Today’s Tuesday Reading is from Marion Groh Marquardt, Associate Director of Web Services at Stanford University and a MOR program alum. Marion may be reached at [email protected] or via LinkedIn.
You know how it is sometimes: we’re so focused on what we want to communicate that we overlook the crucial visual and emotional threads that can make our messages resonate and stick. A couple of years ago, I learned a gem of a framework: “Know – Feel – Do.” It’s a mantra I run through before hitting send on important emails. I’ve found it invaluable for crafting impactful messages, especially with my team, and it’s what I want to share in this message. Essentially, the framework encourages me to slow down and ask myself:
- What do I want them to know?
- What do I want them to feel?
- What do I want them to do?
If you’re anything like me, you dive straight into the “Know” part, eager to share important information clearly and efficiently. What do I want them to do? The answer usually comes quickly (if I take a moment to ask myself), and I can easily make the call to action explicit. However, the real transformation happens when I consider how I want them to feel. An insight often attributed to Maya Angelou: “People will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.” Our professional lives are no exception. Maybe my tone needs tweaking: maybe in the rush to get this information out, I’m coming off as curt and haven’t acknowledged the burden this message places on their workload. Perhaps I can incorporate more context to help situate the work and reduce ambiguity. Or maybe I can assuage some fears by referencing some of the considerations that have gone into this decision and some of the work already in motion.
My team uses a third-party tool for its internal knowledge base. In their most recent newsletter, the vendor discussed treating one’s knowledge base like a community garden. “This means everyone contributes where they can, and you schedule regular moments for small maintenance tasks.” Boom. Just like that, in two short sentences, we get it. We don’t need a lengthy best practices manual; we can visualize what tending to that knowledge base looks like. That was the other lightbulb moment around communications for me: the power of visuals and metaphors (side note: Dan Roam’s Blah Blah Blah: What to Do When Words Don’t Work is an excellent book on this topic).
From my MOR workshop on neuroplasticity, I remember the image of deep tractor tracks to illustrate how difficult it can be to change habits. I can still see it in my mind. And even though it was mentioned months ago, I also vividly recall a MOR cohort peer’s metaphor about not taking down a fence without knowing why it was there in the first place. Such is the power of images.
All day, we collaborate with people who don’t share our technical domains of expertise; those people bring their own set of emotions about technology to the table. Some feel uncomfortable and incompetent when faced with technical conversations; others feel frustrated and distrustful. In my experience, metaphors are the magic tool to cut through the jargon and through those apprehensions and get us to a real collaborative conversation. Visual metaphors are like bridges to unlock understanding – and collaboration.
Next time you’re tasked with an important communication, I encourage you to give Know-Feel-Do a whirl. And in your next planning session, consider what visual metaphor might get your important point across.
Last week, we asked what most gets in the way of balancing thinking and applying:
- 43% said not having sufficient time to think
- 30% said not having a prioritization process
- 27% said not having a future vision
So often, the immediate needs of the day crowd out the longer-term important work we want and need to do as leaders. If we’re not careful we can become so busy doing that we don’t get on the balcony to see if we’re doing the right things. Sufficient time to think is critical for our long-term success as leaders. What can you do to be intentional between now and the end of this year to set aside the time you need to think strategically? It will be time well spent.