I love doctors, lawyers*, scientists, and academics.
But, beyond oversized egos, they generally share something in common: They’re not the most riveting communicators in the world.
The well-educated brain is taught to make an argument and back it up with evidence. The more data and facts, the better. The disciplines of science, medicine, academia demand it.
But when making a case on the public stage, dumping data or evidence alone on an audience rarely works.
You’ve got to do the work —and it is that—to make a subject matter accessible to folks you’re speaking to, whether in a press interview, a speech, or on social media.
The only thing that matters is how your audience receives information, not how you want to relay it.
It’s about them, not you.
It's a translation process
I’m not talking about dumbing anything down. I’m talking about repackaging concepts, translating them into plain speak with a narrative thread.
The human brain is wired for stories. People need a narrative to connect with--one that sings with emotion, simplicity, and relevance.
The marriage equality movement then shifted its message from sterile legal benefits of marriage to a values frame of love, commitment, and family. Real couples, moms and dads, people of faith, servicemembers, business executives humanized the issue.
A similar course correction happened with the Covid vaccine. Drugmaker Pfizer finally broke through to the public by, as Sally Sussman said, ripping up the original playbook of scientific data and experts to convince the public to get the vaccine.
“I was wrong,” Susman said. “It’s stories, [like] I got to see my grandson at his wedding. Real stories, real people.”
Professions like science tend to skip the step between the proverbial research lab and the public marketplace. They forgo the translation process — the process smart politicians and businesses do —required to bring data-backed ideas to market.
A 2017 piece in Slate by Tim Requarth of the NYU Grossman School of Medicine has stuck with me all these years later.
“[T]he obstacles faced by science communicators are not epistemological but cultural,” Requarth wrote. “The skills required are not those of a university lecturer but a rhetorician.”
Moral of the Story
Many heady professionals think they’re the smartest people in the room. But if they actually want to be the smartest person in the room, they would be wise to invest in messaging strategy and storytelling magic.