To Talk, You Need a Point

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No amount of media training will overcome the lack of a message.  You know right away when someone is talking just to hear their own voice. You don’t want to be that person.

The Accounting and Financial Women’s Alliance had that problem.

Wilson-Taylor had the solution. We’d go on, but we already did, in this article just published in Signature magazine — MOVE in Signature March ’13 —  the publication for association communication executives, put out by their own association,  Association Media & Publishing.

 

How to Hijack a Metaphor

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The notion of the career ladder is so embedded in American workplace culture that it’s..well…the yardstick for every other model of professional advancement.

I’d know: as the author of The Career Lattice, it seems that every interview starts with a variation on this question: “We all know about career ladders. What is a career lattice?” (Short answer:  taking strategic lateral moves to position yourself           for an upward move.)  In December, this is how I opened an hour-long radio interview with career coach Bonnie Marcus.

Of course, the title of my book resonates with the public specifically because it almost sounds like ‘ladder’…but isn’t. “Ladder” and ‘lattice’ look similar on the page, conjure up similar images, and sound similar. Riding the coattails of the ladder makes it easier for me to expand the message and brand of the lattice.

Keep an eye – and ear – out for similar metaphors for your key messages. What terms or images are embedded in the culture of your industry’s culture? Hijack one of those metaphors by tweaking it just enough to catch attention and surprise your audience with an image that starts familiar and ends fresh.

There’s No Crying in Crisis Communications

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Well, not in public, anyway.

But the very nature of crisis communication is that you’re reacting to an unplanned event. By definition, you can’t plan for the actual crisis. But you can have at the ready a response plan.

As you frame your crisis communication plan, consider the whole spectrum of stakeholders with whom you must communicate. That’s what I advise in this recent story in The Network Journal:  business partners, suppliers, vendors and their influencers are just as important as the public, employees and customers.

Media training needs to pivot around messaging techniques that enable you to rise to any occasion — crisis or not. You can’t memorize ‘talking points’ in advance. But you can create a grid of key audiences so you can quickly develop messages — using the proven Wilson-Taylor approach, of course — appropriate for each.

 

 

Keeping Up Is Hard To Do

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You’re not the only one on information overload. As wave after wave of information washes up in our inboxes, desks and brains, information overload is becoming a top problem for communicators.

In fact, according to a new report from the Plank Center for Leadership, a think tank for public relations types, “speed and volume of information flow” was cited by 23.1% of the survey’s array of international respondants, making it their number one concern.

What they’re doing about it indicates unfolding spending priorities. In descending order, the top five tactics for dealing with information overload are:

  • Adding new skills and work processes
  • Adopting new technology to collect and disseminate information
  • Same staff, more work
  • Bringing in consultants
  • Hiring

The most powerful driver of new strategies was social media and digital communication. Conspicuously absent: overarching strategies that integrate all strategic communication channels. While the leaders who completed the survey reported that they are boosting training and skills for staff, they appear to overlook the one thing that will always support growth: creating work structures that are designed to always integrate change and adaptation, instead of constantly resetting to accomodate the latest, greatest communication innovation.

 

I Heard What You Didn’t Say

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Want to build influence?

Less talk. More listen.

It’s counterintuitive, but it works, according to research cited in the November 2012 issue of Scientific American Mind.  Referencing research accomplished at Columbia University, professional colleagues credit you with more authority and insight when you listen more than you speak.

Balance is the key: thoughtful responses based on careful listening reflect genuine engagement. The key takeaway: win trust by paying attention to what others are saying. Then, speak up, not out.

Metaphor Me!

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Gotta love a writer who can summarize his creative process in succinct metaphor.

“I’m a dancer who walks for a living,” says Michael Erard in a recent New York Times essay on the creative process. He has a day job — he is a ‘think tank researcher.’ But on the side, he writes for fun and profit.

His two best pieces of advice are useful for anyone seeking to craft messages.

  • Note what catches your interest — especially if it represents a style approach very different from yours.
  • And when you are immersing in your own creative process, really immerse! Turn off your social media and news feeds, and shut down your email.

It’s All About Me..Until It Isn’t

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As Dale Carnegie always said, if you want to break the ice, ask someone to tell you about themselves. They’ll be off and running, and they’ll think you are a great conversationalist.

People spend 30 to 40 percent of their speaking time expressing their own opinions and feelings, according to Harvard researchers, as cited in the September 2012 issue of Scientific American Mind. Talking about yourself triggers happy chemicals in your own brain. Yup: it feels good!

This dynamic cuts both ways when navigating on-the-record interviews. First, a smart interviewer will encourage you to ramble on. You’ll be flattered. It’ll feel good! And then you’ll wander off point and suddenly, it won’t feel so good any more. You’ll have to pull yourself back on point — and correct any off-message comments.

But, if you are just getting to know a journalist or interviewer, ask him or her to tell you about how they became interested in the topic at hand. That will get positive brain chemistry flowing, and will help get the interview off on the right foot.

Proust Was Right

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Comfort food, meet comfort memories.

Harvard researchers have found that when people have childhood memories top-of-mind, they are likely to be more helpful, be more judgemental of unethical behaviour, and are more inclined to donate to charity.

In other words, childhood memories also evoke a more childlike moral perception, as reported in the Sept. 2012 issue of Scientific American Mind.

If it’s appropriate for your audience and your message, considering constructing a metaphor that evokes a child’s sense of right and wrong, or a child’s point of view. For example, someone advocating for consumer protection laws might say, “These are the same lessons we learned on the playground. If you catch someone else’s ball, throw it back.”

Haystack, Meet Needle

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All the news that’s fit to keep.

That’s the expanded mission of the Internet Archive. Having aggregated volumes of print news, the Archive now offers access to the video of national news shows. “TV News Search & Borrow” enables users to search for video based on the terms used in closed caption transcripts.

This makes it much easier to find relevant coverage if you are scheduled to be interviewed for broadcast. You’ll want to view prior shows to see:

  • the interviewing style of the host
  • what points were made — and best received — by guest experts
  • the length of the segment

Plan accordingly!

Best Metaphor of the Campaign

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It’s hard to beat veteran political speechwriter and commentator Peggy Noonan for the right turn of phrase at the right time.

Which is why she delivered what might be the best metaphor of this election cycle, in the Wall St. Journal:

“You know what Romney sounded like? Like a kid new to politics who thinks he got the inside lowdown on how it works from some operative. But those old operatives, they never know how it works. They knew how it worked for one cycle back in the day.

They’re jockeys who rode Seabiscuit and thought they won a race.”

Here’s why it works:  the jockey is in on the victory. But everyone celebrates the horse.  Think for a moment: what IS the name of the jockey who rode Seabiscuit?

I don’t know either.

And that’s how Noonan makes the point that Romney and his cohorts think that their success is 100% due to themselves, when they enjoyed a rising economic tide plus many priveleges. Any of many jockeys could have ridden Seabiscuit and won. And many equally talented managers could have delivered Romneyesque success, given the same circumstances.

That’s the power of the metaphor: a concise message wrapped in an unforgettable package.