I was fortunate to have lived in South Africa for a couple of years as part of work. During those years, I met people of different colours and races. The blacks, the whites, the coloured, the Indian Indians, the South African Indians etc… A nation that’s as diverse as it could get. There is a reason South Africa is called the Rainbow Nation. Once the apartheid regime came to an end in the early 1990s, Nelson Mandela and the new rulers of South Africa had an important charter – to make South Africa an equal place for all. It was one of the biggest experiments on building a diverse, equitable and inclusive nation.
Trevor Noah writes in his autobiographical, Born a Crime: Stories from a South African childhood, “Nelson Mandela once said, ‘If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.’ He was so right. When you make the effort to speak someone else’s language, even if it’s just basic phrases here and there, you are saying to them, ‘I understand that you have a culture and identity that exists beyond me. I see you as a human being”
To build a DEI safe workplace, the first step is to appreciate and recognize the person or the group of people as a human being(s). This is where the power of storytelling helps to build a DEI safe workplace.
So how to go about it? The following are the 3 ways an organization can start and build its DEI initiatives.
Employee story groups – a safe place to share Capture and share employees’ stories beyond the leadership team Authentic and transparent stories from leaders
Employee story groups – a safe place to share
To create a diverse and inclusive workplace, there must be a safe place for people to share and be heard without judgement. This is a place to hear out different perspectives in an engaged and empathetic manner. Personal stories of others can be an opportunity to reflect on ourselves, recognize the conscious biases and be aware of the unconscious biases. This creates a cascading effect that results in behaviour change.
An HBR article shares the following methods to use the power of storytelling to build an inclusive workplace.
Do a round-robin question in a meeting
Hold listening sessions
Host discussion-heavy book clubs
Schedule storytelling town halls
Include stories in blogs, videos, celebrations, promotions, and onboarding
Share survey results that show negative perceptions and harmful treatment
Have social forums and meetups
Develop dynamic social media campaigns that share stories
Most of the time, people underestimate what they have gone through or think that their experience is not worthy enough to share. They need to be reassured that the expectation is to share a real story but not something that is dramatic or perfect.
Capture and share employees’ stories beyond the leadership team
Programs like this should also take into consideration of the various aspects like current geographical presence, ethnic and racial aspects, persons with disabilities, the LGBTQ+ community, women in general and any specific groups like single mothers, mental health & wellness etc.
Another important aspect is to set a goal and track progress on critical metrics. It could be on demographics, diversity hiring at every level of the organization, retention and promotion rates of the focus groups, usage of the DEI resources etc. Periodic reporting at employee townhalls will show the commitment of the leadership and be helpful in raising the bar on accountability.
Leadership storytelling to build a DEI workplace
Apple’s CEO Tim Cook came out in open to disclose his sexual identity in 2014. This was the first time a leading CEO was open about being gay. His decision to come out in public was after receiving several letters from children struggling with their sexual orientation. He went on to say, “I’m not saying that I understand the trials and tribulations of every minority group because I don’t. But I do understand for one of the groups. And to the degree that it helps give you a lens on how other people may feel, I think that’s a gift in and of itself.”
Leadership commitment to DEI programs should go beyond approving such initiatives or giving a budget for that. They have a critical role in making sure DEI programs are given the same importance as any other business initiative. They can do that by playing an active role in the events organized by employee groups.
Being part of the employee groups, can help leaders with awareness, create meaningful connections with different interest groups, develop empathy and mutual respect.
Over time, most leaders take on professional identity and somewhere along the way drop their personal identities. Employees look for authenticity, transparency, and the layered character of their leaders to make them relatable. Personal stories of the leaders expose their personal self.
Some of the ways to dig into personal DEI stories could be,
Think about the time when you had to fit in or feel pressured to conform
An instance where you discovered your bias and how you overcame it?
Were there situations that your background/privilege got you a different treatment than someone else?
Occasions where you saw a bias play out
Did someone in power help you at the workplace?
In summary,
When we share stories that show why we believe certain things and why we behave the way we do, we open up and show our value systems. We may not agree on all matters but acknowledging the other human being with compassion and empathy is all we need to drive change.
An organization that is serious in their DEI approach would start to see the following changes in their workforce,
There will be a sense of warmth and empathy in the way we relate to people and their journey
People start to be open up to diverse thoughts and become intent listeners
Be thankful for being open in sharing their personal stories – this shows that one is heard
Finding ways to improve the safe space for different employee groups
I learnt some valuable lessons on building an equitable and inclusive workplace from my experience in South Africa. I went around 2018, a good 15 yrs since the abolition of the apartheid era. While a lot could have been better, there are changes for good to the section of people who were in disadvantaged position during the apartheid era. If a nation with all the complexities in political, economical and cultural aspects can bring about this change, organisations that are serious can transform with the power of storytelling to build a DEI safe workplace.
In the US alone, there are a record 10.1 million open jobs as per US govt job data. While the UK faced the worst staff shortage since 1997 per a Guardian news report. A LinkedIn and Microsoft survey found 41% of employees are considering leaving their current employer. These statistics point to the spike in demand for qualified people, while employers are in a spot to retain and recruit talent, making employer brand storytelling critical in 2022. In 2020, when COVID hit upon us, several companies took a knee jerk reaction by laying off a record number of people. 81 million people lost their jobs in Asia in 2020 while over 10 million Americans filed for unemployment in March 2020 alone.
The need for employer branding
In 2 years, there is a role reversal happening as a record number of employees are leaving their jobs. The industry is calling this the “Great resignation” movement.
2021 was when the role reversal started. Internal employee surveys, exit interviews and industry surveys revealed some hard-hitting insights.
They were,
Employees wanted to enjoy their job over working for a well-known company
When a company led with purpose, their employees were more likely to work for them
41% of employees in America said, they would not work for an organization that failed to speak about racism
Besides, the traditional motivators like pay, ping-pong tables & free snacks lost their appeal. Employers are forced to transform their employee value proposition in a way like repairing the plane when it’s flying.
How to go about employer brand storytelling?
In the new normal, employers need to talk about the “here and now” vs how their company was cool earlier.
Hence employer brand storytelling needs to cover areas like,
How an employer cared for their employees during the pandemic?
What is it like to work for your organization, right now?
What employees are saying about their employer?
Several pieces must come together for a cohesive and compelling employer branding strategy. It includes an organization’s purpose, values, employee value proposition, their take on inclusivity and diversity etc… It also needs to include channels to reach prospective candidates, content, formats, interview experience to name a few.
Here are 10 employer brand storytelling strategies for a solid employer branding approach.
Show how your company responded during uncertain times
The last couple of years has shown the importance of adopting a humane approach in times of uncertainty. It could be how the company managed through tough times, how a team faced a challenging situation and overcame it, or what the company did for an employee-specific life-or-death situation.
Instead of adopting the standard job description, asking real employees in a specific role to articulate what his/her day looks like, connecting how his/her job impacts their customer/organizations goal by talking in a language specific to the role can make an employer stand out.
This format of storytelling creates a deeper impact and connection with candidates as it will be far more engaging. Candidates will also know from the experience of their prospective colleagues how it is to perform in that role.
Authentic stories from leadership
When leaders come forward and share stories of their journey or their vulnerable moments, candidates relate with them and in fact will want to work with them. Today’s employees want to work for an empathetic organization, there is no better way to showcase the humaneness of an organization than stories from leaders.
Stories of remote or hybrid workplace to build employer brand
A significant number of candidates want a flexible workplace and the option to decide where and how they will work.
Employers need to adapt content across the careers page to the job descriptions to show how remote/hybrid workplace is being practised.
