By Mary Arnold
Andy Janning’sCEO/Executive Team Networksession yesterday was all about helping our messages rise to the top, whether they be written, in person or via “e-stuff.” You don’t have to become hip and you don’t need an extreme makeover to get your ideas across, reassured Janning, president/CEO ofNO NET Solutions, Brownsburg, Ind.
“If your message is compelling, if it makes sense, if it impacts people, they will find a way to spread it,” he said. One way to do this is to tell a story.
Often, we just blast off an email and wonder, Why aren’t they doing what I told them to do? “Because we have confused efficiency of communication with effectiveness,” Janning explained. “Changing human behavior is a messy process” that can’t be accomplished simply be sending a straight-up message. Expecting that it can results from “thinking like the media. Change your mentality from pumping out the message (newspaper style), to more of a broadcast news approach that gets them thinking about the message,” he suggested.
To illustrate, Janning showed a video produced at his previous job as VP/organizational development at $924 millionFORUM Credit Union, Indianapolis. Designed to address an “epidemic of people leaving confidential information in unsecured places,” the two-minute video was called “Lock it up and Clean it Up,” a rip on an Orbit gum commercial.
