You’ve heard this a million times, but probably not like this: If you have something important to say, don’t lecture me, here’s why:
OK?
Can you imagine if the Bible had been written in bullet points? Or if the Gettysburg Address had been delivered as a Powerpoint presentation?
As an undergrad at Wharton, I once got a B on a paper with the note, “Very well written!” I asked my prof about that. She said that in business, people don’t want to read creative writing. They want the facts. Lots of bullets.
I said that sounded like a load of garbage and asked her if she remembered my paper, which she did, including many details. She smiled as she fed my information back to me. Then I asked her if she could recall as much detail from someone else’s paper.
She couldn’t.
In the end, I got a B+ and a powerful life lesson:
Don’t take communication advice from a management professor.
Me, I follow the rules of creative writing:
- Open with a hook—make me care. Give me a character I can relate to, or information that I can relate back to me.
- Set up the conflict. I do this two ways: first, I use language and imagery that evoke an emotional response. Second, I tell you right up front what the end game is going to be. (This is called “Not burying the lead.”) I’m reading the Harry Potter books to Elle. She knows Harry lives—there are 5 more books!—yet she’s riveted and constantly asking me if he’ll be OK. Knowing the ending doesn’t make it boring, it creates tension: how are we going to get from here to there?!
- Avoid cliches as much as possible, as they evoke no emotional response.
- Not every story has a happy ending. the biggest challenge I face sometimes is letting the message be what it needs to be.
- Close with a call to action.
Voila.
Now go tell someone something important!
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I'm Jason. I make people shine. My mission is to help 1 million people tell their stories better. 
{ 3 comments… read them below or add one }
I believe in entertainment. I believe in fact. I also believe, as you have demonstrated in using the two to engage, in all this to prove a point and make info more pallatable. There are differences in the context of school (we are there for most of the day with a variety of subjects and for sometimes years) and a movie (where you are there for a few hours).
Yet if you want to get a message through… then you need to think about the presentation in writing, video or any other form!
Thanks
Awesome! I’m launching a series on how to make communication stick, and this is my first point: tell stories. Stories get stuck, facts get forgotten.
@Ben—I think one of the fallacies of teaching is that all time should be filled with information transmission. That only maximizes time for the teacher. If the emphasis is on learning, then the learners need downtime. My point? School systems would do well to shape their day with dead time surrounding intermittent activities.