STUCK IN THE MIDDLE: The Tug on Product

A few years ago, we were asked to work with a product marketing team to strengthen stories and case studies that they were using to illustrate the impact of their products.

As we began our homework to learn the value their products delivered to customers, we quickly discovered we were learning more about the features of their products than their value to end users. And after a few more conversations, we saw the gap we were really solving for. Sales teams weren’t using the product materials provided; the leader hoped that we would help product marketing position stories to make the products more compelling. And, we did.

But along the way, we got curious about why the marketing materials were so feature focused. And that’s when we realized that the marketing group was really a product group. And, they were getting their insights from the product developers. They were positioning features because that’s how engineers talked about value, and they were missing the customer value and outcomes.

It’s a pattern that we’ve seen repeated in many companies since then.

Product teams often find themselves in the role of the middleman. They’re a step away from customers as they work with sales teams and a step away from deliverables as they work with engineers. Somehow, they’ve become the “go to” group to answer for everything.

And, that’s challenging. Sales gets frustrated because product causes delays. Engineers get frustrated because product causes changes.

Product managers spend most of their time with engineers who are building to a road map. But they experience most of the friction with the sales team. And while friction isn’t easy to navigate, the product group needs the sales group. They are the voice of the customer and provide the best insights and perspective on customer outcomes.

But what makes sales teams great at customer insights can also make them tough as the internal customer. They sign product up for a lot of things that aren’t doable. Sales doesn’t always understand the implications of what they’ve agreed to with a customer, so they commit time without a deep understanding of trade-offs. Or, they pull the product team onto customer calls so that product can personally commit to the request and the timeline.

And, many product managers do commit. Because, after all, their salespeople are good at selling. They can get you to buy into the need and the customer promise with ease. Next thing you know, the product manager has a “to do” list that’s longer than a child’s holiday wish list and about as likely to be delivered on.

And, that’s when product gets caught in the middle.

Because the next conversation is with the engineering and technology teams. And, they want to talk about that growing list of requests. Engineers call out the amount of time required, the misalignment with the overall roadmap and the conflict with bigger initiatives and priorities. Sometimes, the engineering teams refuse to take more on. And, now the product manager will have to go back to sales and communicate the delay. The tug of war begins.

And, that’s how product gets stuck in the middle.

It’s not an easy role to navigate, but it is a manageable one. And as we’ve continued to work with product teams, there are a few rules of engagement that we’ve coached them to consider…

Recognize the Gap

Sales and technology will never think alike. They are opposite ends of the spectrum. And, they don’t have to think alike if they have product in the middle. But they do have to value the perspectives of each other, and that’s the communication role that product can play. Get both perspectives into every conversation. When you’re talking to sales, make sure the conversation moves to HOW we’ll do things. When you’re talking to technology, make sure the conversation begins with the WHAT and WHY for the customer.

Clarify the Outcomes

Sales is a good friend to your customers. But they don’t always challenge the request. We see many technology groups backing off customization in order to deliver speed. Challenge the sales team to understand the outcome and the impact to a customer. Sometimes what they’ve been asked to do won’t deliver as much as a customer may think.

Identify the Trade-offs

The customer is king, but they don’t always rule the whole court. See above the details and call the tough questions. Technology is right about trade-offs. On the roadmap of development and delivery, when one thing moves ahead something else falls behind. Sales doesn’t always participate in this part of the conversation. Keep them in the loop and give them a better understanding of what is falling behind.

Solve Together

Product should have the megaphone in the tug of war. You have to win together and that comes from solving together. Think through the options and then give both groups the sound bites that help explain a delay to a customer or a change order to an engineering team.

Communicate Often

Product managers have become communication managers. And, it’s going to take repetition to keep everyone on the same page. The discrepancy between sales and technology is what needs to be done and the best way to get there. Once they agree, solidify the agreement with consistent communication and help them share it with stories and examples.

When product teams strengthen their role in the middle, companies see tremendous benefit from clarity of thoughts and alignment of priorities. If we can help your product team manage the role in the middle, we’d love to share some of our learnings with you.

Call us when you need us.

My Meeting Didn’t Go Well. Now What?

“My meeting didn’t go well.” Now What?

That may sound like one thought. But, it’s actually two different perspectives. It’s our clients who say, “My meeting didn’t go well.” And it’s me who asks: “So, now what?” What did you do to follow up?

The reply is often: “Nothing.”

Because when a communicator has invested a lot of time and effort to lead a conversation or present a new idea and it doesn’t go well, the emotion they feel is…well, at least it’s over. It’s behind me. And, I don’t have to do that again for 90 days. Whew!

It’s an understandable feeling, but a short-sighted one.

As roles expand, managers, directors and new VPs, are handed more responsibility. And with responsibility comes visibility. That’s a great thing because exposure leads to connection with senior leaders and future opportunities. But it also gets harder because topics are more complex, and recommendations are not so black and white.

In our research on executive conversations, we consistently hear that experienced communicators say conversations with leaders only reach their intended result 60% of the time. That means 40% of the time, the communicator doesn’t get a desired takeaway or result.

Whether your batting average is a little higher or a little lower, the reality is no one hits the mark every time. So, you need to know what to do when things get off course.

And, the answer begins by understanding what happens on the other side of the conversation.

The leader notices that you weren’t on top of your game or didn’t walk out with an approved next step. They may be surprised that you missed the mark if they’ve experienced a more successful conversation with you. Or, they may not know you and this may be their first impression. Whether it’s a first impression or a different one, they take note. And, they hold onto that impression.

