortoise and the Hare, Midas, Icarus -- our culture is full of ancient stories that have the aspect of cautionary tales.  Each of these stories lets us know the risks of behaving in certain ways and the opportunities inherent in certain situations.  Companies can use stories in the same ways to show employees how to behave or even to educate customers. 

Stories work well because they respect the way our minds deal with reality.  We've learned from an early age that there are actors, actions, and results.  If you push the glass over, the milk spills on the floor, and the parent rushes around to clean it up.  That's a very simple story, and it's where we begin to make sense of the world.  We get more sophisticated as time goes on, but it's the same thought process. 

We are all storytellers; it's how we make sense of the world.  Effective communication means taking advantage of the power of storytelling to make connections with people, with audiences, and with the public. 

Marketing and Communications for Consultants

I’m going to do a series of blogs inspired by recent books on communications.  The first is Levinson and McLaughlin’s book, Guerilla Marketing for Consultants.  What’s great about this book, especially for mid-sized and small consulting firms, is that the authors put the focus squarely on practical, straightforward communications that will be readily achievable by their target audience.  This is news you can use, if you’re trying to build up a business that isn’t already Fortune 1000 size.

Three insights in particular inspired by the book seem worthwhile in the communications realm.  The interesting thing about each of them is that they are timeless truths that have stayed true in the 24/7, always-on era. 

First of all, keep your attention where it belongs:  the clients.  That means that your main job is to communicate with them before everything else.  The best advertising is word-of-mouth, and that has only gotten more important in the Internet age. Referrals are your best source of new clients. 

Second, public speaking is still a great way to reach potential clients and create buzz about you and your ideas.  The competition is tough and it’s harder to get to the right audiences, but if you can, you’ll find it worth all the aggravation. 

To speak in public, you need a great message and some practice in delivery.  Don’t try to get away with something less than strong in either area – you won’t be advancing your brand if you do.  Even if you think the venue and the crowd are small beer, do your best.  Someone in that audience will be related to someone else who really, really matters to your business. 

Third, think about writing a book.  It will help enormously with number two on the list, as well as with your brand.  Just don’t expect the process to be like it is in the movies.  Publishers are in the wholesale business; they don’t do retail.  They want to move 1000 or more books at a time.  A marketing budget?  Author’s tours?  Appearances on the Today Show?  Forget it. It’s a do-it-yourself era for authors, and you might as well know that going in.  If you don’t expect anything at all from your publisher, you won’t be disappointed.  Everyone else is. 

I work with a number of second-time authors, helping them with agents, publishers, PR, and the rest of it, precisely because they’ve been badly burned the first time around and watched their baby disappear without a trace into the 100,000 book pile published every year. 

Why do they do it that way?  God knows.  Publishers have no idea what will sell, so they throw a lot of product at the marketplace, in the hopes that every now and then one will sell more than 5 or 10 thousand copies, which is the average.  It’s a crazy business, but the mantle of authority that it confers upon a published author is still worth fighting for, since it turns you from a person with an opinion into an expert.

Next up:  What’s Your Story?  By Mathews and Wacker

Presentation Zen

I just finished reading Presentation Zen, a new book on Power Point design....and more! by Garr Reynolds, on the plane back from San Francisco. 

It's a very west coast book.  It's beautiful, and applying the zen notions of simplicity and restraint to Power Point slides is a great idea.  As someone who has been working to improve business presentations and to minimize the crimes against humanity committed by business people wielding Power Point, I can only applaud Garr's point of view and welcome a fellow soldier to the cause.

I wish everyone would design slides like Garr does.  The world would be a much happier, clearer, more elegant place. 

Reynolds spends most of his time talking about design issues, and how to think about, prepare, and deliver great slides.  But he also gives some advice about presentations themselves in passing, and all of that advice is simple and good too -- for the most part.

I have to take issue with his notions of structuring a talk, and of story, however.  They're just too simple to be truly useful for most people.  He says, think in terms of three parts to a presentation -- a beginning, middle, and end.  Unfortunately, that's just not the most powerful way to think about organizing a talk.  It's far more respectful to the audience, and interesting, and powerful to begin with the question why? -- Why is this issue important, why should you care, and so on.  Then, having framed the talk in the audience's terms, go on to describe a problem that the audience has for which your information is a solution, and end by moving to "how" questions (how do I do this, how do I get started) and giving them some action to take.

