The Leader's Voice
Boyd Clarke and Ron Crossland

The Big Idea:
Every leader has, at one time or another made these four fatal assumptions:
Assuming constituents have understood the message;
Assuming constituents agree to the message;
Assuming constituents care about the message;
Assuming constituents will act accordingly.
We are only human, and leaders sometimes assume the message has gotten through and communication has taken place. More often than not, there is a breakdown. Whether others may tailor the message to suit their own personal agendas or are feeling disconnected, as almost half of working Americans feel towards their company or organization, this book focuses on how individual leaders can achieve results through big ideas involving creating better strategic alignment, greater credibility, and clarity.

Beginning with the big idea at the end: Our forefathers were farmers. Our fathers were industrialists and builders. Today we are information providers. The golden age of talent has come. Leaders who lack the knowledge and communication skills, those who cannot balance facts with human emotion, and significance in symbols, will lead their companies into a blind alley. For the foreseeable future, information will be the business resource and innovation the work.

The Leader's Voice Model: The most effective communicators use three essential channels to convey important leadership messages to overcome the four fatal assumptions. These channels are the Factual, Emotional and Symbolic.
To develop your leader's voice you need to gain clarity in these areas as well: Authenticity:
Who am I as a leader? What drives me? What do I truly believe?
Foresight: What is our vision/brand identity? Where will our strategic direction take us? What kind of organization do we want to be?
Connection: How do I get through the fog? How do I create more meaningful conversations? How do I communicate publicly and privately?
Context: What is required of me now? How will market forces, politics, current trends impact our company?

Our brains are hardwired for facts, emotions, and symbols: By not using facts, emotions, and symbols in their communication, leaders leave out essential ingredients that stimulate and promote the transfer of meaning and quality decision making. Thanks to a strange construction accident and its hapless victim, Phineas Gage, doctors in 1848 first discovered how the brain works. Phineas' accident (a rod had gone through his head) had altered his behavior. The breakthrough was that one part of our brain, which contains logical thinking, and its other parts - the ones controlling emotions and meanings - are all affected and cannot work properly without each other. It is the leader's responsibility to practice speaking to constituents with all the necessary ingredients for eloquence: a balance of factual data, emotive words from the heart that reach out to people, and stories with rich symbolic meaning.
How TNT found Drama: In 1988, Ted Turner launched TNT and filled it with all kinds of programs: from Westerns and classic MGM films, to World championship wrestling, NFL, NBA, and the Winter Olympics. By 2000, TNT was in more than 80 million homes or 97% of American homes with cable or satellite TV. The problem was that audiences never knew what to expect. It did not have a strong brand concept. When you said MTV people knew it meant music. When you said ESPN, people knew it meant sports. With TNT, audiences could only leave a question mark. TNT was a hodge-podge of different things all competing for viewer’s attention. Under Steve Koonin's leadership and good communication instinct, TNT achieved a successful repositioning and new brand image as strong as MTV and other networks whose content you could sum up in one word: i.e. music = MTV. Drama = TNT. The story proves how important it is to communicate in facts, emotions, and symbols.

People love facts, but with facts alone a leader cannot persuade nor inspire. Facts can be misrepresented, distorted, and used to support dubious conclusions. Business leader often communicate facts and presume others will share their interpretation. Some facts obscure the truth. Remember some facts are difficult to believe, false, twisted and whitewashed. Some facts can be interpreted differently or ignored. Metaphors and colour help make communication memorable. Use words or word pictures. Use catchy and original phrases. Display the facts in a graphic way. They must be accurate, clear, and be able to support your interpretation. A graphic should be simple enough to be understood by the average high school student. Constituents will interpret the facts and combine them with their own emotions and symbols to create meaning. A leader who knows how to use facts is powerful. Good factual communication builds trust and confidence.

Tune into Emotions: We follow leaders because of how they make us feel. A great leader can articulate the unspoken dreams and desires of his or her constituents. The best leaders broadcast their message on different levels: Feelings - Anita Roddick pushed her company to do "business with a conscience". The Body Shop is well known for its stand on environmental issues and women's rights. Hillary Rodham Clinton popularized her "It takes a village" concept to constituents, spreading the idea of a community helping raise children. Amazon.com's Jeff Bezos began the 2000 letter to the shareholders with "Ouch. It's been a brutal year." People appreciate honest, direct, and simple communication from their leaders.
Power - Leaders help constituents find their own power. If a leader has great faith in people, she can fan the flames of support in them.
Encouragement - Good leaders communicate praise and let their employees know when they've done a great job. People appreciate a sincere "thank you" more than the perks or bonuses. People need to know that their work matters.
Hope and Optimism - Leaders who communicate optimism rather than promoting negative feelings in their constituents are the ones who will succeed in winning hearts and minds. Inspiration is more important; avoid reminding staff they are behind.
Pure energy - Good leaders have boundless energy and a lot of passion for their work. It doesn't mean you have to be vocal all the time. A soft-spoken leader may inspire through an untiring work ethic, commitment, and continuous actions that bring the company to success.
Empathy - Empathy is the ability to notice and make distinctions among individuals' moods, temperaments, motivations, and intentions. Empathy requires active listening. Ask for the facts, listen to the emotions and confirm how others feel, and pay attention to the symbols they use. Constituents resent leaders who do not listen to them.

Symbols: Rabbit's foot and rosary - Symbols are the shortcuts to the great truths that guide our lives. From Louis Vuitton's stylized text to the famous golden arches of McDonald's, symbols are the corporation's communication vehicles with which brand identity is fostered. Graphic designers’ prototype symbols when they are creating logos and developing brand collateral. They produce several prototypes before honing in on the best design. The final choice is evaluated by its impact, color, scale, feeling, application across mediums, and other features.
Immersing oneself into a single subject is another prototyping process. Talk to experts. Live the subject. Many of the best communicators have a lifelong reading habit. They are constantly in conversation with interesting people from outside their area of business. Read to expand your mind and go out and meet new people. An idea will come to you after you take a fresh look at things. If you have to work hard to explain a symbol, then it's not an effective symbol.
Another form of symbolism is the art of storytelling. Stories in a company culture are passed on with pride and build a rich history. Be the kind of leader that tells inspiring stories and moves people toward working for a greater purpose.

The Three Levels of Communication: Leaders move from the social, significant, to the intimate levels of communication in order to reach their constituents. The social level is purely surface and helps people find common ground. The significant level is where we talk about priorities, politics, religion, or business strategy. Constituents align themselves with leaders who state clearly what they truly and deeply believe. Leaders are expected to discuss issues that others often avoid. Intimate communication is the deepest level reserved for spouses, family, friends, and deities. It is characterized by vulnerability, openness, and trust.

Speaking with One Voice: Every organization has a destiny: a deep purpose that expresses that organization's reason for existence. The leaders must communicate the same "destiny" and deeper purpose in order to speak with One Voice. Send Comment » | Read Comments »