In fact, anyone would. Your peers or employees would notice a conversation that didn’t yield takeaways. What’s different with a senior leader is that their experiences of you are not as frequent. So, their impressions last longer. Impressions last until they meet with you again or get the next report out. So, the power of an impression becomes more significant because they don’t see you the next day like a peer or an employee would. Instead, they hold onto those impressions, and over time impressions can become distorted.

We know this because we capture feedback from leaders who often say: “When I think about Joe as a communicator, I remember a meeting last year.” Or, “Sue seems like a sincere person, but she just can’t anticipate my questions well.” And, the follow-up phrase is often: “I just can’t get what I need from Sue. She’s not ready to lead this kind of discussion.” or, “Joe needs to lift the altitude of his conversations. He doesn’t know how to focus on what I need.”

And, those are impressions and comments that you need to diffuse. So, what do you do when meetings don’t go well? Three things can help a communicator move beyond a bad experience.

Acknowledge it. As much as you’d like to walk out and forget it ever happened, you need to acknowledge that it didn’t go well. Leaders worry most about whether someone is aware of mistakes. Notice in the quotes: “She’s not ready …” and “He doesn’t know …”. It’s the lack of awareness that sets up concern more than the miss itself.

Within 48 hours, send an email and acknowledge that you missed a point or fell short of having needed information. While the impression may not fade entirely, it’s now blended with an impression of awareness that gets high marks.

Answer it. Most misses are caused by questions that can’t be answered in the meeting or perspectives that were too far apart to find common ground. The solve is usually new information or a repositioning of information. Work quickly to get new information in front of the leader before they lose track of the topic. When you circle back with information, don’t dwell on the solution that you started with and avoid being defensive about the information you initially presented. Provide context to reset the topic and focus on moving the conversation forward.

If you can combine the answer with the acknowledgment, all the better. But if not, send an email to acknowledge and commit to a deadline of when the leader will have the correct information.

Check on it. The two steps above represent a lot of effort to reset a poor impression, and they work. But it’s always a good idea to circle back and confirm that the poor impression didn’t stick. This is your brand, not just a presentation. Use your manager to check on impressions. Ask if the leader has moved beyond the impression. In most cases, you’ll get good insight in return.

If you don’t have an easy way to assess impressions, watch for indicators of impressions. Are you taken out of senior-level meetings or presentations? Do you not get as much visibility as you once did? Is someone else reporting out on your initiative? Those are negative indicators. Or, did the conversation reset and move forward? Are you given added responsibilities and visibility? Those are possible indicators.

The reality is that an increase in visibility means an addition in complexity. These conversations aren’t easy, but they shouldn’t be risky. Nobody’s perfect, and nobody is expected to be. But, if your success rate is only 60%, you may need to improve your batting average.

And that’s where we can help. Hitting the right altitude and providing information that leaders value is a methodology we teach in our Leading Executive Conversations program. From how to recover a miss to improving the odds of success, we can help you improve consistency and outcomes.

Call us when you need us.

 

Frosty the VP

Frosty the VP
Was a manager with style
With a story here and a story there
He engaged listeners all the while

Frosty the VP
Had a takeaway for every call
He made data sing
And presentations ring
To departments big and small

There must have been some magic
In those stories that he told
For when he got up in a room
Even the CFO was sold

Frosty the VP
Made slides as alive as they could be
And his employees said
He was better than TED
As his brand spread across the company

His magic was
The tools he got
From SW&A;
For we helped him organize his thoughts
In a compelling kind of way

And into every meeting
With his points aligned just right
He’d brought laughs and cheer into every chair
And put the whole room in his sight

Frosty the VP
Is so many of you today
And as the year says goodbye
And reindeer start to fly
We’ll be wishing you Happy Holidays from SW&A!

The Gift of Feedback

You’ve probably heard “feedback is a gift” a time or two across your career. But it doesn’t feel like much of a gift whether you have to deliver the feedback or receive it. There’s joy in giving, especially this time of year, but we find little joy in year-end reviews or development discussions.

In fact, these meetings often feel more like a chore because feedback isn’t always well-received, and it often creates tension between a manager and an employee until you can move beyond it. When we ask managers to share their most challenging communication situations, feedback always makes the top three. Managers don’t like giving it, they aren’t good at it and they don’t always know how to move an employee beyond it.

And yet, when you ask employees about pivotal moments in their careers, they reflect on feedback or directions that set them on a different course or got them over a hurdle. They may not have liked “the gift” when it was received, but they valued the impact it had on helping them move forward.

Feedback is a gift that should be packaged in a way that both the giver and the receiver are open to engaging in it. And while feedback should be given frequently throughout the year, it seems very relevant and timely in December as the current year wraps up, the new year sets up and employees have an opportunity to reflect and reset for the year ahead.

Here are insights to consider from both sides of the discussion.

IF YOU’RE GIVING FEEDBACK…

Your mindset may begin with getting through it. You may have multiple feedback discussions you need to complete and summarize as a part of company policy for year end. But, feedback shouldn’t be a check-the-box task. While it doesn’t impact your career, it can have a profound impact on someone else’s. Be thoughtful about how you give it and approach it as something you’re willing to help someone work on and work through.

Keep these things top of mind.

The Coach and The Player: The best environment for feedback comes when an employee sees that you’ve shifted from their manager to their coach. Call that out at the start of the conversation so that they believe you’re trying to help rather than trying to correct. Managers approach feedback as telling someone what they did wrong and how to fix it. But a coach approaches feedback more as an opportunity for insight, impact and teaching. In fact, feedback is yours to deliver, but it is the employee’s to solve.

Raise questions, not answers: We grow through feedback because we process and solve for the issues within the feedback. Allow an employee to process feedback, good or constructive. This is an important conversation for them, allow them to see it as such. Don’t offer solutions, let the employee talk through what they can do differently. Sometimes, it may require letting them process it and come back a few days later with their thoughts. Position the impression and then wait…for ownership and reaction.