Until the pandemic, offices that had cool features like open spaces, fully stocked kitchens, nap rooms and creative office perks were the rage. But now, it’s time to show how your employees are utilizing flexibility at work, what their home office looks like, how you are enabling them to work from anywhere and their life both within and outside the office.
What does it mean to be a working parent and working for you?
A lot of women left their jobs or were laid off during the pandemic for many reasons. Primary among them is taking care of family or difficulty in managing both work and family. Due to the spike in demand for jobs, they are an important constituent now.
For the working parent group, stories of how an employer is supporting them with flexible time options, adapted career paths or even how the meetings are scheduled in consideration of a working parent will speak volumes about the flexibility in practice.
Show stories on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in practice
A solid employer branding approach has an always-on DEI component. It’s not about flipping that logo to pink in February in support of women’s month or having a rainbow background in June to support PRIDE month.
With careful preparation and thoughtful execution, a company need to tap into their various interest groups to capture their stories. This will position the employer as inclusive.
Amplifying stories of employee rewards & recognition
Employee recognition and retention go hand in hand. Organizations that have solid employee rewards & recognition programs are better off in managing the current talent tsunami.
By capturing the stories of employees who succeeded at the workplace and were rewarded, companies can turn employees into their brand ambassadors. This helps organisations to attract talent from their employee networks, as they share it among their networks.
3rd party review-site based content
Prospective employees generally believe when employees share their stories on their networks or on independent review sites such as Glassdoor, Comparably etc.
These sites are considered to be collecting employee opinions without bias. Reviews on these sites carry more credibility than those on the career portals of the companies.
Companies need to take a very concerted effort in nudging employees to rate them on these review sites. By bringing in gamification elements to these programs, companies can influence their employees to review more often.
Capturing alumni stories for employer brand storytelling
We have seen statements like, “Once a Googler always a Googler”. But how often do organizations pay attention to their alumni or involve them as part of their employer branding?
When a company promotes the success of its alumni, their credibility as a trusted employer and a company to work for increases multifold. This shows their intent of caring about their employee growth even after they left them. Beyond that, there is also a goodwill and network effect that is bound to happen which adds a lot of value to employer branding efforts.
Articulate company values through employee stories
This should be an ongoing program across the year to create a value stories repository. To be holistic, stories also should be across the spectrum from sales to engineering and from entry-level to leadership.
In summary, while employer branding is a critical element in attracting talent, not every candidate or employer is the same. Candidates are becoming much more aware of what they want. In a market where candidates have the upper edge, employer brand storytelling can help in attracting the right candidates.
US President Joe Biden delivers his inaugural speech in Washington, D.C - Image by Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP via Getty Images
Four years ago, the Politico magazine termed President Trump’s inauguration speech as unapologetically anti-globalist and inward-looking while President Biden has this to say in his inaugural speech which was delivered earlier this week.
“But the answer is not to turn inward, to retreat into competing factions, distrusting those who don’t look like you do, or worship the way you do, or don’t get their news from the same sources you do.
We can do this if we open our souls instead of hardening our hearts.”
And further went ahead and said this, “We will repair our alliances and engage with the world once again.”
Biden’s speech was one of empathy with conciliatory tone aimed at bringing unity (not surprising that the word unity was mentioned 9 times in his speech), after a period of divisive politics that ended with protestors storming into the hallways of Capitol.
Having said that, the objective of this post is to see how President Biden used storytelling to inspire and what we can learn from it. His speech employed proven rhetorical techniques along with aspects of storytelling, not to mention the clever use of words. For anyone in leadership, his speech has got a heavy dose of takeaways on high stakes communication.
These are the 3 techniques that I found interesting,
Storytelling Lesson 1: The power of contrast – highlighting differences
Storytelling Lesson 2: Shared dreams and common grounds
Storytelling Lesson 3: Rhetoric – the science of persuasion
Storytelling Lesson 1:The power of contrast – highlighting differences
Her analysis finds a lot of commonalities between Martin Luther King Jr.’s, “I have a dream” speech and Steve Jobs, the Apple iPhone launch speech in 2007. She reveals both these leaders leveraged the power of contrast to depict a picture of how the world is now and what the future could look like if the audience bought into their idea.
I found the use of contrast in multiple places throughout Biden’s speech. Kudos to his speech writer of Indian origin Vinay Reddy, for having embraced this technique very well.
These are my pick,
” We can see each other not as adversaries but as neighbors.”
“I promise you this: as the Bible says weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.”
“We will lead not merely by the example of our power but by the power of our example.”
And finishes off even more powerfully (contrast words are highlighted and they are my own),
“I will give my all in your service thinking not of power, but of possibilities.
Not of personal interest, but of the public good.
And together, we shall write an American story of hope, not fear.
Of unity, not division.
Of light, not darkness.
An American story of decency and dignity.
Of love and of healing.
Of greatness and of goodness.”
Storytelling Lesson 2:Shared dreams and common ground
One of the important aspects for a leader is to get people to rally behind their (common) cause and great leaders even go to the extent of inspiring followers from the opposite camp.
The challenge before Joe Biden was that the administration that preceded him built their entire narrative on divisive politics while his campaign theme was about unity.
So how did he go about driving home this point?
He eloquently did that with a mix of emotional appeal, pitching for a positive future for all, reminding people about who they are and what was remarkable about them.
How did he execute this in his speech?
Reminding them who they are,
“We look ahead in our uniquely American way — restless, bold, optimistic — and set our sights on the nation we know we can be and we must be.”
Again, reminding them who they are and telling them what the need of the hour is,
“But the American story depends not on any one of us, not on some of us, but on all of us.
On “We the People” who seek a more perfect Union.
This is a great nation and we are a good people.
Over the centuries through storm and strife, in peace and in war, we have come so far. But we still have far to go.
We will press forward with speed and urgency, for we have much to do in this winter of peril and possibility.”
Connecting on emotions, committing himself and inviting them to commit for the shared dream and common good,
“In another January in Washington, on New Year’s Day 1863, Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation.
When he put pen to paper, the President said, “If my name ever goes down into history it will be for this act and my whole soul is in it.”
My whole soul is in it.
Today, on this January day, my whole soul is in this:
Bringing America together.
Uniting our people.
And uniting our nation.
I ask every American to join me in this cause.”
Beyond the above points, he was also versatile in his approach to reach a common ground by evoking patriotism (he used, our nation (7 times), America and American (39 times), constitution (3 times), people (9 times)), quoting past leaders (Presidents -George Washington, Abraham Lincoln and Jimmy Carter, activist Martin Luther King Jr.) and highlighting what a common citizen wants.
“What are the common objects we love that define us as Americans?
I think I know.
Opportunity.
Security.
Liberty.
Dignity.
Respect.
Honor.
And, yes, the truth.”
Storytelling Lesson 3: Rhetoric – the science of persuasion
As the incoming President, once he established the common ground the next step is to inspire people to follow his vision. Great speakers employ rhetoric to persuade. Of the different methods, Biden employed couple of techniques that I could make sense.
The first technique is repetition of certain words at the beginning of a set of sentences (when same words are used in the beginning of the sentence its called anaphora and if its in the end, its called epiphora) and alliteration (letters or sound that occur at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words).
When used effectively, rhetoric can galvanise the audience. Did Biden arouse the audience with his speech? Oh! boy he did a great job at it.
Sample this anaphora,
“My fellow Americans, in the work ahead of us, we will need each other.
We will need all our strength to persevere through this dark winter.
We are entering what may well be the toughest and deadliest period of the virus.
We must set aside the politics and finally face this pandemic as one nation.
