|
Why Business People Speak Like Idiots
By Brian Fugere, Chelsea
Hardaway, and Jon Warshawsky
Free Press (Simon & Schuster), New York, 2005
Hardcover, 174 pages, $22
Reviewed by David M. Freedman
Consultants
Fugere, Hardaway, and Warshawsky expose four common “traps” that otherwise
intelligent professionals fall into when they communicate:
-
The
obscurity trap. “Business idiots” (a phrase they employ often) who want
to sound smart use jargon, acronyms, wordiness, and evasiveness. To
avoid this trap, employ plain English and candor, and make your messages
short and sweet. Don’t try to sound brilliant; just get to the point.
-
The
anonymity trap. Idiots depend on templates, clichés, and conventions.
Instead, dare to express your personality – use your authentic voice –
and make phone calls instead of hiding behind e-mail.
-
The
hard-sell trap. Idiots over-promise, relentlessly accentuate the
positive, and deny the existence of glaring flaws and screw-ups. To
escape this trap, own up to bad news and flops. Use colorful,
entertaining details to support your claims.
-
The
tedium trap. Idiots dump pre-packaged data on their audiences and drone
on in pointless generalizations. Instead, be spontaneous. Make the
details specific and relevant to listeners. Tell a story.
The authors present numerous examples (real and hypothetical) of pompous,
arrogant, tedious, boring, and obfuscatory business communications. Some
of them are entertaining.
The authors also present a few examples – not nearly enough, though – of
very effective communication, including an excerpt from Winston
Churchill’s speech to the House of Commons on June 4, 1940:
We shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to
the end. We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and
oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in
the air, we shall defend our island, whatever the cost may be, we shall
fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall
fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we
shall never surrender.
Those 81 words, which arguably changed the course of history, comprise 105
syllables – an average of 1.3 syllables per word.
The authors spend a little too much ink bashing business people and not
enough explaining how to overcome the traps and fix poor communication
habits. Their style is often mean-spirited. Their publicist calls the book
“wickedly funny,” but I think their relentless, cliché-ridden humor gets
tedious.
The hard-sell trap
The publicist also says in a press release that the book “just might free
the business world from the tyranny of obfuscation, exaggeration,
arrogance, and boredom.”
Obviously the publicist didn’t read the book. In Chapter 8, the authors
say, “Hyperbole drives a wedge between you and any real people,” and
“wrapping [your product] in superlatives erodes trust.”
About the authors
Brian Fugere, based in Danville, California, is a senior partner and
former chief marketing officer at Deloitte Consulting. Chelsea Hardaway is
president of Hardaway Productions, a brand and communications consultancy
in Montara, California. Jon Warshawsky is a manager at Deloitte Services
in San Diego.
About the reviewer
David M. Freedman (www.freedman-chicago.com) is a Chicago-based writer
and media relations consultant, specializing in the fields of law and
finance. He won a Your Honor Award in 2001 from the Legal
Marketing Association for excellence in public relations.
He is a coauthor of The GET GOOD PRESS Series for
Lawyers (www.getgoodpress.com). |
NAVIGATION
Return to LMB
home page
About the authors
Visit the publisher's website
to order the book
About the reviewer
CONTACT INFORMATION
Law Marketing Bibliography
c/o David M. Freedman
390 Flora Place
Highland Park, Illinois 60035
Phone 847-204-6848
Contact Freedman by e-mail
© 2005-2008 Freedman
|