January Articles 2012

The Articulate CEO

January

Qantas Finish 2011 A Winner – For All The Wrong Reasons!

The list that stops a nation – Australia’s Biggest PR Disasters of the Year – is out and in an unprecedented achievement, Qantas won three of the top 10 gaffes of 2011 when the list was released by social networking tracking site Cyber Chatter.

It’s never been done before and it is hard to see how anyone could ever do it again but, then again, Qantas is still with us and 2012 is a brand new year. Who would bet against them?

So, here it is, Australia’s Biggest PR Disasters of the Year together with links to news.com.au for anyone who missed the stories first time around.

Something For Everyone – The Barnum Effect

Ever wondered why people seem so easily conned by slick talkers? The answer may lie in a phenomenon known as the Barnum Effect.

The Barnum effect is the name given to a type of subjective validation in which a person finds personal meaning in statements that could apply to many people.

For example: You have a need for other people to like and admire you, and yet you tend to be critical of yourself. While you have some personality weaknesses you are generally able to compensate for them.

Are We Over Being Over-Connected?

The backlash against 24-hour connectivity is gathering pace around the world amid concerns that the lines between work-life and personal life are becoming more and more blurred.

Workers who find themselves answering work emails on their smartphones after the end of their shifts in Brazil can now qualify for overtime under a new law.

The new legislation was approved by President Dilma Rousseff last month and basically says company emails to workers are equivalent to orders given directly to the employee.

Editorials & Articles Archive

December 2011

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus

Merry Christmas readers and I hope the New Year brings you much joy and happiness. As you know, at Christmas time I like to do things a little differently when it comes to the Editorial and this year I am going to share with you another editorial that truly embodies the spirit of Christmas and went on to become one of the most famous and enduring ever written.

Francis P. Church’s editorial, “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus” first appeared in The New York Sun in 1897, more than a hundred years ago, and was reprinted annually until 1949 when the paper went out of business.

November 2011

PowerPoint & People Who Don’t Know What They Are Talking About

Welcome to the November Editorial. It has been a busy month of speaking – including a lot of time spent in the company of technical speakers with presentations on very weighty subjects. The upshot of that is I have spent the last month being constantly reminded of all of the mistakes people make while presenting and how that results in large portions of their audience losing the will to live!

Not that the presenters will take responsibility for the condition of their audience or even notice that their audience has a condition. The most common defense that you hear is that they are doing the best they can with what is essentially a very boring topic. Here is a newsflash for everyone: there are no boring topics – just boring people.

October 2011

OCCUPY – What Is It and Who Is It?

Welcome to October! That whistling sound you have been hearing all week is the world’s largest collective sigh of relief as 4,500,000 New Zealanders celebrate a Rugby World Cup victory. Congratulations to the All Blacks and congratulations to les Bleus who proved once again that past form is completely irrelevant when it comes to the French National Rugby Team.

This month I go swimming with sharks, examine the OCCUPY Movement and highlight a couple of observations about the biases that exist within mainstream media and government circles when it comes to statistics. What sort of bias you ask?

September 2011

The Rugby World Cup Opening Ceremony

It’s September, Editorial readers, and across Australia and New Zealand that translates into a massive sporting month with both AFL and NRL Grand Finals about to be played in Australia and a Rugby World Cup in full swing in New Zealand. So, what better time to look at aspects of communication that have played (and continue to play) a critical role in sporting success both on and off the field?

While, as always, I am happy to throw a few brickbats around where required let’s start with a bouquet for the Rugby World Cup Opening Ceremony, a quick list of what makes up the components of getting sporting messages across effectively and then we will finish with some amusing sporting communication stuff-ups from the guys responsible for its translation – the commentators.

August 2011

Alan Joyce – An Emperor With No Clothes

Greetings Editorial readers – it is time for a rant. I have been supplied with ample ammunition from the CEO of one of Australia’s largest company’s and obviously, as a result, will have to go in with all guns blazing.

What’s more, it is incendiary ammunition. It is the kind of corporate communication that makes me wonder how people get their jobs and how other people manage to keep them.

So let’s not keep you in suspense any longer shall we? Let’s go hunting… with Alan Joyce and Qantas firmly in the crosshairs!

July 2011

Global Warming, Animal Rights and The Wrong Argument

Good grief! Half the year has disappeared already and despite a huge flurry of activity we seem no closer to answering the big questions that plague us. Whether it be financial meltdown, global warming or spectacularly inclement weather we just can’t seem to arrive at any course of action that might help us out a little.

The United States is on the brink of default, Australia is on the brink of a carbon tax and poor old New Zealand just seems to be continuously on the brink.