I promise you this: as the Bible says weeping may endure for a night but joy cometh in the morning.
We will get through this, together.
The world is watching today.
So here is my message to those beyond our borders: America has been tested and we have come out stronger for it.
We will repair our alliances and engage with the world once again.
Not to meet yesterday’s challenges, but today’s and tomorrow’s.
We will lead not merely by the example of our power but by the power of our example.
We will be a strong and trusted partner for peace, progress, and security.”
And towards the end once more coupled with the power of contrast,
“And together, we shall write an American story of hope, not fear.
Of unity, not division.
Of light, not darkness.
An American story of decency and dignity.
Of love and of healing.
Of greatness and of goodness.”
So what was it all about alliteration, a clever play of words that start with or sound like same letter?
He started off splendidly,
“This is democracy’s day.
A day of history and hope.
Of renewal and resolve.”
A healthy dose throughout his speech,
“Lies told for power and for profit.”
And this
“We can do this if we open our souls instead of hardening our hearts.”
And then,
“The world is watching today.”
Some more,
“We will be a strong and trusted partner for peace, progress, and security.”
Not always a political leader’s speech is looked forward to and when you are the President of the United States, it comes with a huge responsibility. I feel Team Joe Biden did a great job in crafting a speech that was well delivered by Joe Biden.
After listening to Biden’s speech and the transcript for more than a few times, I had to say this “Great speeches happen to those who can deliver it” inspired from Ira Glass’s, “Great stories happen to those who can tell them.”
On July 29th, four men who run companies worth $ 4.85 trillion appeared before the US Congress’s members of House judiciary’s antitrust subcommittee. It was part of the hearing on “Online Platforms and Market Power”, and the chief executives are there to defend their powerful businesses from the hammer of government.
Any guesses – who these gentlemen were?
They were Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Tim Cook (Apple), Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook) and Sundar Pichai (Alphabet-Google). And they were to argue that their businesses are not powerful! Yes, that is what they did.
I am not here to argue whether they are powerful or not, I will best leave that to the US Congress and the readers to decide. But I am going to see who among these influential executives did a better job with their defence.
From their written testimony, I am going to analyze their statements from the narrative lens, who articulated their position in an impactful and convincing manner with supporting stories. For this analysis, I have picked the written statements from the website of the US House Committee on the Judiciary and listened to the five hr+ hearing video.
Decoding Jeff Bezos’s (Amazon) Narrative Traits in his Testimony
Jeff Bezos is known for his narrative style as can be observed from his annual letter to shareholders and the famous 6-page narrative structure memo used in meetings in place of PowerPoint presentations.
He puts to good use his narrative memo structure with one deviation – it runs to 8th page and is one of the detailed testimony that I read among the four.
Jeff starts in style with his origin story. He also gets into details, like his mother was 17 years when she got pregnant with Jeff in Albuquerque, New Mexico, how she has to struggle to attend school and the role of his grandfather in getting his daughter educated.
He moves on to share the story of his immigrant father from Cuba, his traits such as grit and determination and packs a punch when he says, “You get different gifts in life, and one of my great gifts is my mom and dad. They have been incredible role models for me and my siblings our entire lives.” There are several such powerful statements across the testimony document.
From the way he explains about his grandfather, one gets a feeling that Jeff is more like his grandfather. He recollects incidents to support his narrative of him as a problem solver. Bezos has this to say about his grandfather, “He taught me that you can take on hard problems. When you have a setback, you get back up and try again. You can invent your way to a better place.”
And then continues to support that statement with some of his inventions as a teenager. Till here it was more about personal story, detailing about the key stakeholders from his growing up years, humble background and repeatedly affirming that he overcame all odds. This is something that aligns well with the judiciary committee’s objective of supporting the less powerful, small-time businesses against these four big giants.
Jeff Bezos takes us back to the day when he decided to quit his full-time job in an investment firm in New York and how his manager tried to convince him to stay with the job as this business idea (online bookstore) was for someone who didn’t have a good job. Jeff says, he decided to start up and leave the job with his heart and not with his head.
A message he conveys to all aspiring entrepreneurs who talk about risk in starting up. Jeff’s punch statement, “When I’m 80 and reflecting back, I want to have minimized the number of regrets that I have in my life. And most of our regrets are acts of omission—the things we did not try, the paths untraveled. Those are the things that haunt us. And I decided that if I didn’t at least give it my best shot, I was going to regret not trying to participate in this thing called the internet that I thought was going to be a big deal.”
This reminded of the Steve Jobs’ Stanford commencement speech, which was famous for its storytelling aspects, “Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition.”
Over the next few paragraphs, he talks about the risks associated with running a startup in the internet domain and the early day struggles. Even after they grew, he cites that risk-taking and not afraid of failures has been Amazon’s biggest strength. He introduces the concept of, “Day One” mentality that makes Amazon to maintain the energy and entrepreneurial spirit of Day One.
Jeff Bezos then ties how obsessive customer focus is helping them to maintain the Day One mindset. Another punch, “Not every business takes this customer-first approach, but we do, and it’s our greatest strength.”
He emphasizes building customer trust as a key to Amazon’s success. Jeff details the multiple ways Amazon works to earn customer trust and why it is not very easy, “You earn trust slowly, over time, by doing hard things well— delivering on time; offering everyday low prices; making promises and keeping them; making principled decisions, even when they’re unpopular; and giving customers more time to spend with their families by inventing more convenient ways of shopping, reading, and automating their homes.”
And this is where I kind of fell for him. He cites various independent studies on how Americans trust Amazon next only to the US military and the local police. WOW!
At this point, he ups the ante. He gets into the details of his businesses. How online retail helps create jobs in various neighbourhoods by hiring for different skills – the mechanics and plant managers to the computer scientists and MBAs. It is critical to tell the committee that jobs are created locally to serve American consumers, retail being operation intensive, and 80% of their business, they will keep doing this day in and out.
To further drive home this point, he talks about the Career Choice program, which costs them $700 million to train more than 100,000 Amazon employees in various fields and is not always related to their line of business. Jeff Bezos shares about Patricia Soto who utilized this program and is now employed with a medical foundation. Career choice enabled her to pursue a second career which was once seemed out of reach.
Amazon invested $270 billion in the last decade in the US and in addition to direct employment they also helped create 700,000 indirect jobs in construction, hospitality etc,. These jobs were also created in unlikely cities that led to economic activity. He further points to the 175,000 employees hired during COVID with a mandate to hire the laid off.
His speech is nuanced with data leading some arguments supported with narratives and in other places, narrative leading and supported with data.
If you are aware of the Freytag’s pyramid of storytelling, it has the following elements – exposition, rising action, climax, falling action and resolution.
In my view, so for Jeff Bezos sets up the stage for his climax. In the next few paragraphs, he delves deeper into the retail market as a whole and makes the argument why Amazon is not a dominating force. This the key message he wants to send to the committee. Let us see how he unravels it.
Without beating around the bush, in the opening line itself, he states, “Amazon accounts for less than 1% of the $25 trillion global retail market and less than 4% of retail in the US. Unlike winner-take-all industries, there’s room for many winners in retail.
For example, more than 80 retailers in the US alone earn over $1 billion in annual revenue. He pits himself against Walmart which a the largest retailer (primarily offline)and how they are also ramping up their online business (growth of 74% in first quarter of 2020). He also cites online specific competition like Shopify which enable any offline retailer to set up online store easily. He finishes of this argument with, “The range of retail competitors and related services is constantly changing, and the only real constant in retail is customers’ desire for lower prices, better selection, and convenience.”
