Stop Demanding People to Pay Attention. Starting Inspiring Them to Care.
"Please welcome, our next speaker!"
[Trots onto stage.]
"Alright! How you doin' today?!"
[Coughs. Crickets. Tiny "woo!" from one embarrassed attendee.]
"OH COME ON, YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THAT!"
This, dear reader, makes me want to start flipping tables, and I think it's actually part of a larger problem. Speech or otherwise, lots of communicators today seem to openly antagonize their audience.
When you open a speech like that, you immediately create the wrong dynamic, pitting communicator and audience against one another, when the early moments of any experience should focus on initial moments of agreement, which really means initial moment of alignment. Without that alignment, you won't resonate. They won't go with you the rest of the way. You won't do your job. (When I read, "99% of you do this wrong!" or "Good morning to everyone except people who do [thing I do]," I'm LESS likely to engage, not more. Just me?)
The clickbait. The grimy growth tactics. The sensationalized, shouty marketing. The thinly veiled attacks at the audience, preying on their baser instincts and making them feel awful about themselves. It's enough to actively repel discerning, savvy buyers, while at the same time giving me a distinct enemy to my story.
But what if, in a world where everyone is demanding your audience pay attention, you know how to inspire them to do so?
* * *
I see three macro-level trends causing the rise in pushy, even antagonistic communication styles:
There's more noise than ever before. The friction and cost to create "stuff" has come down to nearly zero, while the number of internet users has increased by nearly 2 billion over the last decade, from 3 to 5 billion people. More people using the internet plus less friction to create stuff, multiplied by increasing pressure to create content (or merely the societal acceptance of posting more things more publicly) equals "more noise." (According to scientists and me making this up right now, 12% of the noise is from marketers constantly saying the phrase "cut through the noise.")
Social media companies are showing their true colors. They crave more green, so they demand more gray. Social networks have figured out the kinds of content that serve their cause, to say nothing of yours or mine. So they incentive it. They perpetuate a waterfall of gray (which, actually, if you know how to shine bright in your own colors is rather useful in helping you stand out more easily). Rather than promote a diverse array of thoughts and perspectives and stories, rather than reward deeper or more nuanced ideas, they've built businesses based on internet ephemera. "Create more of the same, please and thank you." I'm sick of the sea of sameness almost as much as I am sick of hearing the phrase "sea of sameness." COME ON, WE CAN DO BETTER THAN THAT! Let's talk about the pond of predictability for a change. The lake of lollygaggers! At very least, let's agree to journey beyond this mountain of monotony. (But I digress down the road of redundancy.)
Expertise has been commodified. Don't misunderstand: I think expertise is foundational, but it's also found everywhere. What makes the source of that knowledge (you) matter to someone searching for it or experiencing it? Plenty of others know what you know, and more of them create content than ever before (see also: "the noise"). Your unfair advantage today to differentiate and resonate isn't what you know about things. It's how you see those things. Your perspective, stories, style, and voice (whether spoken or written or both) are the most defensible things you can possibly use to communicate more effectively. But how often do we lean into those things? (I have some ideas to make that easier.)
Given these trends, the charlatans have found ways to take advantage (the aggressive tactics feel comfortable to them), while the rest of us don't know what to do (so maybe we need to add some clickbait or push harder on material that is ultimately too commodified to differentiate?).
It's my mission to equip people who have genuine expertise and a genuine desire to serve others with the communication techniques and power they need to differentiate and resonate. No grimy tactics required. You're expert enough, but maybe your IP isn't strong enough yet. I believe stronger thinking and bigger ideas can still lead to stronger businesses and bigger results — but we have to proactively package and communicate our expertise to resonate. We want others to care, but rather than shout louder, hype harder, or antagonize the audience to get a reaction, we should do something else:
Create the conditions conducive to caring.
Far too often, we fail to do that.
* * *
Lately and thankfully, my kids have gotten back into watching the best show ever created for children and parents alike: Bluey.
That show's creators deeply understand what it means to create the conditions conducive to caring. For starters, they tell stories. Stories naturally create those conditions (here's why—with lessons from Ted Lasso and Seth Godin). But more than that, Bluey does two more things:
They help you feel seen.
They give you space to feel.
Most content targeted at parents just makes you feel lousy. You end up feeling more stressed about your situation and much less seen. Pristine homes and perfectly groomed people talk about their kids, even if they're making fun of their situations. Psychologists and (more dangerously) influencers talk about precisely what you should be doing to get the ideal outcomes in your parenting and for your child's well-being. Course creators prey on your baser instincts and pain. Everyone speaking to parents seems to suggest that your life is entirely perfect and kids are nothing but a joyride, or else you clearly have six more hours to navigate your child's tantrums instead of the truth: you have sh*t to do and places to be and ideally some semblance of an actual adult life you'd like to live. Not to mention, you arrived to the tough moment the parenting coach is navigating you through already feeling terrible. You aren't showing up your best self to start.