All this continues to happen despite the fact that we, and our technology, are smarter than we have ever been.

June 2011

“It goes without saying … “

Welcome back Editorial readers! With last months’ apocalypse postponed until a date yet to be determined we can safely turn our attention back to the future. The earth continues to spin on its axis, Christchurch continues to shake and the business world continues to find new ways to make the meaningful meaningless. But rather than concentrate on the big picture let’s spend this month looking at the kinds of things that the little bloke has to deal with…

Namely, the ‘what the?’ moments. Those times when you wonder how the hell it came to this. Where did we go wrong and what can we do about it? How do we stop the miscommunication and misunderstandings that seem to be part and parcel of our daily lives?

This month the Editorial boldly goes where we all go everyday – except I will try to offer some words of advice and maybe even the odd solution. As we are about to find out part of the problem is that we think we have a better handle on things than we actually do and part of the problem is that we don’t realize how much we don’t have a handle on at all. I am going to offer two solutions. The first is simply a better understanding of some basic psychology and the second is Twitter.

May 2011

Harold Camping – Evangelist and Two-Time Predictor of the End of the World

Greetings Editorial readers and others who have survived the apocalypse. Once again the world has failed to end and the front row seats that my parents purchased for me 41 years ago are still only good for watching the banal day-to-day goings on of my own existence. How I crave the opportunity for a little excitement!

Still, on the plus side, the fact that we have all survived Harold Camping’s doomsday prediction without a tsunami, earthquake or meteor hitting the Earth does mean that we get to spend at least one more month looking at communication issues (successful or otherwise) and determining what can be learned from them. So let’s start with Harold Camping himself. Who is this clown and why did so many people believe his demented ravings? What is his connection with the demented ravings of Tiger Airways Australian Managing Director, Crawford Rix and why has NASA been lying to us about what they really photographed on the planet Mars.

April 2011

Learning Styles and Other Well Meaning Dribble

Welcome Editorial readers to the April edition. This month the holidays of Easter and Anzac Day are causing problems for bureaucrats on both sides of the Tasman. In New Zealand there is debate over whether the public should be given a day in lieu since one public holiday happens to fall on the other public holiday while in Australia there is debate over whether there is a need for a day in lieu since one public holiday happens to fall on the other public holiday. I know this sounds like the same debate but I have checked with the bureaucrats and they assure me that the situation is quite different.

The debate is further complicated by the fact that one of the public holidays also falls on a weekend, which necessitates a day in lieu in both countries. That means that you get Good Friday but not Saturday, Sunday but not Easter Sunday because it’s already Sunday which means you get Easter Monday except in Australia where Easter Monday is also Anzac Day which means you get Easter Tuesday instead of Easter Sunday. Easter Monday is also Anzac Day in New Zealand but you don’t get Easter Tuesday because you already have Easter Monday and consequently, technically, miss out on Easter Sunday.

March 2011

Commanders Intent – A Great Lesson

It’s not a good time to be a dictator is it? At least it’s not a good time to be a North African dictator – South American and Asian dictators are still finding life comparatively awesome. But if you are a dictator from countries such as Libya, Egypt or Bahrain then it’s a tenuous existence increasingly reliant on military power and your ability to figure out who is with you or against you. What better inspiration then for this months Editorial as we delve into the good, the bad and the ugly of things military and things truthful from a communication point of view.

Funnily enough even in this modern technological age of social media, virtual reality and remote warfare there are still some simple basic truths. In the immortal words of Muammar al-Gaddafi… “I am not such a dictator that I would shut down Facebook. I’ll merely imprison anyone who logs in to it.”

Cry havoc, Editorial readers, and let slip the dogs of war.

February 2011

Is Incompetence the New Black?

Greetings Editorial readers and, in particular, those of you reading in Egypt! What a momentous start to the year it has been. I love a good uprising and I find myself wishing for something similar a little closer to home. Here we are barely two months into the New Year and already we are seeing the same dribble that passes for world’s best practice being peddled by our most prominent corporates.

Whether it be Qantas having trouble keeping planes in the air, Virgin and Jet Star having trouble getting planes into the air or any number of companies that seem to have trouble plain doing anything corporate Australia has pissed off more people in 6 weeks than Hosni Mubarak managed in 30 years. At least Hosni ultimately had the good sense to go away – sadly we are going to have to put up with our tormentors for a good deal longer.

January 2011

Love in the Time of Tragedy

Welcome back to the Editorial for a brand new year! I hope that for most of you it has been a good start to the year but I am acutely aware that for many it has not.