The next big salvo he fires is against the argument that Amazon is squeezing small retailers. He cites two stories, and both are women-centric– Sherri Yukel (selling handicraft gifts and now employs 80 people catering to a global customer base) and Christine Krogue (a stay at home mother of five selling baby clothes and Amazon helping her to double her sales and growing her business).
In the following sections he talks about how fulfilment of Amazon helps create a great customer experience,the players who are challenging Amazon in retail space globally and locally, the minimum wages Amazon provides and why it is important to bring this minimum wage benchmarks to the industry as a whole, the parity in benefits, the diversity in Amazon shareholding (80% shares owned by outsiders), how growth of Amazon helps its investors such as pension funds enabling people to retire better ($1 trillion wealth created for outsiders) etc.
All these points are aimed at the anti-stories that the committee members have as part of their enquiry. The message he sends, the financial success of Amazon has helped the common shareholders enormously.
Before he concludes, he gets into the big picture items. Its important being big, as scale enables to do certain things that is not possible when you are small. This is a powerful punch to cement that argument, “I love garage entrepreneurs—I was one. But, just like the world needs small companies, it also needs large ones. There are things small companies simply can’t do. I don’t care how good an entrepreneur you are, you’re not going to build an all-fiber Boeing 787 in your garage.”
With that statement, he gets onto the big picture like how Amazon is becoming environmentally friendly and commits itself to meet the Paris climate agreement well ahead of time. They are doing this with the adoption of electric delivery vans (supporting Rivian to grow), investing in solar and wind projects, investing in global reforestation projects and the start of climate pledge fund that invests in startups that are building products and services to help companies reduce their carbon impact and operate more sustainably.
And then some social cause projects where Amazon is directly contributing with programs like Amazon Future engineer aimed at underrepresented, underserved communities and minorities to pursue a computer science career, the homeless shelter project in association with non-profit Mary’s place etc.
He signs off by stating that the US is a great nation for companies to start, grow and thrive. Despite all the challenges, people from outside still aspire to be part of this country like his father for the sheer amount of optimism and opportunity this great nation has gifted to the world.
Having read and heard all their written testimonies and their responses to questions, I believe that Jeff Bezos is a natural storyteller and has done a better job in his defence.
Decoding Tim Cook’s Testimony for Narrative Traits
Tim Cook starts with why a company like Apple is possible only in the US, enriching people’s lives is their mission, and they do that by making the best and not the most. So, he straight away knocks off the belief that they are not in the business of selling more. He talks about the Apple promise of building things that makes them proud, and he attributes how Steve Jobs, Apple’s founder, defined their purpose – we only make things that we would recommend to our family and friends.
The case against Apple is unique in comparison to the other three.Apple’s app store is not an equitable place, it promotes its apps vs apps developed by other developers and the charges to use app store are anticompetitive.
Tim talks about the famous Apple user experience and how they are focussed on providing customer satisfaction (iPhone enjoys 99% customer satisfaction rating), and that is their best metric to track progress.
He details more about how Apple is not the dominant player in the smartphone market and this market is very competitive with players like Samsung, LG etc.
Tim Cook then details more about the app store, its features, the business model, how they enable others to develop apps and make money, for a vast majority of apps developers keep 100% of the money and that the charges are also vastly lower than the 50-70% the developers paid before app store came into existence. He goes on to state, app store since its debut has evolved with two primary objectives – one to provide better user experience and the other creating compelling business opportunity for developers.
An economic miracle in the making is what Tim Cook defines Apple’s app store. He does this by getting into the specifics like when the app store was launched it had only 500 apps, while today it has more than 1.7 million apps and only 60 of them belong to Apple (this is the norm variance narrative). And makes a point of how much economic activity is created – the app store ecosystem enabled over half a trillion dollars business worldwide and in US alone $138 billion.
Tim signs off with the massive impact created by Apple’s different products such as the first Mac creating opportunity and possibility by disrupting the personal computing market, iPod creating opportunities for musicians with fair pay for their creative work.
Did Mark Zuckerberg Adopt a Different Narrative Style?
Zuckerberg starts with the problem Facebook is solving – “People use our apps to share videos, photos, livestreams, posts and private messages; to join communities, set up fundraisers for good causes, and even register to give blood. We also help millions of businesses connect with customers. Facebook gives small businesses and individual entrepreneurs access to sophisticated tools that previously only the largest players had. Now any business can use our services to establish an online presence, reach potential customers and grow.”
With the purpose being set clear, he talks about the competition that Facebook faces and how the US is the bedrock of competition and innovation. Due to the competition, several tech companies have failed. At the end of his testimony, he ties this point to another Facebook move. Watch out.
The values that Facebook believes in (democracy, competition, inclusion and free expression) and the ones on which the American economy is built-in are the same is Zuckerberg’s argument. Since it’s the season of China vs the US, he also cites the values of Chinese companies are very different than that of Facebook and the US-based companies.
In his testimony, he goes one step further. He suggests to the US Congress, “I believe it’s important to maintain the core values of openness and fairness that have made America’s digital economy a force for empowerment and opportunity here and around the world.”
Zuckerberg delves deeper into Facebook’s genesis, the different entities acquired such as WhatsApp, Instagram and the services they provide, the hardware products and the investment that goes into R&D ($ 10 billion every year) to improve their offerings to stay relevant to their users.
Since the committee is tasked to probe the anti-competitive forces of Facebook and other companies, Zuckerberg makes an argument around FB’s contribution to the open-source community. Also goes on to make a point that FB shares the results coming out of their research to the entire ecosystem so that it helps in developing new products.
Then he gets on to the social cause projects such as crisis response tools (Safety check tool used in 1400 crises and in 2018 alone, used across 80+ countries in 300 crises) which helps to share information, raise money etc. He cites one specific example of how non-profit No Kid Hungry has raised over $5 million from more than 200,000 donors to help feed children across the United States. The next is about commitment to invest in Black and minority community suppliers in the US.
Since there have been accusations on Facebook on their aggressive and anticompetitive M&A practices, he goes on to state WhatsApp and Instagram acquisitions has helped the individual entities to leverage Facebook’s technology, infrastructure, funding to develop and launch new features which would have not been possible otherwise. This is in alignment to provide better services that offer more value to people and advertisers.
He tries to crush the argument on the scale being anti-competitive by suggesting a more active role for governments and regulators and updated rules for the internet. He also addresses the concern on data privacy and information security-related aspects – like quoting that there are 35,000 people now in FB working on safety and security, an increase of 3X resources in 3 years.
Among the four companies, Mark Zuckerberg has appeared most no. of times in front of antitrust committees for FB’s controversial actions in the past, hence I believe he goes the extra mile and commits for taking more responsibility to keep people safe on their our platform.
Towards the end, he details, how FB has helped people and businesses since the start of COVID pandemic. There was a jump of 1000% of cirical communication calls in Italy during early stages of the pandemic, 700 million people doing video calls on WhatsApp and Messenger in April, enabling small businesses to operate online, connecting non-profits to run fundraisers etc.
He is the only CEO who mentions that beyond the talk on antitrust and competition issues, the Congress also has an opportunity to talk about how technology can better serve society as these are the most influential executives in the tech world.
Zuckerberg’s concluding remark, “Several years ago, Facebook moved our headquarters to the campus where Sun Microsystems used to be. We kept their sign out front, on the back of ours, to remind us that things change fast in tech. I’ve long believed that the nature of our industry is that someday a product will replace Facebook. I want us to be the ones that build it, because if we don’t, someone else will.”
What Narrative Traits did Sundar Pichai (Google) Use in His Testimony?