Bluey understands this harsh reality AND ALSO the incredible beauty of being a parent AND ALSO the way you'd die for your kids AND ALSO want to punt them into the ocean AND ALSO how much more beautiful a sunny day in the yard feels AND ALSO how many tiny messes have ruined your car and living room forever AND ALSO that you'd never want a life without your kids AND ALSO you desperately miss your life without kids AND—
They acknowledge it. All of it.
And they showcase it. All of it.
And they don't make you feel like sh*t for feeling it. Any of it.
They help you feel seen.
So you start to lean in, and that's where their genius really shines. Rather than club you over the head with the lesson, they do something else:
They give
.
.
you
.
.
space.
They never TELL you to care or DEMAND that you care. They inspire you to care. They don't stuff every moment of silence full of action or a key takeaway. Maybe the family of blue heeler dogs is playing in the yard. Following some laughter, or a difficult moment, or a tough realization, they play a little music, then show you a closeup of a purple flower, a tiny green bug, a babbling brook, a bluebird flitting across some marshmallow clouds. In those moments, suddenly, something hits you. Maybe all of it hits you. I can't be sure. Because parenting.
They help you feel seen.
They give you space to feel.
Dear reader, it's feelings. Feelings create the conditions to care.
Ewwww, at work, Jay?!
YES. Especially at work. Work is the biggest microcosm of human existence, more than parenting or sports or families of blue heeler dogs traipsing around Australia.
First, you deeply align with others, then rather than spell it all out for them, give them a beat. "Right? Just me? You too?" The same way a good friend doesn't leap to solutions right away but takes a moment to acknowledge "that must be hard," sometimes, you just gotta let people feel their feelings. Maybe other times, you gotta proactively put them in their feels.
Help them feel seen. Give them space to feel. THEN teach.
Feelings create the conditions for caring. If you communicate in ways that don't make others feel at all, well ... they won't care at all, either. I don't know how many times I've thought to myself, "That business leader speaking on stage right now: I know they believe their ideas matter. Someone should tell their face." They don't express. They don't emote. They don't help others feel seen nor give us space to feel anything, so we don't care enough to engage. (OH COME ON! YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THAT!)
Honestly, most people in business share their ideas like they were auditioning to announce the next Olympic event: watching paint dry.
We simply cannot continue to communicate this way. Being sound and strategic and substantive does not mean feeling stale. We want others to absorb our messages, our ideas, our expertise, but they aren't yet open to it. We have to open them up. Once they do, they might actually receive our wisdom. But until then, they remain closed off, and we remain frustrated or get pushy, or both. It's like trying to pour water into a closed clamshell. It won't work! Turning up the water pressure won't matter.
But that's what the internet feels like today. Lots of people bad at getting others to care, so they just push harder and harder.
It's silly. It's ineffectual. You don't need to be sappy like Bluey. Share more stories. Bring more drama. Punctuate your ideas with a pithy turn of phrase. Be more empathetic, or merely communicate with more restraint. They need to feel seen, but also, they need the space to feel.
Everything we say hints at our intention. If our intention is to merely shove information at people, they can tell. If our intention is to shove harder, they can really tell. But if we intended to open them up, to align with them and connect with them and genuinely serve them, they can also tell. And they might also care. We always try to communicate in ways that convey our expertise. Increasingly, we need to write and speak in ways that convey our emotions too.
Stop expecting others to care. Show them why they would.
Remember, people start any experience with you closed off to new possibilities and ideas. If you come charging forward and expect them to care (HOW YOU DOING TODAY?!) without first creating the conditions where they would? All you're left to do is thrash. (OH COME ON, YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THAT!)
It's time WE, the communicators, were the ones who did better. The writers, speakers, teachers, and leaders. The onus is on us (aren't words fun?). It's our responsibility to improve their response ability. (Okay, that one was a stretch, I'll admit. But hey, I'm making you feel!)
The communicator is responsible for the response. If they don't care, that's not their fault. It's mine. It's yours.
If my social following doesn't engage, that's my fault, not theirs.
If my podcast guest is stiff and awkward, that's my fault too.
If my audience for a speech isn't excited or engaging, then I'm the one to blame.
Great communicators begin by ensuring the audience is open to new ideas and possibilities first. The words they use and their performance of those words first create that openness, and their expertise and advice can more easily come in behind that.
What you know matters, but what you say and how you say it determines whether or not they'll care. Because what you say + how you say it = how you make them feel.
Shouting louder and hyping harder aren't the answers. Come on. You can do better than that.
Stop demanding they engage. Start inspiring them to care.