Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die by brothers Dan and Chip Heath is not exactly news; the book came out in 2007.
But it’s worth revisiting on the eve of Barack Obama’s inauguration as US president, in part because the Heath’s most frequently cited example of a “sticky” idea is JFK’s 1961 proposal to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade. Given that Obama has often been compared with JFK — and is a good storyteller — we can hope that the president-elect uses his inaugural speech to introduce narratives about ideas that will stick as well as the moon-landing story did. The most likely idea relates to energy independence. How will Obama attain our buy-in?
It’s worth noting that fully half of the Heath’s six basic traits of sticky ideas are story-related, as reported in the McKinsey Quarterly. Here are the three that scream out “story” (I added boldface for emphasis):
- Concreteness. Abstract language and ideas don’t leave sensory impressions; concrete images do. Compare “get an American on the moon in this decade” with “seize leadership in the space race through targeted technology initiatives and enhanced team-based routines.”
- Emotions. Case studies that involve people also move them. “We are wired,” [Chip] Heath writes, “to feel things for people, not abstractions.”
- Stories. We all tell stories every day. Why? “Research shows that mentally rehearsing a situation helps us perform better when we encounter that situation,” Heath writes. “Stories act as a kind of mental flight simulator, preparing us to respond more quickly and effectively.”
[Image from ImageChef.com via http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/]