Share real-time observations: Feedback will draw a non-verbal response, even if the employee says very little. Share what you observe. It can often help illustrate the feedback or draw an employee into the discussion.

EX: “John, I imagine that wasn’t what you wanted to hear. And, your lack of response makes me feel as if you don’t want the insight or don’t understand the observation. Actually, it’s similar to how you come across in meetings.”

Manage resistance: If you’ve decided feedback is important enough to share, don’t allow an employee to be dismissive of it. Feedback should be the beginning of discussion, not the end of it. Put the responsibility on the employee to come back with ideas and next steps. Allow an employee to set a timeframe and a context for working through an issue. How they handle the follow-up steps speaks volumes about their willingness to learn and grow.

IF YOU’RE RECEIVING FEEDBACK…

Your mindset may be “grin and bear it,” especially if you’re ready for holiday celebrations and downtime before the year ahead. But, don’t dismiss it. Feedback is a gift and an opportunity to learn as much as you can about perception around your brand and discussion in year-end talent reviews. If you ask the right questions, you may get revealing answers.

Keep these things top of mind.

Be open, be still, and listen… to understand perspective. It doesn’t matter if you agree. Impressions are always helpful because they identify how your brand is being perceived. You may feel as if some feedback comes from a manager who just doesn’t see things the way you do. But even when feedback is isolated to a specific event or meeting, it’s an impression and the more you know about impressions, the more successful you will be in managing them.

Lean in to this conversation, don’t shut it down. Managers don’t like giving feedback and few are good at it. If they sense you’re uneasy, they clam up quick. Don’t challenge the input, seek to understand it and expand it. Ask for more insights. Ask how others reacted to it or whether your manager knows if it’s still a concern. When a manager can’t clearly explain an impression, it may be a sign that it’s a broader impression among their peer group.

EX: Manager says: “You need to show up better in staff meetings. You seem uninvolved and uninterested.” You say: How do I create that impression? And the response you get is: “I often see you on your phone and it seems like you’re not engaged in the discussion.”

This example illustrates a manager who observed a behavior and is very clear about the impression they formed as a result of it. It’s easy to fix. Leave your phone out of staff meetings.

EX: Manager says: “You need to show up better in staff meetings. You seem uninvolved and uninterested.” You say: How do I create that impression and what can I do to improve it? And the response you get is: “Well, you should participate more. Speak up and add your perspective.” You might say: “Can you think of a situation where you felt my perspective was missing or could have changed a conversation?”

This example illustrates a manager who has an impression that may have been shaped by others or from a broader impression of you. It’s harder to resolve because the manager doesn’t have clarity on what they expect to be different. You need to know more about overall impressions of your brand beyond the staff meeting and you should ask for them.

Circle back with action steps. Don’t leave the feedback unresolved with a manager. Even though they don’t like giving it, they remember it. And, they will remember how you responded and what you did about it. No one is perfect; we’re all growing and learning along the way. But we remember how people respond to feedback and our willingness to share more is based on the employee’s receptiveness.

Feedback is a gift, and managers and employees should treat it as one. While feedback may create angst on both sides of the discussion, it’s a critical step to help anyone move forward in their career.

So, embrace it as the year wraps up…and say “thanks” to the person who took the time to make it worthwhile.

Call us when you need us!

Virtual vs. Remote Communication

We’re often asked about managing a listener who isn’t in the room with you. And, we ask in return: Well, are you talking to them virtually or remotely? That almost always draws a quizzical look.

To solve the confusion, we clarify how we think about the two communication mediums. Remote communication means a call where the experience between the communicator and the listener is remote or distant. The word itself refers to an experience without connection. And, that’s how we view it. Remote communication is a voice without a focal point, and it’s the hardest way to connect with a listener. It works best with someone you talk to frequently who attaches a previous experience and impression to the remote setting.

Virtual communication gives the listener and the communicator the ability to see each other. By definition, virtual means leveraging technology to make something simulate something else. So, a virtual meeting simulates a live meeting, and a live meeting remains the best communication situation to drive engagement.

We coach people to be successful in either setting and although there may sometimes be technology limitations for choosing a remote option over a virtual one, there’s a clear difference in the listener’s experience and the communicator’s effectiveness.

So, it’s surprising that some communicators still choose remote methods. It may be a sign of putting your preference ahead of a listener’s. And from our perspective, that breaks the golden rule of communication. The listener’s experience should always be the priority.

If you’re still communicating remotely as a leader or a manager, here are some things to consider.

COACHING TO LEADERS

Leaders manage remote teams and as a result, they think their communication needs to be remote as well. When you consider that engagement is the challenge leaders call out about a remote team, it seems odd to ignore the tool that could establish a virtual connection every week.

Teams like to see each other and to see their leader. The visual snapshot helps put a name to a face, which more than doubles someone’s likelihood to be remembered. It encourages participation in a call and shifts the focus from talking to interacting.

Virtual Meetings: We help leaders understand the virtual experience and focus on how to manage the technology. It is more two dimensional than an in-person setting, so leaders learn to focus forward to strengthen the virtual snapshot. Technology can create challenges with shifting cameras and waiting to speak. It takes practice and modifying a few core skills to build a virtual brand.

Impact: When the listener comes back into focus, a leader works harder for a response and a connection. They spend more time on preparation because they feel more exposed and visible. And, in fact, they are. That’s not a bad thing. The bad experience comes in a remote meeting where a leader is more scattered and less focused on a listener. That’s permission to not really listen.

