IF WE WERE KINGS/QUEENS OF THE FOREST ...

We got thinking:  What would it be like if communicators ruled the corporate world?

[AdAge started us, running a story about the marketing department changes made by Newell Rubbermaid’s fairly new, i.e., 15+ months, CMO, a market researcher by background.  To date, he’s culled staff, established outposts in Shanghai and Sao Paolo, doubled research staff and spend, and winnowed down the number of agencies … so far.]

There’s one current precedent we know:  David Novak at Yum! Brands, also a marketing guru.  And if we were to expand the question into the design arena, Apple – and design chief Jony Ive – comes to mind.  [Obviously, many executives have great quals as communicators and marketers, but not a deep backgrounding.]

Here are a few perks of being corporate kings and queens:

• ·       Embedded teams in every corner of the company, reflecting the ability of communicators to influence change inside and out
• Public relations leading the marketing function, owning social media and content and …
• Change initiatives run conjointly with HR and IT
• A larger spend, all judiciously accounted for
• A cadre of the best and brightest senior talent to tap into, from communications and research to branding and marketing
• An experimental mindset, where pilot programs could take on, say, in-depth research into the power of third-party editorial media

Phew:  There’s more.  Rather than exhaust every possibility, we’ll open it up to you:  What dreams and wishes would you have come true as CEO communicator?

JUNG AND US

Archetypes*, today, are everywhere. 

BloombergBusinessweek usually populates its back-end section with a humorous take on different responses to, say, gossip in the workplace. 

Marketers use new forms of ‘original patterns’ to define and segment their audiences, giving each a distinctive personality that’s easily understood. 

Entertainers of all kinds assume personae, from Lady Gaga to Madonna. 

User experience designers base their groupings on solid research, creating specific narratives for each group.

No doubt, it’s a convenient way to classify folk.  Remember the MBTI and Insights, among other personality assessments?  A similar concept:  Colleagues are downright fascinated with the diagnoses, and will spend time discussing and arguing about where they fit.  We’ve seen some very fascinating behaviors during presentations and workshops, where participants almost immediately assume the roles ascribed to them.

One month later, those personae are forgotten.  Work rules, after all.  Yet are we using archetyping and its brethren, personae, in the best possible ways – while avoiding stereotypes? 

We’d say ‘no.’  Most of us don’t use guideposts to understand the nature of how our very different selves act in the world, and in the workplace.  Existing assessments like MBTI, while useful in workshops and change situations, don’t help us as we form strategies to get our staff and team and enterprise to act in certain ways and adopt specific goals.

Ever try to gather all the INTJs into one group to figure out what appeals?   Good luck.  And give us a holler about the narratives and personae you’ve used to drive change.

*[Our caveat:  Thanks to Swiss psychiatrist Carl Jung, this Greek word now serves as a model for ways of being/acting in the world, even though that wasn’t his original intent.  And even though personae differ from archetypes.]

WORDS THAT STICK

Change is our middle name.

Yet, because we began our careers as writers and journalists, words are near and dear to us.  So, from time to time, we wear our linguistic hats and probe into the nature of language.  Which, sorta, kinda, is part of change.

Lately, fellow wordsmiths (or smithies, we suppose) have wrestled with the notion of permanence, that is, which of the new lingos heard and invented will last more than Andy Warhol’s 15 seconds.  Twerking, selfie, catfish, lean in:  All have precedents and other meanings attached.  Twerking, it’s said, was a Nawlins’ figure of speech two decades ago; selfie belongs to our compatriots Down Under (and even earlier, if you believe the Princess Anastasia myth).  Mash-ups and phrases, like cronut and Boston strong, seem to have more legs than others.

What makes for word permanence?  More professorial minds than ours cite five factors, from frequency and diversity to unobtrusiveness.   Others say it takes 40 years for slang to become embedded into our dictionaries.   To avoid theorizing, the venerable American Dialect Society (yes, Virginia, there is one) votes on its Word of the Year every January; believe it or not, 2013 was the year of “because” … as in “because nachos.  Because politics.  Because science.” 

No comment.

Instead, we see two factors that count for language stick-to-it-tiveness.  One, a word that’s inextricably linked to a physical object or unforgettable event.  Think “drone” and “9/11.”  And two, an appendix that can transform any plain-Jane ordinary adjective or noun into something new and different.  After all, consider what adding “nado” and “gate” does to shark and water … among others.

Why the concern with lastingness?   Because change.  It’s what we do.

WE QUEUE. DO YOU?

Darn:  Got in the wrong check-out line!

If you’re like us, chances are you’ve got a litany of to-dos (or not) when trying to cash out at a store.  Look for female cashiers.  Get behind those with less than half-full carts.  Avoid shoppers with kids.  Re-jigger the number of items to qualify for the Express Lane.

Do these strategies work?  Not always.  So it should come as no surprise that brick-and-mortar retailers have made this a science, beginning with Little’s Law (calculating the wait of a particular line) and, perhaps, concluding with PayPal’s latest product, Beacon, recognizing your smartphone the minute you enter a store.

[Okay, we do shop online.  But, somehow, Peapod just doesn’t get our produce right.]

Our point is the waiting.  Once you hit three minutes, experts tell us, the perception of wait time multiplies exponentially.  And patience isn’t our strong suit.  If the queue takes too long, we’ll most probably abandon our purchases, mumble under our breaths about the store, and leave pronto.

Imagine, then, working with a team or a function or an enterprise during times of change.  Say, undergoing an acquisition, when the deal itself might be moving at lightning speed, but the information isn’t.  That wait time will be interminable for employees who don’t know their status, where they’ll be sitting, and/or what they’ll be doing.  Granted, there are good and legal reasons for not releasing the information.  On the other hand, it’s also humane to, at the very least, give workers an idea of the process, the calendar, and a wide swath of times when decisions will be made and communicated.  Broadcasting factual information regularly mutes the gossip and discontent, and psychologically lessens the waiting time.

Then again it’s nice to linger by the “impulse buys” aisle …