Similarly, it's not enough just to tell people to use stories.  How do you tell a good story?  What's the structure?  Theme?  What works with audiences that doesn't with the printed page, and vice-versa?  There are lots of questions associated with the simple word 'story'.  If it were easy to tell good stories, every Hollywood movie would be a blockbuster, and every novel published would be a bestseller. 

There are basic stories that our culture understands and that people 'get' quickly, so it pays to use them in a deep sense when telling a new story of your own.  Joseph Campbell most famously identified the "quest" and his books are a great place to start to understand how your presentation can fit into these deep cultural stories and move your audience to action.  Great storytelling is not a simple thing.  Enlist your audience on a quest to take your business to the next level, though, and you'll be on to something.  Then, design your (few) slides to look like Garr Reynolds' and you'll get a standing O.    

The Pow-Wow

My partner Nikki and I attended the Second Annual 1-800-CE0-READ Pow-Wow in Chicago this week, and what a fascinatin' gathering of authorial illuminaries it was.  For my sins, I was the kick-off speaker, and hot on my heels were Ray Bard, of Bard Press; Mark Bloomfield, of HBSP; Susan Williams, of Jossey-Bass; Barbara Cave Henricks and Dennis Welch, of Cave Henricks Communications; Mark Fortier, of Fortier Public Relations; Les Tuerk, of BrightSight Group; Gerry Sindell, of Thought Leaders Intl; and Shelley Dolley, of Leap7.  Apologies if I've missed anyone; there were some pick-up talks added to the preordained scrum.  There were 20+ authors in attendance to discuss the vagaries of the biz and to network, and authors are good networkers.  Don't be fooled by their tendency to sit alone in front of a computer and write books; when they get the chance, they make up for lost time and network like billy-oh. 

I talked about ideas and public speaking, my favorite subjects, but I learned the most about blogging and the brave new world of cyberspace from several of the authors who are expert in that field.  David Meerman Scott, www.webinknow.com; Barbara Henricks, http://blog.cavehenricks.com/;  Rajesh Setty, http://blog.lifebeyondcode.com; and Phil Gerbyshak, http://makeitgreat.typepad.com have all blogged on the event already.  The knowledge in the room was inspiring, and the willingness to share heartwarming over 2 cold Chicago days. 

Thanks to Todd, Jack, Kate and the other amazing folks at CEO READ for a great event. 

How do you avoid the slush pile?

If you write a brilliant book, attach a witty and incisive cover letter to the manuscript, and send if off to a reputable publisher, your work will end up in what the trade calls a 'slush pile', a pile of similar manuscripts that an intern is slowly working his or her way through, 10,000 high. 

The odds of being published from that pile?  Pretty bad.  Once in a great while a gem is found, vetted all the way up to the decision-makers, and published to glowing reviews.  But it's exceedingly rare. 

How can you avoid the usual slush pile treatment and become one of the 100,000 books published every year?  (Some say 200,000, but either way, it's a huge number. So why not you?)  Here's a counter-intuitive tip:

Don't write the book. 

Instead, write a proposal, or a treatment, or a concept, and get it in the hands of a good agent.  Get that agent excited about the idea, and let him/her sell the book to the publisher.  That's what agents do. 

Some people sell their own houses, but most people involve a real estate agent, because it's only an occasional thing for most of us, and we want the help.  Same with selling your own book.  Get help.

Getting an agent is, of course, almost as hard as finding a publisher.  But not as hard as writing a book and having it sit unpublished.  The way to an agent's heart is through buzz.  Write an op-ed piece, get in the news for your expertise, publish an article.  Give speeches.  Build up a resume and publications list that offers evidence that you can do it.  Then agents will take notice. 

The rest is comparatively easy....   

Two New Books Illustrate the Pitfalls of Public Speaking Advice

I wanted to like these books, I really did.  I'm grateful for any good new ideas about public speaking wherever they come from.  But unfortunately, both The Exceptional Presenter, by Timothy J. Koegel, and There's No Such Thing as Public Speaking, by Jeanette and Roy Henderson, are not useful additions to the lore.  The first book is a hodge-podge of tips taken from earlier work, some of them now outdated and even wrong.  The second at least contains an original theory, but actually following it would cause speakers to do things that would alienate their audiences.  The authors claim to be the coaches for President George Bush.  Hmmmm.   