Remote Meetings: Keeping the listeners’ attention is the number one challenge with a remote medium. Leaders feel less pressure and put in less effort, and the remote medium requires just the opposite. It takes even more preparation and more facilitation to involve and engage a listener. And those are the two things we coach to improve results. We look closely at agendas and how they’re outlined for a remote listener. Remote meetings are rarely successful without advance agendas and supporting materials. Without the ability to see non-verbal cues, a leader has to plan for verbal cues. That puts a leader in more of a facilitation role, and it requires a new skill set.

Impact: When we ask teams about remote meetings run by their leaders, they admit that they aren’t always paying attention and they seldom get what they need through this format. However, the remote meeting can be successful if a leader develops a new approach and a more structured flow to a meeting. We help leaders learn how to facilitate these meetings differently and map out specific points of interaction with listeners.

But the best advice we give leaders is to recognize that their choices with these two mediums are often mimicked by their teams. And, that means that customers could be experiencing a real tradeoff.

COACHING TO MANAGERS

In most workshops, we talk about virtual vs remote communication. And, I’ve heard every excuse for why managers don’t use virtual options.

• “I don’t like for customers to look at me when I’m talking.”
• “I feel more vulnerable and responsible when they see me.”
• “I don’t have a very professional setting/backdrop for customer calls in my home.”
• “I don’t like getting dressed for calls.”
• “Our customers are traditional. They don’t like technology.”

At the core of most comments is what the communicator wants; not what the listener may prefer. I was taken back at one company to hear a group talk about how interactive and collaborative their internal meetings are. When I asked about virtual customer communications, they were quick to say they don’t like using it. So, the collaboration they show internally is never seen by the customer. Isn’t that a mistake?

Of course, it is. Every company talks about innovation and collaboration, and a great way to illustrate it is by leveraging technology for a virtual experience. If you deal with difficult conversations with customers, they are less likely to become aggressive and more likely to listen if they see you.

Virtual Meetings: To a customer audience, they don’t know the difference in an on-site worker and a remote worker. Everyone is remote to them until you go to their location. But, you can leverage a virtual setting to build a relationship with them. Connection is stronger when you see someone, and that’s true of your customers. The attributes that you want to convey in communication…honesty, authenticity and warmth…come through in a visual view of you.

Impact: Relationships move faster and trust builds quicker. In a virtual meeting, you’re a real person to me and not just a name in my email. But, it may take some effort on your part to nudge your customers to this medium.

Remote Meetings: Listeners have also developed bad habits around remote communication. They don’t fully listen, they multi-task and they are much more likely to cancel a remote call. We coach employees how to strengthen a remote call with advance materials and a clear takeaway for the listener. Then, we help them tighten the storyline and focus on clear takeaways that the listener will value.

Impact: A communicator can build interest and drive actions with a remote listener. But, it takes participation, a well-thought-out agenda and facilitation skills to a keep a remote listener active in a conversation.

It’s OK not to be a natural at virtual communication; few communicators are. Most need some guidance to lead it well. But, it isn’t OK to avoid it because it puts less pressure on you as a leader or a manager. You need to leverage virtual communication to focus on your listeners. And, we can help you do that.

SW&A teaches virtual workshops to illustrate the best way to run a virtual or remote meeting. And in 2019, we’ll expand our presence programs to focus more closely on the virtual communicator.

Call us when you need us.

The Repeatability Factor

One of the questions we hear at the midpoint of a workshop or coaching engagement is: “How do you know so much about our business?” There are some companies that we know well, but what we tell many groups is it feels like we know you because we’ve shifted your storyline to what your listeners value about you. We may not know you in and out, but we know the listeners sitting in your presentation pretty well.

And, the response to skeptic clients is the same. When someone wants help building a compelling storyline, we sometimes hear “You don’t know our business well enough.” And, my response is always: It’s your job to know your business. It’s my job to know your listener.

Our work revolves around the communicator, but our approach is based on the expectations of the listener. And, we explain it this way. We build the communicator’s skills through fundamentals on content structure and delivery expectations. But, our measure of success is set by the listeners’ takeaway.

And, we call that measurement the repeatability factor.

Repeatability is the goal of most business content, isn’t it?

If you deliver a sales pitch on a new product, you expect your customer to repeat it to others in their company until there is agreement to move forward.

If you introduce a product development protocol, you expect engineers to repeat it to their teams until the timeline and new approach is adopted.

If you set a new strategy in a town hall, you expect employees to repeat it and discuss it among themselves until there is buy-in and excitement about a new direction.

Those expectations mean that the success of communication is actually in the hands of the listeners. And, those are high expectations for listeners! In fact, if you’ve read our latest book, Storylines & Storytelling, you know that listeners say their expectations for repeatability are seldom met.

Communicators must be able to build a storyline that helps a listener understand what you want them to do with the content and then gives them elements within that content which are easy to repeat.

That’s the methodology behind our content work.

A storyline that frames the overall direction of communication, a message that defines an outcome that the storyline will prove out, and a framework that organizes data points to help the listener buy into the outcome.

All of these elements get the listener to an outcome or takeaway. But in many presentations, listeners get it and forget it in less than 24 hours. So, well-structured content can still be missing the repeatability factor. Repeatability means thinking beyond what you will say to consider what the listeners will repeat about the content a few weeks later.

Here’s our acid test for repeatability in presentations.

When we work with someone on an upcoming presentation, it often involves a PPT deck. We take the deck and spread it out across a large table so that the communicator can visually see the flow of their storyline.

Then, we ask them to imagine that they are now the listener two weeks after their presentation has occurred. As a listener, they remember the message and remember thinking there were a few key points. We ask the communicator to look through the deck and identify the points that are repeatable.

What do they think the listener will focus on? Can they find the repeatable slide…or the repeatable story…that is easy to pull out of this storyline and insert into another one?