Sundar Pichai starts by stating his personal value of expanding access to opportunity by using technology and goes on to narrate his story. A story of a boy coming from a technologically disadvantaged place and how the US gave him access to computers. This opportunity enabled him to create many cutting-edge technology products, including Google chrome etc.
From his point, he sees technology should provide access to anyone irrespective of his/her background and the US as a country has done this for him. It closely relates to the subcommittee’s concern for equal opportunities in business. Personal stories are compelling, and he also goes one step further by tying his values to the subcommittee’s objective.
He proceeds further to state how as a company, Google has helped Americans with jobs (out of 120,000 worldwide Google employees – 75,000 are in US alone), investments and how they are creating jobs in different states of US (Google’s offices and data centers are spread across 26 states out of 50 states).
One needs to remember, the end goal of this antitrust committee is to avoid monopolistic powerful businesses that skews opportunities and take away any unfair advantages these big giants have by virtue of their size, money, data and business agreements.
To alleviate this concern, he goes on to share stories of people who have benefited by using Google’s products & services. When people have preconceived notions, it is tough to cut ice with them through facts, slick presentations, or passionate speeches. The best way to counter is by sharing stories with perspective supporting one’s argument. Sundar Pichai leveraged that with the stories of how Fat Witch Bakery of New York, Kettlebell Kings of Austin and Berry Digital of Urbana are using Google Ads, analytics and YouTube to improve their business prospects even during COVID.
Beyond this, he gets more into the data of how much Google is investing in R&D, cites how their investments in technology like AI, self-driving cars and quantum computing are helping other industries such as medicine and battery manufacturers.
He further moves on to citing how Google’s competition is equally powerful, how competition has helped in reducing advertising costs, how they are enabling others to innovate with the freely available Android platform and how it has enabled to launch feature phones at lower prices.
Sundar Pichai started well with the connection story that helped him to connect with the cause of the enquiry, he then moved on to use stories of small businesses who have benefited from Google products but then he veered into data on investments, statements on competition and ended with typical corporate-speak on privacy & security.
I somehow felt that his 2nd half of the statement was typical corporate speak whereas he could have done better by continuing what he did in the 1st half of the statement.
In summary,
These are the most powerful men in the corporate tech world when they speak, the world listens. I think given the nature of the enquiry, had the CEOs been more open about the impact they had created to the community with anecdotes and references to specific cases (which only Jeff Bezos and Sundar Pichai used), it would have added some heft to their defense.
Since I also listened to the enquiry, I can see that the enquiry committee members have several points loaded against the anti-competitive practices of all these companies.
I also saw the frustration expressed by one of the members on how they broke ATT in 1984 almost for the same reason for which these 4 companies are being called for hearing. But after 35 yrs, ATT has grown through M&As and is now again back to where it was as the dominant telecom operator of the US.
Given this backdrop, it would be interesting to watch out for the outcome of this enquiry and how it pans out.
Wells Fargo is still in business, but their reputation remains stigmatized! Why?
In 2016 Wells Fargo, a financial service company based in the US, faced a crisis. Their employees were forced to open fake accounts without the consent of customers to meet sales targets.
When the scandal came to the notice of authorities, the bank paid $185 million in fine.
They could have tried to reduce the damage had their leadership taken the responsibility and established open communication with all their stakeholders.
But, Wells Fargo’s leadership response potentially damaged the bank’s image as much as the scandal.
In times of crisis, employees, customers and partners get panicked. Sharing information alone doesn’t help. They are well within their rights to know what happened. And when you don’t tell them what happened, they start looking for information from other sources. Great leaders know how to use storytelling during a crisis. They use it to deliver key messages and demonstrate their leadership chops.
Storytelling helps to connect with stakeholders during a crisis in a manner they empathize with you. By being authentic in your communication, you make them realize they are important part of your business and you are taking necessary steps.
Storytelling during a crisis at play
In 2008, Maple Leaf Foods a food processing company based in Canada that supplies processed meat faced a crisis where their products were contaminated by listeria. Twelve people died, and many more fell ill.
When most people would try to suppress things, CEO Michael McCain took accountability. He didn’t try to blame employees, food safety standards, or equipment manufacturers.
Michael McCain, president of Maple Leaf Foods, holds media briefing on new food safety protocols at its new packaging meat plant in Laval, Que., Friday, Dec. 12, 2008
Instead, he took responsibility & stayed transparent by telling people about the breach of safety standards. He led from front, if he had not told what Maple Leaf is doing, then someone would have driven the narrative putting him in a defensive position.
A company-specific crisis can give ammunition to competition & the media to paint a villain out of you. They are looking for an opportunity and are least bothered about the real issue.
In this case, Maple Leaf could have easily become a villain, but since McCain took charge of the narrative, he could tell the company’s side of the story. It helped them to fix the issue and move on.
Post the debacle, Maple Leaf deployed the best staff for their food processing units and ran several marketing campaigns to regain the market share. By the end of 2009, they returned to profit.
Usually, companies recruit an army of lawyers and accountants to reduce the damage and pin the blame on someone. But McCain understood the emotions of his customers and treated them like humans. He conveyed the truth & people understood.
Crisis communication is an integral part of crisis management. You may have already identified the problem and started working on it, but as long as you don’t communicate it with your customers, they won’t know.
You can’t work in silence, especially during a crisis. If Maple Leaf had stayed silent and not communicated, they would have lost their credibility for life and faced severe legal consequences.
Great companies demonstrate their values during crisis
With the COVID crisis, companies are struggling to adapt to the radical changes happening in the business environment. One of the major problems faced is employee productivity.
CodeScience, a Saas company based in Chattanooga, US, took this moment to comfort their employees, who were feeling overwhelmed.
Their team always worked remote, so adapting to the new norm of work from home was not a problem for them. But what was different this time was they had to do it alongside their kids & spouses at home.
In March, Brian Walsh, the CEO of the company, tweeted a list of things they are doing to make their employees feel relevant. One of the interesting ideas was to normalize the noise of kids in the background during a professional call.
He also invited the kids of their employees to join their company call, making it an event to share their self-isolation stories.
It made them feel that they are not the only ones losing track of work. It also acted as a team-building session for their employees who barely saw each other.
An employee posted a message on LinkedIn, in response to CodeScience’s note. “This is another reason why CodeScience is the BEST place to work. Beyond grateful for our leadership team, and I am so proud to be a part of this amazing company and family.”
What the company did through this was they expressed their value of transparency. They told their employees that we know it’s difficult for you & you don’t have to hide it from us. To know more on how to find and share stories read.
People are more likely to do what you say when you give them a reason for that action. CodeScience stayed true to their value of transparency, which encouraged their employees to remain transparent and show what their current work from home situation was like.
Lesson from crisis communication gone wrong
Stories help you give the right context to your message delivery. Lack of context may cause misleading message delivery, which can hurt your reputation. Recently, brands like McDonald’s, Audi, etc. supported social distancing by giving spaces between elements in their logo.
But was that message thoughtful? Certainly not, as people in Brazil felt that it was insensitive for McDonald’s to do that. They felt like the restaurants are still open and are being opportunistic.
The redesign lacked context, leading McDonald’s to issue a public apology. Even though the logo redesign was a creative move, it didn’t resonate with their patrons.
People criticized this move on all social channels as they expected the brand to be responsible & sympathetic towards people. They wanted to see McDonald’s care for their employees & distribute free meals to the marginalized.
Alternately, if McDonald’s had backed the redesign with stories of how they are helping people amidst social distancing norms, then the message might have been conceived in a positive light.