Keogel begins by exhorting us all to be exceptional speakers.  Apparently the way we are to do this is to "tell 'em what you're going to say, say it, then tell 'em what you said."  What Koegel doesn't seem to realize is that this speaking model came from the US Army in World War II.  The Army needed a way to indoctrinate quickly large numbers of people of wildly varying educational backgrounds and abilities in some fairly straightforward information.  And they needed a way of making sure that there was some uniformity in the way all the information was put forward in many different locales. 

The Army hit upon repetition as the way to achieve these two ends.  They didn't care much about making the experience a great one for speakers and audiences. 

We did win the war, but not because public speaking in the Army was exciting or even especially good.  Unfortunately, the officers that survived the war came home, went to work, and infiltrated the business world with the mistaken idea that public speaking was basically a matter of shouting orders three times. 

No wonder most public speaking is so bad.   

To continue to use this method of presenting when we know so much more about what works is pernicious.  Thanks to 40 years of communications research since the early 1970s (and the great founders of modern communications work, Albert Mehrabian and Ray Birdwhistle) we know that people receive communications on two levels, content and non-verbal communication.  It's what I call the two conversations.  If you don't pay close attention to both 'conversations', the verbal and the non-verbal, you won't be able to communicate effectively, because, as Mehrabian found, when the two are not aligned, people believe the non-verbal every time. 

Koegel both mispells Mehrabian's name and misrepresents his work (cf. p. 14).  That's unfortunate, because his insights can tell us a lot about public speaking and what we need to do to succeed at this difficult art.  Suffice it to say that the famous 55/38/7 study did NOT show that most of your "impact" as a speaker comes from "the visual," as Koegel wrongly claims.  What it DID show was that people decode the EMOTIONAL content of a communication mostly using visual (55%) and auditory (38%) cues, such as hand-waving and an angry tone to indicate anger, rather than the actual content of the words themselves (7%). 

I could list a dozen other examples of how Koegel gets things wrong, but one will have to suffice.  In a section on gesture, he talk about one that he says "can and should be used often."  (p, 74).  He calls this gesture the "claw."  It's the gesture you use when you're trying to get a dog or a child to stop jumping on you.  The palms are open, facing downwards, and you 'push' them down to stop behavior you don't want or like. 

Since most speakers are trying to increase the strength of the connection between themselves and the audience, using "the claw" often is a sure way to fail.  It will have the effect of making the audience think you either want them to stop jumping on you, or you don't have anything important to say.

The other book, There's No Such Thing as Public Speaking, has the virtue of thinking systematically about public speaking, rather than just collecting tips from others.  Unfortunately, the system the authors come up with is just plain weird.  If President Bush has been using it, a lot becomes clear.

The authors recommend that you begin by Acknowleding the audience.  Then, you must try for Acceptance by uttering an "Irrefutable Statement" (p. 33).  Is this why President Bush has an annoying  habit of stating obviously wrong ideas as if his audience would be stupid to argue with him? 

In any case, you then give your case, and ask for an action.  A simple, three-step process, say the authors.  No wonder Bush's approval rating is so low.

If only it were that simple. 

Elsewhere, the authors make a 5-page farrago out of something that should be kept simple -- turning from one side of the podium to the other (pp. 75-80).  By the time most readers are done with that section, they'll be afraid to ever move again. 

There are bits of good advice in this book.  The authors talk at length about how important pauses are for good speaking, and I can only agree.  They talk about how essential authority is for speakers, and it is, but unfortunately their explanation for how to achieve it is labored, incorrect and based on bad research.  They stress the importance of making an entrance, and I agree, but again, the 'how' is not well explained.  If everyone took their advice, "walk slowly and deliberately to the lectern," we would begin to think that all public speaking was funereal. 

The main problem with this book is that it ignores the audience, which is where the focus in public speaking should be.  After all, if the audience hasn't heard you, you haven't communicated and everyone's time has been wasted. 

A bit of advice in closing:  never buy a book on public speaking if there is a chapter in it entitled, "the microphone," or "natural."  The first will be too specific about the wrong things and the second will be too vague about the right things.