THE ART OF THE ONE-PAGER

You would think that a society consumed with 140 characters and all types of texting abbreviations would have mastered succinct-ness.

Not so much.

Ever sat through PowerPoint presentations  that drone on and on and on?  Or suffered through meetings that, somehow, misplaced their agenda?   And waded through mounds of non-legal documents to try to uncover the one or two salient points needed to move the project ahead?

It is difficult, we admit, to filter all the information from our inboxes, our business conversations, our RSSs, our regular subscriptions, our podcasts and vodcasts (not to mention the drive-time radio) into one compelling message or outcome for our latest work project. 

Numbers are proof of our lives’ (and our thinking) complexity.   For instance:  Every two days more information is created than between the dawn of civilization and 2003.  

When that happens to us, we resort to diagrams and drawing.  And dumping our minds and insights on one (and only one) 8 1/2 by 11 sheet of paper.  Now, we’re not talking “drawing” in terms of Michelangelo, but rather in the use of shapes and figures similar to what we did in grade school.  In fact, anyone – even without a design bone in their pinky – can produce a one-pager.

Where to start:  Ask yourself about the end of your project, what you want to accomplish.  The results, in short.  Begin with a picture (in stick figures, if you’d like) of the “end.”  What will the company do differently?  Your team?  Other audiences?  What will the impact(s) be on all these varying groups and sectors and industries?

Those musings, we suspect, can be captured in a few bullets or phrases. 

Then, track back to the beginning and plot your progress. Like Monopoly, you’ll need to begin at “go,” what consultants call “current state.”   Select circles or arrows or any two-sided shape to show the two or three previous phases that need to occur before arriving at desired results.  Insert, again, a few bullet points for each shape.  Expect to explain only enough to have readers/viewers/listeners understand your journey.  And applaud.

AN Rx FOR DISTRACTION-ITIS

Everyone these days has some form of the distraction disease. 

It’s manifested through multi-tasking, reminders to “be in the moment,” and marked (or disguised) inattention to directions.  It’s further demonstrated by our focus on all the wrong syllables and cloud-thinking while in the midst of other activities. 

Before you bristle and say “that’s not me,” answer a few questions:

• How many times have you checked text or email while idling at a stoplight?
• Do you ever turn off, shut down, or otherwise ignore your constant e-companion … or not answer your cell?
• How often do you wake up from a sound sleep to capture an idea – yes, on paper – at your bedside?

Yeah, you got it:  Distraction-it is.  As do we.  What’s more, our attention span for even leisurely reading or movie watching tends to get shorter and shorter.

To be honest, it’s really not our problem.  Just the issue of those colleagues who insist on conducting long meetings and require that way-too-lengthy documents be absorbed.

For those managers, we have the panacea:  Serializing.  Or breaking up subject matters into discrete information chunks that we can digest while (okay) completing other tasks.  Charles Dickens wrote and published his novels in magazines, chapter by chapter.  Soap operas and TV sitcoms/rom coms and dramas are, in essence, video serials; we tune in to our weekly 30- or 60-minute fix of Mad Men, Modern Family, and the erudite Masterpiece Theatre, among other sequential stories. 

All hold our attention, captivate it even.  Water cooler talk swirls around Lord Grantham’s valet Mr. Bates and his “imprison-hood,” or if the HBO series Luck with Dustin Hoffman as ”Ace” Bernstein will ever return. 

Why not, then, embrace the serial?  A story told well will resonate – and, at least, be remembered.  New hires would have access to the series’ “bible” that lists facts and figures, introduces protagonists and antagonists for consistency.  It’s available in any medium.  [Obviously, the shorter, the better.]  It could feature a prequel, a sequel, and, in years to come, revivals.  It spotlights distinctive personalities to care about.  Installments make easy engagements – and cliffhangers, compelling. 

Compared to the daily deluge of emails and PowerPoints and conference calls and meetings, we’d welcome these words:  “Please sir, I want some more.”   

HAPPINESS @ WORK

We’re confused.

When it comes to assessing employee engagement or “contentment,” every consultancy offers a different measure.

One claims it’s about having a best friend (among other factors).  Some point to the amount of discretionary effort workers exert – willingly.  “It’s all about the manager-employee relationship, in part, how well your boss supports you,” say a number of other experts.  At its extreme, happiness can be translated, simply, into higher pay and company-sponsored outings.  [That was the solution for Foxconn, the Taiwanese contract manufacturer that experienced worker suicides not so long ago.]

Then there’s the constant dialogue about the differences between generations – surveyed Millennials, for example, rated their managers more highly than Boomers did – among diverse populations, and in different geographies.