Crafting your narrative
To use storytelling during a crisis, create an engaging narrative for your story, discuss the tension, and tell people what you are doing to repair the damage. Taking ownership & telling the story gives you the power to direct the dialogue. It is not about what happened as things can go wrong. It is more important to communicate what you are doing to improve the situation.
Need help in crafting narrative? Happy to help.
Conclusion
Storytelling can be a tremendous value-adding element to your communication. Not only it helps to create enticing marketing and promotional messages but can prove to be beneficial in crisis. Storytelling in crisis enables consumers to understand your situation better. Your stakeholders want you to be open & transparent about what you are doing to ensure that it doesn’t happen again. Understanding the emotions of your customers, employees, and community by supporting your messaging with the right stories can help you make a way out of the crisis.
As part of my role, very often, I work on client proposals, and the output of it is usually in the form of PowerPoint presentations. What makes it fun is that this is a team effort and teams across engineering, pre-sales, sales, marketing, legal, finance, and HR work together in these proposals. I get to work with several such proposals in which my task is to make the presentation impactful with data storytelling.
Presentations come in several forms – the good, the bad, the ugly and the great ones. One thing that I had observed from the great ones is the intelligent use of colours with data, appropriate charts and the headlines that convey what the slide is all about.
Since this is a season of webinars and virtual presentations, I thought of sharing one method which is simple to use at the same time help you to make impactful data presentations.
Here is a brief background for this presentation slide.
Amidst COVID, Company A’s management team is looking at the spend of various departments and wants to prioritize, which spend needs to be optimized from a short-term saving perspective. They also want to look at department level spends to prioritize any long-term strategic initiatives. The management intends to target the top-15 spend items based on value.
A typical representation will be in the form of bar-chart like the one below, it is devoid of any data storytelling elements.
The above bar chart is a simple bar-chart with data labels within the bars, clear color choices for data labels and bars. But does it convey anything except there are 15 vendors and a bunch of some random spends?
What do you think will be the psyche of the presenter and the audience (in this case, top executives of the organization)?
Now, the next best way to do this representation is to sort the spend from biggest to smallest, and this gives a clear idea of which vendor accounts for the most to the least spend. This representation tells a story of your accounts payable situation.
This one is similar to the above chart, with clear data labels within bars, use of colour that is easy on eyes, free of grid lines which enables a neat representation. The scale on x-axis can be taken off to make it even better.
But, is there a way to make it even better to aid in decision making?
The following bar chart shows that just three vendors account for 40% of the spend, and they are highlighted with the use of colour variation, which helps in building your data narrative.
Remember to not use multiple colours as that will lead to confusion. It is better to use a variation of a base colour, as it serves the purpose of highlight and lowlight.
With this chart, anyone running this presentation will be able to articulate the story better. And the executives know where to focus their attention when it comes to spend optimization.
The other way to further help in decision making is to provide additional inputs along with the bar chart – with the category of spends, current spend vs forecast or comparing against similar quarter or last quarter spend which gives a sense of the expense trend specific to the category. It strengthens your approach to craft a narrative around data.One can also add specific intelligence like spend on strategic initiatives that give long term benefits and then context-specific information such as COVID related spend.
By using this approach, anyone new to the decision-making process will be able to make an informed decision with the amount of intelligence that is provided in the chart.
To make your visual & data storytelling better, use the right choice of colours and pair it with data, meaningfully categorize data based on categories, and provide additional inputs wherever possible. I have used the variations of this method in different scenarios, and it helped me in making an impactful presentation.
Have you tried data storytelling in your analytics proposals or meetings on financial projections?Trust me, you will see meetings becoming a lot more outcome-driven when you start practising storytelling.
This is the second post in the Basics of Business Storytelling, you can read the first post here.
The year was 2015, this company had the crème-de-la-crème board that included notable former US secretaries of state such as George Shultz and Henry Kissinger, former Secretaries of Defense James Mattis and William Perry, and ex-US Senators Bill Frist and Sam Nunn. It was touted as the “the Apple of Healthcare.”
The founder was a Stanford drop out with her venture funded by marquee investors. At its high point, valued at $ 9 billion with the founder’s net worth alone at $4.5 billion. It all came crashing by Oct 2015 when the WSJ opened the pandora’s box. The company I am talking about is Theranos, and the founder is Elizabeth Holmes.
The year is 2020, this company is a greenfield telecom startup which had managed to put established telecom operators out of business with its predatory pricing model. The promoter calls it a platform instead of a communication service provider.
With the potential to disrupt entertainment to e-commerce, investors believe this startup is all set to be the next big thing. Over the past five weeks, it has attracted investments from Facebook to PE players such as Silver Lake, General Atlantic, Vista Partners and KKR.
You might have guessed the company now – it is Jio part of the Reliance Group and the man behind it is Mukesh Ambani.
How did Elizabeth Holmes and Mukesh Ambani get their companies valued at a premium and attracted investments from the who’s who? The answer is in their narratives. They were able to tie their narrative to the numbers, i.e. their business story drove their valuation.
New York University’s Prof. Aswath Damodaran, an authority in corporate valuation says, “In a good valuation, the numbers are bound together by a coherent narrative and storytelling is kept grounded with numbers.”
When an entrepreneur is pitching for an investment, the narrative that goes behind the numbers is more important. That is what gave premium valuation and attracted investors to Theranos and Jio.
Founders of all the leading companies Amazon, Tesla or Apple, have a consistent story that aligns with their decisions.
“We first measure ourselves in terms of the metrics most indicative of our market leadership: customer and revenue growth, the degree to which our customers continue to purchase from us on a repeat basis, and the strength of our brand. We have invested and will continue to invest aggressively to expand and leverage our customer base, brand, and infrastructure as we move to establish an enduring franchise. Because of our emphasis on the long term, we may make decisions and weigh trade-offs differently than some companies.”
For the last 23 years, Amazon still retains this narrative. Jeff Bezos always talks about having a dominant market share in whichever segment they operate in, investing back into the business for long term growth and focussing on customer experience.
Whether you are a retail investor trying to value a company before investing in its shares or you are an investor evaluating a startup for potential investment, you must have an investment thesis behind your decision.
To make the valuation story better, Prof. Damodaran suggests a five-step process. It is about weaving numbers into narratives and having every narrative backed up by numbers.
Source: Prof. Aswath Damodaran’s Blog
Step 1 is about the story you say about the business.
What story you tell for the business will drive the valuation. In the above reference, I consider Amazon as a retailer and compare it against Walmart. You might have a different narrative for Amazon, which is fine. Your narrative will influence your valuation.
The founder’s narrative will play a key role, based on how persuasive, consistent, and credible their story is, both public and private investors will believe or not believe in them. It will influence investment decisions.
Step 2 is about how the narrative holds good against history, common sense, and reality.
Theranos story will fail against common sense and reality. There could be disruption in technology or business model which may be against historical cases, but it still needs to pass through common sense and reality filter. Common knowledge rides on principles of economics and mathematics. Prof. Damodaran asks investors to test if the narrative is possible, plausible and probable.
When Holmes said she could do 100+ tests with two droplets of blood all at a very competitive price, she was telling a runaway story. Everyone wants to believe this type of story. Unfortunately, no one questioned the numbers behind it or use common sense to understand how blood-testing works. That is what led to massive wealth erosion for the investors in Theranos.
Step 3 is about tying narratives to different levers that drive business.
You break down the big picture narrative into individual narratives. For example, how competitive advantage in the business story gives better margins, how scale gives pricing power, how the asset-light model results in lower Capex and easy scaling, etc. This step is more about narratives than numbers.
Step 4 is about connecting the different levers to come up with the valuation (the end goal).