The floods currently engulfing Queensland, Victoria and parts of New South Wales in Australia have had tragic consequences in terms of both loss of property and loss of life. So with that in mind The Editorial will depart from its normal direction and instead offer up an article I wrote that was published in The Punch and seemed to strike a chord here in Australia and overseas. If you have ever suffered any form of loss then I trust you will recognize the sentiment and perhaps the words may offer some small degree of comfort.

Brett Rutledge Editorial January/February 2012

Welcome to 2012 and the impending end of all things – at least that is what the Mayan Calendar, Nostradamus and my Great Aunt Elsie have been telling us is in store for 2012. To be fair, the meaning of the Mayan Calendar is in dispute, Nostradamus was a bit on the vague side and my Great Aunt Elsie could only come through with the letter ‘A’ at the séance (which I naturally interpreted as ‘Armageddon’). Either way the signs all point to imminent doom.

In preparation for the end of the world I have decided to lessen my workload somewhat and the Editorial will now be a bi-monthly publication. This is mostly due to the fact that the consulting I do has increased considerably and I will also be lecturing at Monash University this year. I know what you are thinking, Rutledge lecturing on communication at a university… the end is closer than we thought.

So, let’s start the year with a look at the sorts of communication evils that we can guarantee will be visited upon us no matter what happens regarding the fate of the Earth itself. After all, what if the ‘A’ from Great Aunt Elsie meant something else entirely? What if it was Uncle Buster trying to reach us from the grave instead? What if nothing changes and 2012 is much like every year before it?

Then we can expect this kind of nonsense…

Advertisers, Politicians and Weasly Words

To quote Robert Hendrickson (New York: Facts on File Publications, 1987). “Weasel words are words that suck all of the life out of the words next to them just as a weasel sucks an egg and leaves the shell.”

As such they are a favoured communication tool of advertisers and politicians alike. They cunningly give the impression of taking a firm position while avoiding commitment to any specific claim.

For example, advertisements tell us that certain products help or may help (prevent, stop or fight) this or that. A toothpaste helps fight tooth decay. A new drug may help relieve pain. Note that the ads do not say specifically what the product will or can do. The only weaker claim they could make would be that their products may or may not help this or that.

One of the greatest weasel words is ‘only.’ What is the difference between a car that is $19,000 and a car that is only $19,000? The latter sounds like you are getting a great deal. The word ‘only’ suggests that the price is low. Those special offers for a limited time only of only a limited supply imply that you better order now before it is too late. ‘Only’ can also suggest that a statistic is low. “Only half of all women who have been married one time say they would marry the same man if they had it to do over again, according to a new survey.” If that were true then only half would not marry the same man again.

‘Almost’ is almost as slippery as only. Some products promise almost miraculous cures or almost superhuman healing secrets. Others promise to almost instantly get your dishes virtually spot-free. In other words, the product will not get your dishes spot-free instantly.

Another favourite expression of advertisers is up to, as in “This pen lasts up to 20% longer.” The ad does not say that the pen will last 20% longer, but even if it did it still wouldn’t mean much since it doesn’t say longer than what.

What does it mean when a package of peanuts has the words 15% more on it? Who knows? Or what is being promised by an ad that says “Come on down and save up to 50 per cent.” Even if you save nothing you still save within the promised range. The ad says that the most you can save is 50%; it says nothing about the least you can save. In fact, it does not even say that you will actually save anything-although that is clearly the inference the advertiser hopes the buyer will make.

That is what weasel words do. They sound like they’re expressing something specific, but are they? They are, in short, ALL-NATURAL words that are CLINICALLY proven to be UP TO 15% better in POTENTIALLY HELPING you sound MORE effective than ALMOST all other words… I think.

Leaders, Managers and Business Insincerity

Blue sky thinking, pushing the envelope, going forward, adding value, reaching out, championing and sharing – the brainlessly upbeat language of the office isn’t going away in 2012 is it?

You know you are screwed when you start seeing people like David Beckham using the same kind of language used by the titans of business. When asked if he was going to be the England captain again after his triumph with Trinidad and Tobago in 2008, David Beckham came out with the gnomic reply “Going forward, who knows.” It seems that the less you have to say, the more likely you are to reach for a ‘going forward’ as a crutch. Politicians find it comforting for this reason. “We are going forward”, poor Hillary Clinton said just before the last, fatal democratic primary when it became indisputable that she was going nowhere of the kind.

That is the problem with a ‘going forward’ – it is nothing more than a verbal pause, a modern day ‘um’. It’s kind of a giveaway that you are not all that confident in what you are talking about.

