Figuring It Out

by | Jan 5, 2015 | Learning

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What’s a great way to learn something new every day?

That’s the question I’m pursuing through this blog.

More specifically: through the practice of corporate communications, what are the best ways to delight customers, engage employees, wow shareholders and contribute to communities? And how will those approaches change and evolve over time?

One thing I’ve learned about learning is that it requires a good degree of humility. When you’ve reached a certain point in your career and your life, the expectation is that you know everything. Or that you should know everything. And be able to figure it out if you don’t.

After unsuccessfully giving something your best attempt, it takes courage and confidence to ask someone else for information, ideas or inspiration.

As advertising exec Court Crandall said in his TEDx Manhattan Beach talk in November, “as a creative person, your expertise is tied to your self concept.”

He talked about the growing gap between the world changing at an exponential rate and the human brain’s unchanging capacity (Stanford’s Carol Dweck might beg to differ with her concept of a growth mindset, but that’s the subject of a different post).

Court’s solution? Focus on learning, and turn each day into a paid internship. Hey, it worked for Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn in The Internship, right?

But Court is on to something. In today’s world, no one has all the answers. Everyone comes to the table with different information, different ideas and different perspectives. It’s in the melding and shaping of those ideas that diamonds are formed from the crushing pressure of the business world.

Drawing on Socrates, Court advocates being a great facilitator – asking good questions, listening to ideas and embarking on a collective quest for knowledge.

John D. Wagner described this in a humorous piece for The New York Times, Learning a Foreign Language Called Public Relations.

A writer with an M.F.A. in poetry, he was surprised to land a senior role in corporate communications at a startup. “I spent each workday in full wing-it mode,” he began.

Yet he mastered the art of corporate improv – taking what was thrown at him and pivoting toward a brilliant yet simple solution, time after time. He asked great questions and acted with common sense. And when the startup crashed, he realized he’d learned to tell meaningful stories that motivated people.

And that master storytelling is one of the important things that corporate communications is all about.

It reminded me of a recent conversation with Smooch Reynolds, a luminary I met early in my career as a communicator. She was describing the importance of being able to navigate an FIO environment.

Because that’s what we’re all doing every day – figuring it out.

Leading Communications

by | Jan 1, 2015 | Leadership

“Every human advancement or reversal can be understood through communication.”

These words greeted and inspired me two nights a week two decades ago as I worked on my M.A. in communications management.

They were the opening of Ambassador Walter H. Annenberg’s mission statement at the USC Annenberg School for Journalism and Communication.

And his words could not be more true today.

Without communication, has anything actually happened?

It reminds me of the brain-bending question, “if a tree falls in the forest, but no one hears it, does it make a sound?”

The corollary?

If a company or a person does something great but no one knows about it, does it really matter?

Could be a game-changing product, a life-changing customer experience or an awe-inspiring place to work. If others don’t know about it, that company or person won’t reach its full potential.

That’s the power of communication. And that’s what I’m excited to explore in this blog.

Because once we’re done with our formal education, we begin the lifelong journey of learning something new every day. (Or sometimes every moment, depending on how fast your life, industry or company moves.)

And there are three themes I’ll explore in this blog.

Leading the function. What does it mean to lead a corporate communications function today – and tomorrow? What kinds of people should you hire and how should you help them develop? How should you structure and lead your team? How should you change and grow your team and the function over time?

Leading the field. How will you contribute to the body of knowledge in corporate communications? What experiments can you conduct in your organization to improve the best practices in communications? How can you innovate with your unique challenges and opportunities?

Leading the future. What are the ways you can create a compelling future – for your organization, your team and yourself – through the creative and innovative practice of communications? How can you not just survive constant change but genuinely thrive and create a better world?

Many successful bloggers have inspired me in this journey. Who all say, in one way or another, “just start.”

And isn’t that true of any important endeavor? Just start.

A speaker at TEDx Manhattan Beach also inspired me this fall. Travel writer David Hochman shared his adventure in the Omo Valley as a metaphor for his life’s mantra, “why not me?”

He described the physical manifestation of his mindset as a “thumb slam” – slamming against the “send” key in act of boldness.

So here’s my opening thumb slam!