Unfortunately, not very often.

If someone has to spend a lot of time looking through notes or a PPT deck trying to remember the points or translate details, they simply won’t do it very often. That means the storyline is missing the repeatability factor.

When it’s there, it can be the distinguishing factor between content that lives within an organization or dies shortly after it’s delivered.

And, we see it in companies we know well where we work on storylines at multiple levels. We often tell a story like this one to validate the repeatability factor:

I worked with Evan earlier this year on a recommendation for a new product platform. He was making a multi-million-dollar request of division leaders across his company. As the technology lead, he was excited about the recommendation, but it would mean a disruptive six months for product development across all the divisions.

As we built his storyline, I felt he needed to provide more context around competitors’ product capabilities. I knew his audience would need this to believe there was urgency in changing their product platform. Evan was hard to convince because he felt the features of the new platform would sell the idea. He was more focused on how they would build future products rather than why they needed to change their approach.

I finally convinced him to include a slide that illustrated the capabilities of two top competitors because of platform changes they had made in the last two years. If you’ve taken our storylines or executive conversations workshop, you’ll recognize this as framing the External Perspective. Once he understood it, Evan did a good job of setting the stage with what was happening and how customers had responded to the new capabilities available on competitive platforms. Then, he set up the gaps in their existing platform and explained to the division leaders how he’d like to solve for the gap.

They bought into his recommendation, but each division leader had to resell the idea to their product teams and across their divisions.

When we were working on his storyline, I explained to Evan the concept of repeatability. I took him through the “acid test” exercise, and he agreed the competitive comparison would be his repeatability factor. We worked hard to make the competitive slide simple and easy to repeat. And, it worked.

For the next two months, Evan saw each division leader take his information on the competitive platforms, reuse his slide and validate the need for change across each division. They approached it differently and focused on the advantages it gave their division, but each leader kept his competitive story intact. It was repeated across each division and even evolved into a competitive analysis in three divisions for a more robust look at added functionality.

That’s repeatability!

And when you achieve it in your presentations, you’ve reached our measure of success. We can help you get there, and a great way to start is to test one of your presentations. Send it to us. We’ll put it through the “acid test.”

Call us when you need us.

Telling Great Stories

Chapter 14: Telling Great Stories (an excerpt from Sally Williamson’s third book)

Listeners like stories in a business context because it helps them remember and repeat ideas. But when we asked people we surveyed about stories, they told us that they don’t hear stories often and, when they do, they don’t repeat them because the stories aren’t relevant or don’t align with the topic. They thought stories would be more memorable if they were more relatable and if the presenter was a better storyteller.

In order to solve for those expectations, we formed focus groups to watch and listen to people telling stories. Our goal was to observe how people tell stories so that we could identify commonalities and develop best practices. But what we found communicators had in common were the mistakes they make, not what they do well. The takeaways from these sessions validated a lot of what people had told us in our third-party survey.

• “The stories themselves aren’t always interesting.”
• “Many storytellers aren’t great at delivery.”
• “Listeners get frustrated trying to figure out the point of a disjointed or rambling narrative.”

In short, our most consistent takeaway was that many people find it hard to tell a story well.

We also asked focus group participants about stories they hear in business settings. Here’s what they said:

• “We tell stories about our brand; not about our people.”
• “Stories that I hear and repeat hit me emotionally, not logically.”
• “We talk about stories, but we don’t use them.”
• “One in a hundred stories that I hear are worth repeating. But when I hear a good one, I use it over and over again.”

In the focus groups, we also tested whether participants could remember and retell a story.

One participant used a personal story to illustrate to a group of new hires that they were joining a great company. Here’s Craig’s story:

Five years ago, I’d been out of work for almost a year. My search for an IT management job took longer than I thought, and it was stressful on me and on my family. We were so grateful when I was offered a job here, and I started working in early November. I didn’t have my confidence back yet, so I was concerned when I was called into my manager’s office after just three weeks. Unbeknownst to me, each department here has a tradition of giving away a holiday turkey, and my manager had selected me. He seemed to know that my family had been going through a tough time, and it was a wonderful gift. That’s when I knew this is a company that cares about its people. You’ve made the right decision to work here.

The participants’ feedback? They wanted more emotion. They wanted to feel a personal connection to Craig’s stress level before landing a job.

Here’s how I retold the story:

I know as you sit here, you are a little unsure of what it will be like to work here. I can tell you that in short order, you’ll realize that you haven’t just accepted a job, you’ve joined a family.

That’s certainly how I felt five years ago. I was an IT manager who’d been let go from another company during downsizing. I had a solid skill set and thought it would be pretty easy to find another position. I was wrong. I was out of work for almost a year. If any of you have been through this, you know how hard it is being out of work that long. I’d passed the point of stressed out. I was beginning to genuinely worry about how I’d take care of my family.

It was a huge relief to be offered a role here and to get started in early November. Things were still a little stressful; we’d fallen behind on some bills and I was still playing catch up. But we had a way forward and I hoped the situation would improve by the new year. I didn’t talk about this with my new coworkers, but I always carried that weight with me. Three weeks later when I was summoned to my manager’s office, I could feel my stress neurons firing. Surely I hadn’t messed up already. What could he want?

Well. Unbeknownst to me at that time, the company’s tradition is to give away a turkey to someone in every department, and my manager thought it might make a difference for me that year. Boy, was he right! We were living week to week. Thanksgiving wasn’t even on my radar. That simple act of kindness was a big gesture to my family. The fact that my manager had noticed something was off and wanted to support me—that was a powerful signal to me that this company is an extended family. So the message I want you to hear today is: welcome to the family!

I asked the group again after my version and found that the group remembered the emotion in the story and connected with it more.

