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We take persuasion a step further to consider how effective verbal communication can change not only minds, but also actions.
March 2006
Volume IV, Issue 2
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Reason and Emotion
If you want to build a ship, don't drum up the men to gather wood or assign them tasks. Instead, teach them to yearn for the vast and endless sea.
- Antoine de Saint-Exupery
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Each of us possesses our own beliefs, experiences, preferences and prejudices. Persuasion
is not easy. Convincing someone, through verbal communication, to adjust his or her beliefs
to your way of thinking can be a daunting task. And it is even more difficult to motivate
a person to take the next step and take action.
Therein lies the real Power of Persuasion.
It is one thing to entice your audience through strong verbal communication to acknowledge
your point, and possibly even cause them to think a certain way. It is quite another thing
to use spoken language to spur action. If I possess effective communication skills, I can
be very successful in changing your thinking about my product. But unless I further motivate
you to purchase my product, there is little measurable value in having changed your mind.
Ultimately, my success depends not only on my ability to persuade you to think differently,
but also on my ability to motivate you to act upon your new belief system.
Ultimately, the challenge is to leverage the Power of Persuasion to motivate our audiences
to think and act differently.
Previous issues of The Beacon have focused on persuading audiences to think in a certain
way. In this issue, we take the persuasion equation a step further to consider how effective
verbal communication can change not only minds, but also actions.
As many of you know, I am serving a four-year term as Chairman of the United States Olympic
Sailing Program. This is a volunteer position with significant responsibilities that I
fulfill alongside my work for The Latimer Group. In this Olympic role, I am ultimately
responsible for leading a committee of 32 people that administers and supports more than
100 athletes who are preparing for the 2008 Olympic and Paralympic Games in Beijing, China.
Our goal is simple: win as many medals as possible at the 2008 Games.
Succeeding at the Olympic level of competition is difficult under any circumstances. However,
our Olympic Sailing Committee inherited a program in a particularly tenuous position. Several
competitor nations were, and still are, outspending us by a significant ratio. Our athletes
were competing essentially as amateurs in a quickly-evolving professional world. Our medal
count over the last three Games started to dwindle, and fewer and fewer American sailors
were choosing to put their lives on hold to train for future Olympic Games. The prospect
of competing against fully-funded professionals was simply becoming too great a financial
and time burden. Many of our most talented sailors were choosing to do other things with
their lives.
The US Olympic Sailing Program had all the characteristics of a classic business challenge:
declining output, shrinking revenue streams, intense international competition and disgruntled
employees. The program was in desperate need of some fresh thinking.
In order to reinvigorate the effort, the first order of business was to bolster our fundraising
program to supplement revenues, which would allow us to increase the number of athletes
receiving critical support. Our committee did all the appropriate things: We drafted a
budget, made our finances transparent and cleaned all waste out of the program. We organized
our message by identifying facts and figures and then produced a well-reasoned argument
for why the US Olympic Program was worthy of donations and support. We had several experienced
fundraisers look at our “story,” and they found no obvious holes. Yet, fundraising
results for the first several months of 2005 were meager.
Then, I had one of those “Eureka” moments when you realize that you have
been ignoring something obvious. It is an awakening when you relearn a simple yet critical
lesson. It happened after spending some time listening to Charlie, a key member of our
fundraising team, speak to a group of potential donors. I was struck by how he was positioning
our need. His case focused on the personalities of our athletes. He mentioned them by name,
showed pictures of them and described their experiences. On the surface, his version of
our story lacked what I perceived to be the essential facts and figures of the funds we
needed. He made the discussion about Olympic Sailing very personal: short on numbers and
details and long on stories and anecdotes.
When I asked Charlie about his tactics, his point was simple. The numbers and details
are important, he told me, but people will be drawn in by the emotional connection to our
cause. Charlie helped me re-learn the importance of emotion in the persuasion equation.
We adopted Charlie's approach broadly. Our message became first about the athletes, their
personal stories, interviews, photographs and a touch of national pride. We then added
details and numbers in order to make the connection between our athletes and our goals.
We made our message consistent across the board: in our presentations, newsletters and
fundraising letters. We detailed the accomplishments of individual athletes and then made
the connection between a donated dollar and the effect it would have on the lives of these
talented, young sailors. We have helped our donors and potential donors see the connection
between their support and the likelihood of seeing the red, white and blue up on the medal
stand.
The results have been dramatic. In the last 10 months, we have raised more than $1 million – twice
as much as had been raised in any previous four-year period, and we increased our funded
budget by more than 33 percent in one year. With a growing top line, we infused new energy
into the Olympic Sailing Program, and we have a whole new generation of talented sailors
who are committing to full-time training efforts. Our athletes produced four world championships
in 2005, amidst a longer list of impressive results racing against the best in the world.
The US Olympic Sailing Program is undergoing a dramatic turnaround, both on and off the
water.
The lesson here is simple, and it goes to the heart of the Power of Persuasion. If you
want to lead your audience to think a certain way, use reason and logic. But if you want
to take the next step and motivate your audience to act, leverage emotion and a personal
connection. Give them specific action steps to take and explain to them how taking those
action steps will benefit them personally.
Here's the simple take-away: Persuade through reason; motivate through emotion. Remember
this line, because in my opinion, it is one of the most important concepts in verbal communication.
If you want to persuade a potential client or investor to think about your product or
organization or idea in a certain way, make a logical, reasonable, fact-based case. This
is an important part of the equation. But if want to apply the Power of Persuasion and
motivate them to act, you need to make an emotional connection. You need to demonstrate
how your product, service or organization will affect their life, how it will have a tangible
impact on them and how it will change their reality. You must make it real for the audience.
This is the heart of motivation.
Whether we are talking about fundraising for Olympic athletes, motivating a work force,
making a sale or persuading an investor, the equation remains the same. Persuade through
reason. Motivate through emotion.
Dean M. Brenner
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© 2006 The Latimer Group. All Rights Reserved.
Dean M. Brenner -
The Latimer Group: 203.265.4344.
Feedback or comments: dmbrenner@thelatimergroup.com.
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