Setting partisan politics aside, one has to acknowledge that Colin Powell made a profound and memorable statement Sunday. What struck me as I listened to it was that he followed the SUCCES(s) principles set forth by authors Chip and Dan Heath in Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die (one of my all-time favorite business books). I review a ton of business books, and sometimes it’s hard to see their relevance. That’s why I decided to revisit the book and demonstrate how it applied in Powell’s talk.
Powell’s statement last week was political and had nothing to do with business. I highlight it, however, because if I were going to give a speech that was intended to sway people who were undecided or even adamantly against a proposition I was making, I would model it after Powell’s statement.
The Made to Stick authors focus on six key principles that make an idea “sticky”:
- Simple: Make your message basic and profound.
- Unexpected: Capture your audience’s attention by doing something unexpected.
- Concrete: Avoid abstract ideas.
- Credible: Make sure you have support and data so that people will trust your authority.
- Emotional: Get your audience to care.
- Stories: Tell the right stories so that your ideas sink in.
Powell nailed them all–and gets a 10.0 for sticking the landing. To view his speech, you can click here.
- Simple: “I’m supporting Sen. Obama.”
- Unexpected: He stepped across party lines to do so.
- Concrete: He stated several clear, easy-to-grasp reasons for making his statement. Some were extremely simple and completely unexpected, like the following. “Is there something wrong with being a Muslim in this country? The answer’s no, that’s not America. Is there something wrong with some 7-year-old Muslim-American kid believing that he or she could be president?” Well, now that you put it that way . . . of course not.
- Credible: He’s Colin Powell. Whether you disagreed with his support of the war or other positions in the past, or you now disagree with his endorsement of Obama, we can all agree that he earned our respect long before he went on camera Sunday. Had he been a Hollywood actor or a local politician, that same statement would not have held as much weight.
- Emotional: I shed a tear when he spoke about Kareem Rashad Sultan Khan’s mother grieving at his grave. He struck my mom chord and got my full attention.
- Stories: He explained his change of heart by not only telling Khan’s mother’s story. He also gave us a visual reference by describing the photograph that moved him to support Obama.
It’s not likely we will ever be giving our own statements of national importance, but these are all factors we can try to emulate in our everyday attempts to get our ideas to “stick.”
Top Shelf Bottom Line: If you haven’t read Made to Stick, I highly recommend it, as being an entrepreneur means you are in the business of peddling ideas. This means we have to sell them. And it’s easier to do that when we can make them stick.
This entry was posted on Thursday, October 23rd, 2008 at 5:50 pm and is filed under Nonfiction. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.4 Responses to “How to Make a Statement ‘Stick’”
Leave a Reply
October 26th, 2008 at 9:58 am
Great analysis. This book will be on my books-to-buy-and-read list.
October 29th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Thanks for the review. I have been meaning to read that book for a while now. I’m now on my top 10 books to read, so maybe within a few months I’ll read it. But, for now I have your review to give me insight.
Powell made a big mistake, forget the war, the last thing the economy needs right now is to expand.
November 4th, 2008 at 6:20 am
Diane
I met you last weekend at Christy’s party. Looked up your article on how Colin Powell’s endorsement of Obama met the SUCCES attributes –
http://topshelf.entrepreneur.com/2008/10/23/how-to-make-a-statement-stick/. Nicely done!
Dan
April 15th, 2009 at 6:48 am
Hey, nice tips. I’ll buy a bottle of beer to the person from that chat who told me to visit your site