We continued the exercise of listening to stories and then I repeated each story. Each time we asked for observations based on the storyteller’s version and mine. Here are some of the groups’ observations:

• The story took longer when I told it, but it didn’t feel long.
• The people and circumstances were more relatable.
• My story seemed to include the listeners.
• My version of the story expressed more emotion.

As we worked with each group to rework their stories, we found three key elements that many of their stories were missing:

A Point: Many of the initial stories told in the focus groups left participants thinking, “So what? Why did you just tell me about that?” This matched what we learned from our survey participants as well. Listeners often feel that most stories don’t have a point or any direction at all. This is something most people have experienced at some point. Speakers fail to tell a story well because they get too bogged down in details or they add elements to a story that really aren’t relevant to the takeaway.

When we asked the focus group participants about the flow of their stories, we found that many of them were simply relating the events as the details came back to them. They had little structure in mind. That lack of structure is precisely what leads to rambling and disjointedness.

Listener Interest: Some of the stories did have a point, but either they were boring or the storyteller failed to make the audience feel like a part of the experience.

We then worked to retell the stories with more texture, more detail. Listeners in the focus groups confirmed that the details made a significant difference in what they remembered.

The storytellers were surprised at this. In my retellings, the added context came from questions we asked the storytellers after they had initially told their stories. It wasn’t new information; they just hadn’t included that level of detail in their stories because they didn’t perceive the need for it. This ties back to the risk associated with telling stories. Most speakers don’t know how much detail is too much or too little, or what kinds of details make a story interesting. When I retold some of the stories, I added texture by focusing on things we wanted the listener to relate to in the story.

It was another important proof point that stories can take a while to tell. Several of our storytellers were worried about this. They weren’t giving themselves permission to embellish the story enough to make it interesting.

Listener Response: Few stories actually drew a response from the listeners. While people were willing to listen, they didn’t have comments or questions afterward, unless to ask for clarification or because they had missed the point. The listeners didn’t give reactions, share similar experiences or seem impacted by the stories.

Our observation was that storytellers were simply sharing experiences and not working to make the experience matter to the listeners. If stories are told well, they are the elements of a presentation that will be remembered and repeated, because listeners relate to them. But the stories told in our focus groups weren’t accomplishing this.

In response to what we learned from these focus groups, we now had insights on common gaps in storytelling. But, we still wanted to capture best practices and see if there were commonalities in people who tell stories well.

So, we continued our research by asking companies to introduce us to their best storytellers. And the most common response we got was a blank stare. This seemed to have something to do with the aura that people attach to great storytellers and the lack of compelling communicators in company cultures. The term “storyteller” is loaded. People expect a master communicator, an entertainer. So we changed our question. We began asking for the people who bring ideas to life and who seem to put context around their thoughts. We compiled a list of storytellers from a number of companies and interviewed them to test the mechanics of storytelling we’d hypothesized.

Our earlier research had shown that people who tell stories find it easy. This new round of interviews reaffirmed this.

Many of the storytellers we interviewed had been telling stories for so long that their approach was more habitual than intentional. We had to dissect their habits to get at the principles that made their storytelling effective.

So with the challenges identified in focus groups and the habits we observed in good storytellers, we were able to identify three principles that are universal to good storytellers…

Excerpt Ends.

To learn more about our three principles of good storytellers, pre-order your copy of Storylines & Storytelling. Or, you can learn more about our Connecting Stories to Storylines program that introduces and coaches the fundamentals of a compelling storyline and a memorable story.

Chapter One: Why Storytelling?

It’s Thursday, 8am. Pretty early for someone who was up after midnight, but that’s common practice at industry conferences and large company meetings, because colleagues and peers mingle late into the night—networking, reconnecting, and building relationships that will prove fruitful in the months ahead.

You’re feeling a little sluggish as you head into the massive ballroom for the opening session, but the room is anything but tired. The pulse of the music is electric and infectious. A thousand audience members begin to fill the seats, their energy visibly rising with anticipation.

It’s your first look at the conference setup and it’s clear the coordinators have spared no expense. Screens wrap from one end of the massive stage to the other and splash light and color on the audience. The stage is set with sleek white leather chairs.

The bells and whistles are all in place. The music is interrupted as the host announces the conference will kick off in five minutes. You settle in with a fresh cup of coffee and high expectations, and begin perusing the conference app.

You might be surprised to know that the one person who is not as ready to go as the setting suggests is the senior leader. He’s backstage passing off changes to visuals and skimming the teleprompter script over the operator’s shoulder to ensure that he has remembered every detail. When the host announces that the conference is about to start, he moves toward the back steps and waits for his cue to join the MC on stage.

He steps up to the podium and launches into a keynote that covers the company’s plans for the year ahead, calls out the trends that he is betting on and the big wins they expect, and then unveils some new concepts that customers can expect to see soon.

This isn’t what you were hoping for. The dynamics of the room promised energy and entertainment—something memorable. But within the first five minutes of his speech, the energy in the room evaporates. You hear the details, but you don’t really feel moved by them. The speaker clearly doesn’t either. He’s reading sound bites off a screen on the floor and seems to be working harder to read it right than to say it well.

What’s worse, he’s not saying anything you didn’t already hear at his competitor’s conference last month. You mentally check out and scan the app to see what’s coming next.

The second speaker is Julie, a senior manager on the leader’s strategy team. You don’t know much about her, but the topic intrigues you so you resolve to be patient and see if the energy changes. You slouch a little further into your seat and skim through emails until the keynote wraps up. After what feels like an eternity, the speaker winds down and the MC brings back the energy with audience participation and the highly charged music returns. You adjust your posture as the MC announces the next speaker.