Yet more annoying, however, is the new business insincerity. All around us is a phony upping of the emotional ante such as the e-mail sent by an extremely powerful person at JP Morgan encouraging his investment banking team to be more human. In it he said: “Take the time today to call a client and tell them you love them. They won’t forget you made the call.” I certainly wouldn’t forget it if I received that call. I’m not sure they would be getting quite the reaction they were after though.

And if love seems a bit out of place then maybe it is about time that we started questioning passion. Passion, says the dictionary, means a strong sexual desire or the suffering of Christ at the crucifixion. In other words it doesn’t really have an awful lot to do with a typical day in the office – unless things have gone horribly wrong. And yet passion is something that every employee must attest to in order to get through any selection process.

Is ‘passion’ really that necessary? Even to get a humble job in a call centre passion is required. One of the big banks is currently advertising for such workers saying, “we seek passionate customer service representatives to uphold our values.” Bollocks. What the bank is actually seeking is vaguely competent people somewhere the right side of brain-dead to follow instructions and answer the phones.

The biggest lie of all, however, in modern business speak is about ownership. In order to make it appear that there is a strong bond between customers and companies there is My e-Bay and My Optus Zoo and – apparently – Myer is my store. At the risk of being pedantic, I’d like to point out that it isn’t my store. It isn’t yours either. Neither is it even CEO Bernie Brookes’ Myer. The company belongs to its shareholders (most of whom are wishing it didn’t).

I don’t need to be loved nor do I need to believe I have a say in how things are run. I just need a few more companies to tell it like it is and do what they said they were going to do. What are the chances of that ‘going forward’?

What are you hoping for in 2012? Do you feel like your world ended quite some time ago and you have just been waiting for the obituary or does 2012 hold more promise for you. Whatever the case drop me a line and tell me how much you love me… or don’t. According to my Great Aunt Elsie it won’t make much difference.

The Articulate CEO’ is continuing in 2012 with a mix of podcasts, video and blog to highlight communication successes as well as mistakes in the business world and what we can do to learn from them. If there is anything you would like to see highlighted in terms of content then please let me know and I will do my best to address it for you.

December Articles 2011

The Articulate CEO

December

Clever Hans Phenomenon & The Origins of Non Verbal Communication

Ever wonder how the subject of non verbal communication ever came to our attention? The answer is Clever Hans Phenomenon and it dates back to the early 1890’s.

It refers to a form of involuntary and unconscious cuing that sometimes happens in communication and the story itself is about a horse who responded to questions requiring mathematical calculations by tapping his hoof. Sound familiar?

The Tiger Woods Effect & How Competition Can Backfire

I often talk about the ’symbolic’ channel of communication and how ofetn it can lead to results that we wouldn’t necessarily expect. One place where you think symbolism would do its intended job, however, is reward and recognition systems. After all recognising a brilliant employee should – in theory – be an inspiration to colleagues.

Unfortunately, due to the Tiger Woods Effect, this is not always the case. What is the Tiger Woods Effect I hear you ask?

Put simply, it means that someone at the top of their game can not only put off everyone else but can actually lead them to put in less effort.

Swearing Can Be Good For You!

If you have the misfortune to hit your thumb with a hammer then the best thing you can do to help cope with the pain is turn the air blue. That’s right, swearing can provide effective relief from pain – but only if you use it judiciously, according to research.

Experts found swearing helped people cope with pain in the short-term but the frequency of swearing played an important role.

Researchers at Keele University’s School of Psychology recruited 71 undergraduates who were asked to carry out a cold-water challenge while either repeating a swear word or a non-swear word.

Editorials & Articles Archive

Brett Rutledge Editorial December 2011

Merry Christmas readers and I hope the New Year brings you much joy and happiness. As you know, at Christmas time I like to do things a little differently when it comes to the Editorial and this year I am going to share with you another editorial that truly embodies the spirit of Christmas and went on to become one of the most famous and enduring ever written. Francis P. Church’s editorial, “Yes Virginia, There is a Santa Claus” first appeared in The New York Sun in 1897, more than a hundred years ago, and was reprinted annually until 1949 when the paper went out of business.

It was in response to a letter from a reader who was only 8 years old at the time and 36 years after her letter was printed, Virginia O’Hanlon recalled the events that prompted her to write:

“Quite naturally I believed in Santa Claus, for he had never disappointed me. But when less fortunate little boys and girls said there wasn’t any Santa Claus, I was filled with doubts. I asked my father, and he was a little evasive on the subject.”

“It was a habit in our family that whenever any doubts came up as to how to pronounce a word or some question of historical fact was in doubt, we wrote to the Question and Answer column in The Sun. Father would always say, ‘If you see it in The Sun, it’s so,’ and that settled the matter.”

