Don’t tell me it’s important – Tell me why it’s relevant

Talking about the importance or purpose of a business plan or program is easy to do – and tends to undermine what one is trying to achieve.  Or at least that’s what recent research by the Corporate Executive Board (CLC Building Next Generation HR LinePartnerships) indicates.

What’s the alternative?  Leave the value judgments to the audience.  Give them the facts that implicitly tie the program, initiative, or message to the relevant  business challenge context.  So, to illustrate but oversimplify, don’t say “performance reviews are important.”  Emphasize, rather, that “we are in danger of missing our ship dates on our products due to our mismanagement of employee performance”.  The difference may seem either subtle or obvious, but the impact is measurably different.

How different?  According to the same study, “emphasizing the importance of a communication” actually has a negative impact on effectiveness.  You’d have done better by not even mentioning the topic!  On the other hand, making the message relevant to specific business challenge(s), and allowing the audience to draw the conclusion of the message’s importance creates quite a bit of positive impact.

Don’t make it tough: position the data only a step away from the conclusion about how important it is.  But keep your focus on relevance, and context – and don’t let up.  According to the same study, the only things as impactful as relevance are setting clear expectations and articulating a strong point of view.