Julie’s posture is different from the moment she walks out. No slides appear behind her. She seems completely at ease as she scans the room and begins to tell a story about an experience she had six months ago at a conference just like this one. She expresses exactly how you felt this morning after the late-night networking and early morning call for caffeine. In short order, she makes you feel as if she knows how you are feeling at that exact moment.

From there, she seamlessly transitions into why certain strategy insights can reset the direction of managers just like you.

If you weren’t so engrossed in her talk, you might notice that you’ve shifted forward in your seat and begun to listen with a whole new level of attention. In fact, the whole audience looks rapt. She’s funny, witty, and at total ease with what she’s saying and what she wants you to get out of it. Julie’s not just a speaker; she’s a storyteller.

Instead of listing evidence to prove her point, she leads a room of 1,000 listeners on a journey to show why competitors are collaborating and what innovations she believes will change the marketplace. She weaves in industry examples and insights, but she never wavers from the journey. It’s clear where she wants to take you and, like every other listener in the room, you gladly go along for the ride.

Her presentation ends the way it started—back at the conference she attended six months ago. She takes a long pause, nails a closing tagline, and walks off the stage.

The lights come up, and everyone looks around. You overhear some audience members talking about the examples she shared and others talking about her. You can tell that others are thinking the same thing you are: it’s an interesting idea. It’s worth considering. Who in this room could make a difference in my business?

What you don’t hear is any mention of the CEO of the company who was the opening keynote speaker. His remarks were forgotten the moment they were spoken.

The speaker’s impact isn’t because she’s a well-paid professional speaker. It’s because Julie knows how to connect to people through storytelling. She’s a compelling communicator…and you will hear her name time and time again as her career advances.

There is a difference between a competent communicator and a compelling one. We don’t just look for the storytellers once a year at the industry conference. We hope for them in every meeting, on every conference call, and in the monthly town hall meetings.

Stories make information relevant, relatable, and applicable to what we do. They make it easier to pass along strategies and inspire others to get on board with changes or a new focus. And yes, we like to be entertained as we process all the information coming at us.

Storytelling is one of the oldest forms of communication known to mankind. Cavemen drew stories on walls; Egyptians depicted them in hieroglyphics. Before written history, cultures used stories to pass their customs from one generation to the next. Religious and political leaders have always used stories to build a following.

Stories are the common thread that link us to what has already happened and what is still to come. Stories throughout history have been able to make great things memorable. We remember that:

• Columbus sailed the ocean blue in 1492…and started American history.
• Santa Claus leveraged the nose of a reindeer…and delivered presents on a magical night.
• The tortoise outran the hare…and taught us that slow and steady wins the race.
• Martin Luther King pulled all of us into a dream…and we can still hear it today.
• Scarlet O’Hara told us to “Think about it Tomorrow”…and helped us see hope in devastation
• Rocky Balboa turned a boxing match…into a theme song for every physical challenge.

Through parables and fables, novels and ballads, all of us have learned lessons and shared them with others. Chances are you can trace many of your life values back to stories.

Yet somewhere along the way, communicators stopped using stories in business settings. That’s where our story picks up. As we did our research into the impact of storytelling in business settings, we were hit with a surprising truth: few business people use stories in their communications. Our research uncovered any number of reasons:

• Some say storytelling places a higher expectation on a communicator……(it does).
• Some question whether storytelling is appropriate in business……………….(it is).
• Most say telling stories requires animation and vulnerability………………….(it does).
• All say that storytelling has a clear pass/fail effect on a group…………………(it can).

Maybe that’s why it isn’t always easy to find great storytellers in the business world. Cultures that have storytellers lean heavily on them to set vision, drive influence, and empower others to bring their best talents forward. Our research participants thought that most storytellers are leaders. But the truth is, there are storytellers all over organizations. They just aren’t good at it yet. But they can be.

Storytelling starts with a basic concept. The role of communication is simple and difficult. Communication occurs when the speaker’s intentions connect to the listener’s needs and interests.

If you’ve ever presented to a distracted team or disenchanted audience, you understand the difficult part of communication. This is why most people aren’t likely to take the risk of adding storytelling to an already stressful situation.

Communicators understand the power of the listener, but they don’t always understand the interest. They’re told, “Be direct and get to the point,” and they take it to heart. It’s true that communication has to be clear, but our research shows that listeners also want those thoughts to connect to each other. They prefer thoughts to be woven together rather than listed point-by-point.

In our exploration of storytelling, the listener will be front and center because the more it is understood how others respond to communication the easier it is to deliver on those expectations.

At some point, you might wonder if storytelling is an art or a science. The truth is, it’s a little of both. In our workshops, we teach the science and structure of the storyline and we also teach the art of engagement—how to pull listeners in.

In the chapters ahead, you’ll read about both the art and the science of storytelling. You’ll also read insights from listeners about what makes information memorable and repeatable. You’ll read stories—of course!—about how managers and leaders have developed their storytelling skills over time.

But ultimately, I hope this book will inspire you and start you on your own journey to becoming a great storyteller.

Excerpt Ends. To learn the three-step formula to reach compelling communication, pre-order your copy of Storylines & Storytelling. Or, you can learn more about our Connecting Stories to Storylines program that introduces and coaches the fundamentals of a compelling storyline and a memorable story.

From Insights to Outcomes: Technologists as Reluctant Communicators

Within every company, there are influential communicators. And, they play a critical role in driving a company forward. They’re the ones who take ideas and turn them into concepts, they take concepts and create strategies, and they use strategies to drive actions and outcomes.  Historically, some of the most influential communicators come from marketing or product.  They could spin a tale and create energy behind ideas long before the company could see clear outcomes.