” ‘Well, I’m just going to write The Sun and find out the real truth,’ I said to father.”

“He said, ‘Go ahead, Virginia. I’m sure The Sun will give you the right answer, as it always does.’ “

And so Virginia sat down and wrote her parents’ favourite newspaper. Her letter found its way into the hands of a veteran editor, Francis P. Church. Son of a Baptist minister, Church had covered the Civil War for The New York Times and had worked on The New York Sun for 20 years, more recently as an anonymous editorial writer. Church, a sardonic man, had for his personal motto, “Endeavour to clear your mind of cant.” When controversial subjects had to be tackled on the editorial page, especially those dealing with theology, the assignments were usually given to Church.

Now, he had in his hands a little girl’s letter on a most controversial matter, and he was burdened with the responsibility of answering it. “Is there a Santa Claus?” the childish scrawl in the letter asked. At once, Church knew that there was no avoiding the question. He must answer, and he must answer truthfully. And so he turned to his desk, and he began his reply which was to become one of the most memorable editorials in newspaper history.

Church married shortly after the editorial appeared. He died in April 1906, leaving no children.

Virginia O’Hanlon went on to graduate from Hunter College with a Bachelor of Arts degree at age 21. The following year she received her Master’s from Columbia, and in 1912 she began teaching in the New York City school system, later becoming a principal. After 47 years, she retired as an educator. Throughout her life she received a steady stream of mail about her Santa Claus letter, and to each reply she attached an attractive printed copy of the Church editorial. Virginia O’Hanlon Douglas died on May 13, 1971, at the age of 81, in a nursing home in Valatie, N.Y.

So here, in all its glory, is the original text of Francis P. Church grappling with one of the most poignant questions any adult can be asked by a child… “Is there a Santa Claus?” Merry Christmas!

Yes, Virginia, There is a Santa Claus

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:

Dear Editor,
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, “If you see it in The Sun, it’s so.” Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O’Hanlon

Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the scepticism of a sceptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men’s or children’s, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy.

Alas! How dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that’s no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You tear apart the baby’s rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! He lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.

The Articulate CEO’ is continuing in 2011 with a mix of podcasts, video and blog to highlight communication successes as well as mistakes in the business world and what we can do to learn from them. If there is anything you would like to see highlighted in terms of content then please let me know and I will do my best to address it for you.

November Articles 2011

The Articulate CEO

November

How To Deliver A Great Introduction

Introductions are so important that professional speakers usually provide their own. They know what it is like to be on the receiving end of a bad introduction – they spend the first ten minutes of their speech desperately trying to win their audience back.

The worst experiences are when you have provided an introduction but the MC (normally some bumbling employee because the organisation are yet to learn the value of a real MC) decides not to use it and instead provide their own moment of genius.

The Truth About Graphology – Another Communication Con

Graphology is the study of handwriting, especially when employed as a means of analyzing character and personality traits. The people who practise it will often claim to be handwriting experts. They are not.

Real handwriting experts are actually known as forensic document examiners, not as graphologists.

Forensic document examiners consider loops, dotted “i’s” and crossed “t’s,” letter spacing, slants, heights, ending strokes and so on. They examine handwriting to detect authenticity or forgery i.e. is that a real signature on a document?

Subliminal Messaging – You Can’t Hear What Ain’t There!

Let’s tackle an oldie but a goodie – subliminal messaging. Now to quickly put everyone in the picture the subliminal is below the liminal (the smallest detectable sensation).

Obviously anything truly below the level of detectable sensation could not, by definition, be perceived.

However, when people talk about subliminal messaging they generally mean messages that are below the threshold of conscious perception. There is a widespread belief, not strongly supported by empirical research, that without being aware of its presence or content, a person’s behavior can be significantly affected by subliminal messages.

Part II: The Myers Briggs Type Indicator – Does It Work?

In a word… no. Firstly, a common misconception about the MBTI is that helps determine the kinds of things that people will be good at by showing their aptitude. That way you can use it to figure out career and industry suitability in the workforce for example.

Unfortunately it doesn’t do that. What it actually does is try to show your preferences. So Myers-Briggs isn’t about figuring out your ability but rather determining your comfort zone.

It identifies the types of activities you’ll like and be most content with; not necessarily those at which you’ll be particularly good at.

Editorials & Articles Archive

Brett Rutledge Editorial November 2011

Welcome to the November Editorial. It has been a busy month of speaking – including a lot of time spent in the company of technical speakers with presentations on very weighty subjects. The upshot of that is I have spent the last month being constantly reminded of all of the mistakes people make while presenting and how that results in large portions of their audience losing the will to live!