This step is more about numbers than about narratives. Those of who familiar with valuation know the DCF (Discounted Cash Flow) model where you discount the future value of cash flow to the present value and arrive at the intrinsic value of the share. Based on the intrinsic value and the current market price, you either take a call to invest or not to invest.
Step 5 is more to fine-tune than the valuation process itself.
By keeping with times, one may want to relook at some of the narratives you had built-in for the business. You can do this by tweaking the narrative to the changing nature of the business and by being open to feedback from different market players.
This is where you say, Amazon is not just retail business but also cloud service provider which has a higher growth rate and you plug those numbers. By doing that, you can also open up a range of valuation starting from how a pure-play retail player is valued to how a company that encompasses streaming services to cloud services to e-book & audiobook readers to pay wallets to the smart assistant is valued. Different segments come with different risk, growth, and profit margins.
When I started my sales career in my early 20s, I was raw, and little did I know about using conversation starters that help in building a relationship. In company events or industry conferences, it usually went like this. I am Krishna, sales executive with HCL Infosystems, so what do you do? I did evolve from there and have built long-lasting relationships with narrative-based conversation starters.
I am sure, at various points in life, you must have met someone new in conferences, industry events, training programs etc. and to build rapport would have asked this standard question – “So what do you do? “
In the current context of COVID, where most of us are in some sort of lockdown, it is natural to check what the other person is doing during calls. You might as well have asked this question or ended up in the receiving end of the same question.
But do you think the question, SO WHAT DO YOU DO? made a meaningful difference to the other person?
Research suggests that it is not the best question to start a conversation if you intend to build rapport.
Mark Manson, the author of the New York Times bestselling book The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck, writes, “Sometimes I ask people, How do you choose to suffer? Pleasure is an easy question. And pretty much all of us have similar answers. The more interesting question is the pain. What is the pain that you want to sustain??”
Here are eight questions that can be great conversation starters which can help in finding commonalities that lead to building a lasting relationship. You can learn more about storytelling powered narratives in this piece.
The first four are specific to the current context, while the rest are generic.
What have you learned from the lockdown so far?
This is as open as it can be, it can range from people sharing about what new skills they picked up to things about their relationship in the family to workplace-related dynamics etc. Your response can be about your learnings which helps the other person to know about you.
What are you looking forward to after this lockdown?
This question allows the other person to share something forward-looking (which is positive in the current context) and can have a wide variety of responses. It could be as simple as having that water-cooler conversation which has always been fun to going back to the gym to the long drive. This question can unearth some of the mutual interests.
The one thing that you are not missing because of this lockdown?
Gets people to think hard, but also helps them realize what was considered important during normal times is no longer critical. The options are endless here, be it dining out on Fridays to conducting interviews face to face to driving to work itself! Depending upon the person on the other end, you may get a range of responses that are philosophical to funny retorts.
How has this lockdown changed any of your belief systems?
This question is a twist to the earlier one but has a deeper meaning. More likely, this question will elicit serious responses as it is about belief systems. Age-old beliefs/practices are questioned due to restricted movement – how many of us imagined flight-free world even at the start of 2020? Almost all enterprise sales leaders talk about walking the halls to be closer to the customer, how that is possible in the current scenario?
What is inspiring you right now?
This question is forward-looking and can get you current context-specific responses, but also useful in normal times. It is like what is your new year resolution type question. In general, one can expect more personal reactions to this question, thereby getting to know him/her at a personal level, but work-related responses are also not uncommon.
What is your passion project/side hustle?
We are passionate about our side hustles/passion projects. But not everyone will want to share in a common forum, based on situational context people will respond in detail or keep it short. This question will be able to open up the other person, and one can also get to understand their hidden talents. I have known people who have charted new careers based on response to this question.
What are you doing that is fun?
In a way, this question is a slight twist to the passion project question. Rest assured, this question will steer the conversation away from work-related topics. It could also help spot people who consider work is no different than what they would be doing for fun. Most entrepreneurs fall into this category—a great question to find mutual interests outside of work. Many life and business partnerships have born out of this way.
What book have you recommended the most?
A personal favourite, a different spin to what is generally asked – what book are you reading now? Helps to find what has impressed them so much that they are recommending it to others repetitively, this question also will help in knowing the other person’s interest areas. One more question to find common interest outside of work and nurture a life long relationship.
Did you find your favourite question among these? What surprising insight have you uncovered by asking conversation starter questions?
With all the above questions, the aim is to ask an open-ended question that elicits non-work responses. By doing that, you are creating more opportunities to find mutual interests that are not necessarily work-related. When you connect more with personal interests than work matters, there is a higher chance of converting a stranger into a friend.
I have been getting requests from the readers of my blog and from my network on how they can practice storytelling at work. The basics of business storytelling series will cover this aspect. This series will cover ideas from what I read, observed and learned from practice. This post is about a book that I read which is helping me in my practice.
Prof. Chip Heath and Dan Heath are the authors of the book, “Made to Stick”. In it, they explain why some ideas stick and others die. For an idea to stick, it must have certain elements which help in connecting people and to carry the message forward. The authors have studied several ideas from the field of advertising, leadership communication, social cause messaging, people & company stories before arriving at this framework.
From their studies, they propose six principles that make an idea stick.
Principle 1: Simplicity
There is a simple reason why proverbs have lasted generations across cultures. The Heaths state that, any idea needs to be stripped to its core to make it memorable and easy to pass it on. The Golden Rule is to have a one-sentence statement so profound that an individual could spend a lifetime learning to follow it.
Google’s mission statement, “Our mission is to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful.” is powerful but also simple.
And a company that is built on that mission is generating revenues upwards of $ 120 billion.
Dr Martin Luther King Jr’s speech, “I have a dream” galvanized an entire community and nation towards freedom from slavery. Imagine a speech filled with jargons, complex information, and superfluous language. It wouldn’t have got this reach.
When you have many message or ideas, use the principle of exclusion to reduce all that into one.
Principle 2: Unexpectedness
“For an idea to endure, it must generate interest and curiosity,” says the Heath brothers. But it has to be done in a balanced manner. Master communicators will expose the gaps in the audience mind and then fill those gaps with their idea.
This approach allows you to hold the audience even though they have got gaps in knowledge. It is done by tapping into their existing knowledge, then exposing the gaps by curiosity and raising interest levels, and by filling that gap with your ideas.
George Loewenstein proposed this gap theory. He says that, as we gain information, we are more and more likely to focus on what we do not know. Someone who knows capitals of 50 countries would be proud of their knowledge, but someone who knows the capitals of 170 countries will more likely want to know the capitals of the rest 20+ countries.
Principle 3: Concreteness
Life is not abstract, but more often, the language we speak is abstract, and it gets worse as we move up the ladder. Terms such as liquidity, metacognitive skills, thematic learning are a put-off when it comes to spreading a message and when you want people to act.
“A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush” is a concrete message. Ideas need to be expressed in human action and sensory information, staying clear of business-speak.
John F Kennedy’s famous moon-shot speech of 1961 can also be expressed as, “Our mission is to become the international leader in the space industry through maximum team-centred innovation and strategically targeted aerospace initiatives”. Or it can be, “Put a man on the moon and return him safely by the end of the decade.”
JFK being a visionary leader, chose the latter. The message is simple and concrete. By speaking in concrete terms, one doesn’t allow a chance for anyone to interpret it differently, the above message means the same thing to everyone, be it the NASA scientists or the US Congress representatives or to the people of the US.
Principle 4: Credibility
Why should people believe in your ideas? Should be the question one needs to answer first. Not everyone has the same level of authority in all the subjects. We associate authority to individuals based on their past actions, their experience.