And while marketing folks are still building storylines, technology groups have emerged as owners of innovative thinking and are often the incubators of new directions in companies. But, unlike the marketing group, technologists are much more reluctant communicators. In fact, few of them have really thought about how to communicate their ideas and most have never been trained to develop a compelling story around an idea.

That’s a pretty big roadblock for moving ideas forward. And, it’s often why great ideas get stuck in R&D and major initiatives get sidelined. As we’ve worked with teams and witnessed buy-in around technology becoming stalled, poor communication is usually to blame.

There may be a few good communicators at the top of a technology organization, but they rarely have the bandwidth behind them to sell an idea up, down, and across an organization. And, that’s what it takes to build momentum behind ideas.

How can this be and why does it occur? We’ve observed three dynamics across technology teams that are often at the root of most communication challenges:

1. Technologists speak in jargon. Their day-to-day language is one of bits and bytes, not stories and analogies. So, when they think about communicating ideas, they approach conversations by talking through how things could happen rather than what should happen and why. This leads any listener into a barrage of details rather than outcomes. But, technologists work in details, and it isn’t easy to transition away from the details to communicate concepts and outcomes.

 

2. Leaders aren’t role models of compelling communication. There are certainly exceptions to that observation, but we rarely hear the CTO or CIO touted as the strongest communicator in the company. More often, technology leaders have communication styles similar to their teams. Many are also reluctant communicators. They go through the motion of sharing information, but they don’t always provide clarity and conviction behind a message. And, if they haven’t invested in improving their own communication impact, they aren’t likely to invest in developing it in others.

 

3. Tech employees can be siloed. Today, many organizations have integrated technology into every division and function across a company. But, some still have more siloed organizations. And, this allows technologists to spend most days just talking to technologists. So, if the expectations for communication are low, they don’t get much practice strengthening that muscle. Heads down in technology can prevent your technologists from experiencing compelling communicators and seeing the impact of compelling storylines across an organization.

So, how can you solve for any of these dynamics?

We work with many technology teams to strengthen communication expectations as well as to develop the skills of individuals. Here are three things that could raise the bar in your technology group:

Communication Roadmap – We have helped many teams develop a communication roadmap alongside a product roadmap. This ensures that the storyline develops in sync with the product plans and becomes as essential to the conversations as the technical steps themselves. It becomes a way that technologists talk about projects and how they share the project across an organization. It helps an initiative develop a brand and become a more common theme in meetings and conversations.

Storyline Methodology – Few technologists get training on how to build storylines or how to lead executive conversations. We’ve developed workshops that do both of these things. Organizing ideas well isn’t easy for anyone, but technologists especially need a methodology that transforms their details into a higher-level conversation. They can also learn to use stories to make data memorable and repeatable to any audience.

And ultimately, you have to develop a personal presence in each individual.

Personal Presence & Delivery – A compelling storyline will help your technologists get their point across, but their ability to influence people always comes down to their confidence and conviction with any group. And sometimes, it’s more difficult because the technology groups are global and there can be language barriers and dialects that hinder clear communication.

Presence matters, and it matters sooner than you may realize. As we work on leadership programs across companies, we see fewer technologists in the programs and we’re often told that this group has a different career path. They don’t want to be people managers or leaders, so they aren’t put on the same development path. And, that’s where some of the personal brand discussions and communication skills are developed. But, I would argue that they will all have to be communicators because they are driving the innovation and new direction in most companies.

These skills can’t wait. And, they shouldn’t have to.

Your reluctant communicators can become strong communicators, and that’s when the roadblocks seem to melt away. Insights can drive outcomes, and once that happens in a company, communication can be the greatest enabler in the organization.

Call us when you need us.

Could We Be Your Elf On The Shelf?

Have you ever wondered how we know what we know
How we can determine the choices that will help you to grow?
For thirty some years it’s been a big secret
It now can be shared if you promise to keep it!

First, we gather the facts from evaluation and review.
And, we take a keen interest in what your listeners say about you.
You should know when they sigh and when they stand up to clap
You should know how they describe every communication challenge and gap.
Are you driving results? Are your points succinct and clear?
Or, do you need to put influence on your goals for next year?

We gather perspective. It’s as if we’ve been sitting on your shelf.
And, it may be the right time to evaluate and invest in yourself!
Whether it’s style or content, we’re experts at heart!
We know communication, both the science and art.
But, we see common mistakes made each and every day
That prevent folks like you from making an impact with what you say.

If we could see you at work, would we like what we see?
Do you put in the time to make communication everything it should be?
Or, are you juggling too much? Are your meetings a mess;
Are you scattered in your thinking and dealing with project stress?

Are you always on devices? Do you type as you listen?
Is there a lack of response and non-verbal cues that you’re missing?
Would your listeners say: It’s more than day to day
They don’t hear points in your keynote or a clear the takeaway.
That sounds like a storyline and message development,
There’s nothing too complex that we can’t help you make relevant.

Communication can differ across every directive,
What is truly important is a dose of perspective.
Listen to the feedback, don’t put it back on the shelf.
You won’t become a master communicator by yourself.
This skill isn’t magic, it takes work and precious time.
But, it’s the best investment you can make with yourself and your dime.

And, that’s the secret that we promised to reveal
How do others get ahead and master this at will?
They have an SW&A coach, an elf that you don’t know
We work behind the scenes, so most don’t see us come and go.

We can help manage co-workers and pinpoint your stress
We can develop frameworks and untangle the meeting mess.
We can manage the nerves you feel in front of a crowd
And make sure your points are clear when you say them out loud.

Could you use an elf? A communication coach?
We’re up for the challenge with a tailored approach.
But Santa won’t bring us, you’ll have to let us know
So, hurry…don’t wait until another evaluation comes and goes.