Not that the presenters will take responsibility for the condition of their audience or even notice that their audience has a condition. The most common defense that you hear is that they are doing the best they can with what is essentially a very boring topic. Here is a newsflash for everyone: there are no boring topics – just boring people. Everything in the known universe is interesting but the explanations often leave a lot to be desired. That’s why you won’t find a child anywhere who doesn’t like learning but you will have no trouble finding kids who hate being taught.

So this month we are going to focus in on a couple of these heinous crimes against nature and explain how boring, incompetent people are sending us all to an early grave.

PowerPoint & People Who Don’t Know What They Are Talking About

For most people PowerPoint is not a presentation tool. For most people, PowerPoint is, in fact, a presentation planning tool. They use the templates provided as the basis for building their entire presentation and then rely heavily on those notes for their actual delivery. In other words they don’t know what they are talking about.

From an audiences point of view there is no presentation situation that necessitates PowerPoint so the fact that it is used so heavily says an awful lot about a presenter’s motives. Many will claim that they use it to make things more interesting or to make the presentation itself more effective. However, both science and your audience will tell you the same thing – it does neither. Science tells us that PowerPoint used in conjunction with a real live, talking, human being results in cognitive overload. This is a fancy scientific term to describe a situation where you can read or listen but you can’t do both. Therefore if you are using PowerPoint there is a strong likelihood that I will not listen to you. The more text that you put on the PowerPoint the more I have to read and the less opportunity to listen. I can also read faster than you can talk and am now annoyed that you are covering information that I already know.

The inevitable conclusion is that these text-heavy slides are not there for my benefit as an audience member because they make it almost impossible for me process the information being shared. Therefore they must be there for the speaker. If the speaker needs all that information on those slides then it must be because without them they couldn’t deliver the material. Therefore… they don’t know what they are talking about!

Experts Who Can’t Tell What Is Important

Another problem that occurs when you are presenting to an audience (particularly if it is on one of those technical subjects) is that the person presenting is an expert on their subject. Experts have great difficulty in articulating their expertise for two primary reasons:

1. As an expert you are not only knowledgeable but also enthusiastic about your subject. To you everything is important and you will often make the mistake of thinking your audience is as knowledgeable and enthusiastic as you are. They are not. Worse than this, of course, is that you have the best of intentions. You want to share your knowledge and help your audience. Because you think everything is important you will do this by sharing all the information at your disposal and try to be as thorough as you can. This inability to prioritise will leave your audience bored and confused.
2. As an expert you also tend to talk in abstracts. That is you use terms and phrases for which you understand the context and make the mistake of assuming everyone else understands the context. They don’t. If you want people to understand the importance of what you are talking about (particularly with technical subjects) it is vital that you explain yourself in terms of a context they already understand. Watch Stephen Hawking explain the intricacies of the universe and you will see what I mean.

Linear Thinking and Storytelling Don’t Mix

Presenters who tend to talk on technical subjects usually have fantastic stories to share. Unfortunately, they don’t normally bother to share their stories and instead bore everyone stupid with a long list of data, methodology and findings. Firstly, if you want to make a point and have it stick then use examples. Secondly, if you are going to use some examples and tell some stories then it is important to learn how to tell them. Get our attention by getting to the point rather than engaging in a linear exploration of chronological sequence. You are not writing a novel!

Basically it is about creating an information gap to fire our curiosity. Surprise us with an unusual outcome and we will then want to know how you got there. If you take your time building to that outcome you are likely to lose us along the way.

Seriously…get in touch

So, there are just a few of the things that have been getting on my wick lately. If you would like to explore any of these in more detail or want some feedback on a presentation you have coming up then please get in touch.

Remember there are no boring subjects – just boring people. See you next month.

The Articulate CEO’ is continuing in 2011 with a mix of podcasts, video and blog to highlight communication successes as well as mistakes in the business world and what we can do to learn from them. If there is anything you would like to see highlighted in terms of content then please let me know and I will do my best to address it for you.

October Articles 2011

The Articulate CEO

A CEO Who Is Anything But Grounded

On the 29th of October, Qantas CEO Alan Joyce announced that he was grounding all the aircraft in his airline in a bid to bring a protracted dispute with numerous unions representing Qantas workers to a head.

The dispute had resulted in ongoing industrial action that was costing the airline millions of dollars a day and despite so-called ongoing negotiations neither party seemed capable of moving towards a resolution.

So the day after the AGM the shock announcement is made that the airline has effectively shut up shop and left some 60,000 passengers around the world stranded.

The Myers Briggs Type Indicator – What Is It?

