Entries Tagged 'Communication' ↓

Building Your “Idea” Story

In part 1 of 5 we covered the basis of producing a solid idea that will gain traction. Once you’ve received the support needed to get to the next round, you’ll need to frame your idea with a strong story. At this point, you need to give your target audience something to remember and talk about. It needs to stick and forming your pitch around a story is the best way on how to do this.

People don’t get excited about figures, facts, and statistics, even though it is still an essential pillar for your idea. What people will embrace after your pitch is the story that explains the facts and the situation you’re trying to improve. Therefore, the narrative must be simple and compelling. Let’s take a look at a quick guide to help you.

• Intuitive – This means that your idea needs to connect with the audience according to their view of the world. It needs to make sense to them and not question their belief system. Be smart by stepping into their world with your idea not having them step into your world with your idea.
• Feel Good – No one wants to listen to an idea that makes them feel bad about themselves or question the morals of society. Make the audience feel good about the decision to adopt your idea. Build on aspects of the environment, society, improving life, and helping to reduce problems socially or economically.

“When you’re trying to sell somebody a new idea, you must persuade them that the idea confirms their own opinions, rather than proves them wrong.” Author Seth Godin

Let’s now take look at some examples to clarify this important step in gaining traction. One of the best ways to build a story is to tie it to current events, corporate issues, or benchmarks from successful companies. Let’s assume your firm just lost a huge customer, chances are that the Sales Department is worried about a larger spill of clients (their world-view). You should come in with an idea that directly addresses the situation to retain and build loyalty among existing and potential customers. Furthermore, if a competitor launched a successful product and your company has better technology, your idea should show how your firm can leap frog the competition by returning to their roots of technology to devise a new and improved product.

In part 3 of our 5 series post will get into the meat of the decision maker. I’ll explain how to map your idea and motivate the decision maker to take action. Please provide any comments, suggestions, and/or feedback in the written comments below.

Introduction & Idea Creation

We all have ideas, some more than others. Yet, we struggle with getting them implemented, discussed, or even heard. The corporate environment is no different than pitching to your friends; in fact it’s even harder. If you’re successful you’ll be able to kick start your career into overdrive. It takes patience and support to move your way to the decision makers and sway them in your favor. The key elements require support from your boss, a financial king pin, and a decision-maker that’s at the executive level. So if you’re in the market of pitching your ideas to corporate America, continue reading for some useful advice.

Let’s first review what you’ll need to get started:

• Time: Between 2 weeks and several months
• Focus: Your brain on caffeine overdose
• Whiteboard: In your cubicle to plan out your idea in plain sight
• Trusted Colleague: Someone to keep you from fantasizing
• Allies: Start lobbying and wooing your superiors to form trust
• Humility: Your idea will suck, yes you! Learn from criticism.

Step 1 of 5: Find a connection between you and your idea

Selling an idea is not like selling a product. Selling a product is easier because people can see what they’re buying. With an idea, no one knows what they’re getting into. To sell an idea you need someone to believe in you, trust you, and know that you can get the job done. I usually have a lot of ideas, some that never would go anywhere and some that could be the next big thing. The ideas that gain traction are the ones that will match your track record, or status of credibility. If you said you can make the next Google and you work in Healthcare and never programmed a day in your life, but yet, you know how to do it; people will laugh in your face. If you just graduated MIT with a Masters in Computer Science and you suggest the same idea, you’ll get people to listen, and listen closely. Get the picture?

You have relatively three avenues to choose from if your idea requires executive level traction.

1. Explain your idea to someone you trust and farther up the corporate ladder. This in my opinion is risky, but makes the most impact. The reason you take a risk is that once it leaves your hands you no longer “own” the idea. Don’t be surprised if executive level loves the idea but has no clue you were behind it all. When it comes to using supports higher up in the chain they have motives and E-level management wants the idea not the person thinking about it, they’ll put their own team in place that they trust. Weigh the risks, if your idea is “a big idea” this is ultimately the only path.
2. Match your idea to your credibility and make it so that you’re in charge because only you can make it happen. This requires less out of the box thinking because you need to be more realistic with your idea. Leave the corporate strategy to the big dogs; focus on plans to climb one rung at a time.
3. Shut up, you’re idea sucks, get back to work and focus on doing your job. Once you build a track record of achievements then think about pitching some of your ideas and you’ll get some casual ears to listen.

This concludes part 1. In the next post will get into the actual discussions with upper management and how to frame your position with strong story telling. Please respond in the comments with any feedback on part 1.

More often than not, communication with upper management or executives involves multiple emails. Time is limited and if the point isn’t made concisely it will be buried with the other 100 emails that never get read. If you’ve got ideas for improvements or critical situations it’s easy to have your boss hear you out. Dealing with the “big dogs” you need to know the difference between the right way and the wrong way to send an email. If you’re successful, you’ll get your point across fairly quickly. Let’s digest the structure of an email to properly communicate a message within the corporate hierarchy.

Subject Line: Since this is the first part anyone will read it needs to be engaging. Dull, boring, and non-descriptive subject lines lead people to think that your message is not important. Call attention to your email by making it relevant to the job description of the person. This way when they read it, they’ll see the value and open the email to respond.

Introduction: There are couple ways people write introductions. Sometimes they go off on tangents explaining a complete back story, other times they just don’t get to the meat of the point and end up diluting the subject line. The most effective introduction starts by stating the problem or situation that follows the subject line. Be consistent and quick to the point otherwise the rest of the email will not be read.

Purpose: The purpose should follow the introduction sentence. Once you get the problem stated you need to inform the reader why this is happening. If the purpose is buried at the bottom then the whole email won’t make sense till the end. The purpose should end your first paragraph and transition into the supporting facts.

Support: Refrain from giving your opinion at this point. The person could careless why you think this is an issue or problem, rather use the context of business to state your support. It’s best to use bullet statements for supporting your stance. Too many paragraphs and words will signal overload. Provide your valid points to show you did your homework and weren’t just sending a complaint email.

Close: If you want action or a response to your well constructed email you need to close it properly. First, anticipate and/or answer any possible questions that may arise. Cover all grounds so that the person you sent it to doesn’t have to respond with a lengthy email. A simple “Ok” will suffice since you did the due diligence and presented the results clearly. If you close it as an action item or leave the ball in their court, expect to be waiting for a response. At the least, lay the groundwork for a follow up phone call or meeting.

Signature: If the message is to someone very important you need to make it personal. Ignore the static signature that’s sent with all the other mundane emails you produce. End it with a nice close and show that you signed off on the email rather than your stored signature.

These tips will help you write more effective emails. Body language and non-verbal communication is important for developing your interpersonal skills. Written communication is important for developing your personality and character within a corporate environment. So next time you need to get to the top, start at the bottom with the proper email etiquette. I welcome your comments below and any additional tips I may have missed. Let’s all contribute to what a “Killer” email should be.