Some people build credibility by showing numbers, but even numbers do not have credibility when shared by a person who does not have authority in that field. For example, while we believe a physician’s take on health disorders, we do not give the same credibility, when he talks about the fiscal deficit of the economy.
Dan and Chip say, “Sticky ideas have to carry their own credentials. We need ways to help people test our ideas for themselves – a “try before you buy” philosophy for the world of ideas.”
One way of doing this is by adding vivid details that are truthful and meaningful to humans, which symbolize and support the core idea. Including statistics that are in the context of the idea also can help build credibility.
The other famous method is the Sinatra test. If an example passes the Sinatra test, then that one example alone is enough to establish credibility. It traces its origins to Frank Sinatra’s classic “New York New York”, about the life in New York and the chorus sings, “If I can make it there, I’ll make it anywhere.” For it to be successful, one needs to find the Sinatra test relative to the idea.
Principle 5: Emotions
Why should people care about your ideas? By making them feel something. Humans are wired to feel for people, and abstractions do not help in this regard.
Research shows that people are more likely to donate to a single needy individual than to an impoverished region. That is the reason why when funding agencies reach out; they say a specific story of an orphaned kid or someone with health problems in need of money for treatment.
Same emotions do not elicit similar responses across a different set of people. Teenagers may react to one set of emotions differently than adults, so the hard part is figuring out the right feeling to harness for a specific campaign and audience.
Principle 6: Stories
And finally, stories get people to act on ideas. Hearing stories preps us to respond more quickly and effectivity to a situation that is the reason, stories are powerful.
Companies are moving from being case study centric to client story-centric; it is not just a change of title. A story walks through the situation that persisted earlier, the pain points prompting the client to look for solutions, and when the solution provider sensing the business challenges, provides a solution that promises a new normal.
Often master storytellers like Steve Jobs or Elon Musk have used this technique to position their products that promise a new normal and relieves the consumers from unpleasant experiences.
To make an idea stick, it should be a Simple, Unexpected Concrete Credentialed Emotional Story! Now one can observe that it can also be remembered as SUCCESs.
For an idea to last, it should make the audience,
1. Pay attention
2. Understand and remember
3. Believe
4. Care
5. Be able to act
Are you preparing your next leadership communication or brand message? Read more about the strategic narrative. Read the next post in the Basics of Business Storytelling here.
I am listening to, “Originals: How non-conformists move the world” by Wharton School professor Adam Grant in Audible. In that book, he analyses some of the leaders who made a significant contribution to the world that we live in today. He had picked up anecdotes from different periods which makes it even more exciting.
He analyses Martin Luther King Jr’s famous, “I have a dream” speech. It is one of the path-breaking moments in American history. It is referenced in several leadership communication sessions for how to communicate a vision that has a clear call to action and galvanizes people.
But, Dr.King didn’t utter the “dream” word for the better part of his speech, and it was his friend Mahalia Jackson who shouted from behind, “Tell them about the dream, Martin!”. And the rest, as we know, is history.
This speech is an example of how compelling a strategic narrative can be when it is specific it motivates, engages and connects people to a higher purpose. Great leaders use narratives during crisis communication to deliver key message. In business, it is about communicating a company’s strategy or vision in a way that employees can connect their jobs to the overall vision of their company.
Often, companies spend millions in coming up with a strategy once in a few years, and they spend an insane amount of effort to craft customer communications. But how often, the same importance is given to communicate the strategy to their employees?
A typical organization might do an offsite for senior management, few workshops for their top managers across regions. But beyond that?
And, then some bland internal communications emails would be sent to all employees about what is the new vision, which goes something like this.
To be the most efficient service provider on the earth or World-class customer service or To be the preferred partner to world’s leading blah blah blah
To a frontline employee or a mid-level manager, what does To be the most efficient service provider on the earth mean?
How Good is Your Strategy?
According to management thinkers Chip Heath and Dan Heath, “A strategy is, at its core, a guide to behaviour. It comes to life through its ability to influence thousands of decisions, both big and small, made by employees throughout an organization.”
For employees of SouthWest airlines, it could mean deciding on what to be served to passengers on board – peanuts or a chicken salad. Their next question will be, will serving a chicken salad help us become the low-fare airline in this route? If not, then they are not serving that salad.
A good strategy delivers financial success and drives action that differentiates a company in that specific industry. But a bad strategy can result in less differentiation and drag the company down.
When sitting down to formulate a strategy, every leadership team aspires to come up with a great strategy that could deliver them differentiation in the market and inspire their employees to act. It doesn’t happen always.
Strategies may be powerful in a PowerPoint document or on the walls of the organization or in the leadership speeches. Still, if they do not manifest in action, they are inert and irrelevant.
What differentiates a vision statement from being just on the wall to something that inspires people to act is a compelling narrative. A narrative essentially inspires and moves people to act. It is more than off-the-cuff spontaneous storytelling, but a clear and consistent story in every discussion about vision and strategy be it with the leadership team or an employee town hall.
One of the main reason that strategies don’t stick with a broader audience is the way it is communicated, and the prime culprit for the same is leadership’s curse of knowledge.
Curse of Knowledge
Most of us might have experienced this at some point in time in our career. As people move up the ladder, the curse of knowledge afflicts leaders when they try to communicate a strategy to the rest of the organization. It leads executives to talk about strategy as though they were the audience.
When someone uses high-level and abstract matter, you can say that the curse of knowledge afflicts them. The bigger problem is that they are not even aware that they are speaking abstractly.
One can overcome the curse of knowledge by using stories, as it helps to demystify concrete language.
FedEx has an award called Purple Promise which honours employees for making sure FedEx’s delivery promise that packages will “absolutely and positively” arrive overnight.
When a delivery truck broke down in New York, and the replacement van was running late, the FedEx driver after having delivered few packages on foot realized that he might not deliver the other packages on time. But he managed to convince a driver from a competitor to take him on the last few deliveries.
Now this story can be used by a top sales executive to convey, “this is how FedEx employees take the delivery promise seriously”. A new delivery driver can use this story to guide her behaviour that it is not about working from 9 to 5, but it is about getting the packages delivered come what may. The same story could be used by a procurement person to negotiate better maintenance contracts such as the fastest possible maintenance/replacement vehicles for delivery trucks.
Communicating the Strategic Narrative
A strategic narrative is best represented by contrasting the current situation with the promised land. It is a structure that inspiring leaders have used in their speech to inspire, influence and act. This is what Martin Luther King Jr did in his speech as well as Steve Jobs used that in his iPhone launch in 2007.
It consists of four parts,
In the past…..
Then something happened….
So now….. and
In the future….
It addresses the, “Why.”
So, when a sales leader wants to pitch to VP-customer care on their solution, it could go like this.
With one of our clients, their prepaid telecom customers had to wait for 12 minutes before they could speak to the call centre executives, this resulted in bad customer experience, and customers started dropping off their network. Then the client implemented a customer agent intelligence solution that predicts the call volumes of a day and assigns call centre agents by which the customer’s waiting time is reduced to under 1 minute. Now customers are happy, which is resulting in more referral business.
Stories that speak to an organization’s strategy have two parts. The story itself and the moral of the story. It is nice to have both, but if one must choose between the two, choose the story. Because the moral is implicit in the story, but the story is not implied in the moral. And the story with its concrete language, specific protagonists and the real-world setting is more likely to guide behavior.
By using a clever mix of stories and concrete language, leaders can overcome the curse of knowledge and everyone in the organization stands to benefit from a shared understanding of the strategy.