Based on Jungian psychology, the Myers-Briggs test is used all over the world, and is the single most popular psychometric system in the world. But is it a valid psychological tool or is it just another example of communication pseudoscience? This two-part blog will firstly examine exactly what this popular test is and, secondly, whether or not it actually works.

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, called MBTI for short, is a direct result of the work of the Swiss analytical psychologist Carl Jung. In 1921, Jung published his book Psychological Types, in which he laid out all of the concepts found in the MBTI, but he had them organized quite differently.

The Three Little Pigs in a World Gone Mad!

Remember the childhood story “The Three Little Pigs”? A classic tale complete with animals, action, and some life lessons about not taking the easiest route that, despite variations over the years, has always retained its core story. At least it had up until now.

Apparently a new version of the story is now appearing in US classrooms. In this new version, the wolf has a sudden heart attack while trying to blow down the third little pig’s adobe house.

Steve Jobs – So Close and Yet So Far

Most of the copy written about Steve Jobs since his death has been extremely positive with many hailing him as one of the world’s great communicators but much of this commentary is hubris and more an acknowledgement of his undoubted success than a realistic appraisal of his legacy as a communicator.

Poor Communication – Symptom or Disease?

Poor communication seems to come up an awful lot these days when people are discussing workplace issues or analysing the reasons behind various disasters. But is it really the culprit, or has some underlying problem caused the communication breakdown?

Editorials & Articles Archive

September Articles 2011

The Articulate CEO

Facebook – The Communication Tool That Can’t Communicate

Why is it that every major Facebook change seems to also be a major public relations disaster? With Mark Zuckerberg, the darling of mass media, considered some sort of business guru, you would think that there would be a little more thought that goes into the company’s approach to privacy, major user interface changes, and how those are communicated to the very people those changes affect.

Cultural Differences – The Power Distance Relationship

The final in our series on cross-cultural communication issues looks at the concept of ‘power distance’. Power distance refers to the way in which power is distributed and the extent to which the less powerful accept that power is distributed unequally. Put simply, people in some cultures accept a higher degree of unequally distributed power than do people in other cultures. When in a high power distance culture the relationship between bosses and subordinates is one of dependence. When in a low power distance society the relationship between bosses and subordiantes is one of interdependence.

Cultural Differences – The Past, Present, Future Conundrum

As we continue our blog series on issues of cross-cultural communication issues one of the most mystifying can be that of whether the culture has a past, present or future orientation.

It is an orientation that can shape every aspect of managerial behaviour and, when the orientations are not matched, the clashes are quite spectacular.

Past-oriented societies are concerned with traditional values and ways of doing things. Tradition is, in fact, highly valued and attempts to mess with that tradition are regarded with a lot of distrust and suspicion.

Cultural Differences – Individualism versus Collectivism

Continuing our series looking at issues of cross-cultural communication we are now going to turn our attention to the ideas of individualism and collectivism.

In individualist cultures, individual uniqueness and self-determination is valued. A person is all the more admirable if they are a “self-made man” or “makes up their own mind” or show initiative or work well independently.

Collectivist cultures, on the other hand, expect people to identify with and work well in groups which protect them in exchange for loyalty and compliance.

Editorials & Articles Archive

Brett Rutledge Editorial October 2011

Welcome to October! That whistling sound you have been hearing all week is the world’s largest collective sigh of relief as 4,500,000 New Zealanders celebrate a Rugby World Cup victory. Congratulations to the All Blacks and congratulations to les Bleus who proved once again that past form is completely irrelevant when it comes to the French National Rugby Team.

This month I go swimming with sharks, examine the OCCUPY Movement and highlight a couple of observations about the biases that exist within mainstream media and government circles when it comes to statistics. What sort of bias you ask? Well let me give you one example – the official rate of unemployment (commonly called the U-3) in the USA is about 10%. Sometimes though, we hear reference to the underemployment rate or the U-6 rate. The U-6 rate currently sits at 17.3%. This measure encompasses those individuals who desire more hours, are working below their skill set, or are discouraged and have exited the labor pool.

But the U-6 only includes short-term discouraged workers because the long-term discouraged workers ceased to exist in US government modeling in 1994. If you add those guys to the picture the unemployment rate in the US could be as high as 22%. This rate is known as the U-Have Got To Be Kidding! Sadly, however, I’m not. What is the correct rate? I have no idea. Welcome to the October Editorial and vive la revolution!

OCCUPY – What Is It and Who Is It?