It’s no wonder that work happiness is under discussion.

Our point of view (and you know we have one):  Friend after friend, story upon story tells us that meaningful and self-empowered work makes the difference in productivity and engagement.  No, it’s not a statistically significant study.  On the other hand, these anecdotes are very personal and very powerful.  Listen to the comments:

“I quit my job because life is too short; I wasn’t making a difference.”

“My boss was a micromanager.  In the end, I couldn’t please her – and when a recruiter called, I hurried.”

“The work was boring.  I’d spend hours surfing.  And no one cared.”

Even in this challenged economy, workers, whenever they can, are opting out – to join other companies, to do their own thing, even to take sabbaticals.  It’s about the purpose  of, the meaning behind, and the contribution to work.  Twenty-first century trend-seers have already pegged the issue, from Daniel Pink to Stephen Covey.  And a handful of corporations are experiencing true engagement – and worker happiness, like Southwest Airlines, W.L. Gore, Zappos. 

Happiness, in short, is no longer a warm puppy.

WHY GOOD THINGS MIGHT (RE)APPEAR IN SMALL PACKAGES

Flash fiction.  AOL’s CliffNotes in comic video formats.  Retailers that gobble up high-end sale sites.

These three newsy trends all say small:  Fiction that’s usually less than 1,000 words.  Classics reinterpreted quickly for the non-reading public.  And designer duds at reduced prices for an hour or so. 

Thinking further, we figured out that packaging also ties the three together.  Which got us ruminating about the power of packaging inside corporations. 

Externally, we can all vouch for the impact of great packaging.  After all, CPG companies spend millions and more on product look and feel, the way it’s displayed on shelves, in aisles, and end caps, how it appears in advertising and online. 

As consumers, we’re attracted to bright shiny objects as well as cinematographically-challenging movies (Inception, anyone?).  Many of us, regardless of generation, are captivated by the speed of Internet search and purchase, not to mention the ever-changing possibilities of digital networks.  That, too, is packaging at its height, one of many time-proven ways to get us hooked into and using brands.

Rarely, though, do we ever get well-packaged communications as employees.  Here are just a few examples to trigger some thoughts:  For many and often legal reasons, communicating about benefits tends to be long and involved and simply not all that engaging.  In quite a few businesses, corporate announcements are often ignored or stored in e-folders for later reference.  Even major initiatives that bring good change to life don’t necessarily receive the kind of overall look and feel they deserve.

No, we’re not advocating good looks without quality content and well-defined metrics.   Nor do we espouse internal advertising-type campaigns that are glitz sans information, and lack in-depth analysis and use of WIIFMs, up and down the ladder. 

We’d like to continue the form-versus-function debate re communications:  Does it matter if the package is Tiffany blue or UPS brown?  Or, simply, that something worthy is inside?

DIGGING TO CHIINA

Ever been flummoxed by a seemingly simple request for data?

We have. 

When starting work on a new project or for a new employer-client, we usually ask for more information than anyone’s supposed to have, ranging from brand guidelines to a pretty explicit picture of employees, internal customers, and external stakeholders. 

Of course, we could do the research ourselves (caveat:  Barbara is a former MSLS-type librarian).  On the other hand, what better way to immerse ourselves in the business – and get a great bead on the culture – than by reviewing all sorts of stats and surveys and guidelines, noting questions and some surprises, and then beginning a conversation with the folks inside?

That’s a best-case scenario, unfortunately. 

Many times, we get a high-level portrait of audiences, without the kinds of demographics (not to mention psychographics) we’d prefer.  Agreed:  There’s usually an enterprise IT system that can spit out information on groups.  Human resources and marketing/sales and corporate communications functions also provide decent pictures of the different stakeholders, inside and out. 

If, though, our mission is to drive behavior change(s) among specific audiences, we gotta dig deeper.  Knowing past and detailed responses to change events helps.  Segmentation’s even better.  So are the kinds of in-depth emotional customer studies often pioneered by ad agencies, or by the new data analytics software.

That’s our point.  Let’s take a cue or two from our business partners and corporations.  Intel, for instance, boasts an on-staff cultural anthropologist who provides her company a better understanding of how people, worldwide, use technology.  HP, IBM, and Microsoft also employ social scientists with similar skills.  Dr. G. Clotaire Rapaille of The Culture Code (among other books) is another who applies that kind of thinking.

So why not an up-close, personal, and psychological look at the different internal groups that comprise our worlds?   After all, our employees buy our company’s products and use its services.  They interact with brands in much the same ways as our customers do.  Armed with that information, we’d proceed to developing and delivering plans that work hard to change behavior.

Sure beats digging to China.