In mid-2011, the Canadian-based group Adbusters Media Foundation proposed a peaceful occupation of Wall Street to protest corporate influence on democracy, address a growing disparity in wealth, and the absence of legal repercussions behind the recent global financial crisis. According to the senior editor of their magazine, “[they] basically floated the idea in mid-July into our [email list] and it was spontaneously taken up by all the people of the world, it just kind of snowballed from there.”

The ongoing series of demonstrations started in New York City in the Wall Street financial district. They are mainly protesting social and economic inequality, corporate greed, and the power and influence over government of corporations, particularly from the financial service sector, and of lobbyists. The participants’ slogan “We are the 99%” refers to the difference in wealth between the top 1% and the other citizens of the United States.

By October 9, similar demonstrations were either ongoing or had been held in 70 major cities and over 600 communities in the U.S. Internationally, other “Occupy” protests have occurred in over 900 cities worldwide. The participants themselves are very diverse including young and old, trades and professionals, unemployed and beneficiaries as well as political and social activists.

What is most interesting about the OCCUPY Movement is that it does not appear to have leaders. There are certainly organisers who facilitate the aims of the movement but no clear leaders as such. According to Fordham University communications professor Paul Levinson, the Occupy Wall Street and related movements represent a resurgence of direct democracy where people collectively make decisions for themselves without having elected leaders. This could mean that what we have here is the beginnings of a real revolution because if there is no head then how do you kill the beast? Watch this space – I don’t think this is going away and it taps into a real sense of frustration with our financial institutions and their regulation.

What If The Statistics Are The Lies?

One of my very first tasks when I joined the workforce was to explain to my boss, and then a client, why a piece of research that client had commissioned was fatally flawed in its methodology and the results therefore complete rubbish. As you can imagine, it was a fun meeting as I pointed out that the $100,000 they had spent with a well-known research firm had yielded a result that was about as flakey as a freeze-dried leper. I always considered this a kind of one-off event but the month of August made me question this.

As you all know my wife runs a little baby gift boutique by the name of ‘Tiny Polkadots’ that, since it opened 2 years ago, as always had month on month growth. That is it did until August. August was the first month that we did not get the growth we were used to. Fortunately, sanity was restored in September and October is already ahead. I was prepared to consider it a one-off until I saw an article in the paper that quoted statistics showing that retail sales grew in August. Why, I wondered, was our personal experience so different from the official position? It lead me to wonder about the so-called official position and what methodologies they employed to get to these outcomes. What I discovered, as I mentioned in the example used earlier, was that official statistics have a habit of only reporting what they feel like reporting. Methodologies are often arbitrarily changed – in the US for example the CPI (a primary measure for inflation) methodology has been changed in favour of a lower result at least twice in the last 20 or so years. In Australia the governments in every state reported decreased hospital waiting lists because the measure of what constituted a waiting list was changed. Real estate agents organisations regularly report on artificially enhanced auction clearance rates in Australia and New Zealand because they only include the auction results reported to them rather than the number of total auctions conducted.

Now before you conspiracy theorists out there get excited, I am not suggesting that our Governments or anyone else is trying to lie to us. Changes made to methodologies are often the result of attempts to improve accuracy and gaps in data are often more to do with practicalities than they are with subversion. However, it does serve as a reminder that we need to be open about the pro’s and con’s of the methodology used in deriving our statistics if we want people to trust our results.

Swimming With Sharks

I had a fantastic experience at the Melbourne Aquarium when I got to spend some time on the other side of the glass amongst the sea creatures. It was very professionally run and I had a great time watching sharks, manta rays, sea turtles and fish of all shapes and sizes swim around me for 15 minutes. I had such a great time that I was even willing to answer the little survey they sent to me afterwards. It was just 15 questions and because I had fun and was feeling kindly disposed towards them I thought I would share some feedback. The last question was “Do you have any suggestions as to how we can improve the Shark Walker experience?” I didn’t have any suggestions so I left the box blank and hit submit only to have an error message come up telling me I had to answer the last question. Because I didn’t have an answer I closed the window and gave up. Why do organisations do this? If the last question is really the one you want an answer to why bother with the first 14? If the answers to the first 14 questions are important to you, why risk losing that information by forcing people to answer a 15th? Why are surveys so poorly designed that they themselves often leave the customer with a negative impression of the experience they are being asked about.

Seriously…get in touch

Whomever you barrack for the best of luck in your sporting team and/or idols endeavors over the next month and I hope it is a successful one for you. Feel free to drop me a line to crow about your vicarious victories!.

See you next month.

The Articulate CEO’ is continuing in 2011 with a mix of podcasts, video and blog to highlight communication successes as well as mistakes in the business world and what we can do to learn from them. If there is anything you would like to see highlighted in terms of content then please let me know and I will do my best to address it for you.