Made to Stick: Booke report 5

In the last Section of Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, the authors take all the parts in the last chapters and put it all together for the reader. They take the main idea of each chapter tell the reader how to use all of these together to make an idea stick. These five things are Simple, Unexpected, Concrete, Credible, Emotional, Story. These five things are very important in creating an idea, without one of these elements the whole idea could fail in some way.

            In this section the authors talk about “villains” that can destroy an idea. One villain is focusing on the speaker more than the message. Know that it is still beneficial to be a good charismatic speaker but the listener has to forget about how well the speaker is doing and needs to focus on the message. The next villain is the Curse of knowledge. When someone tries to speak they tend to communicate as if the audience is themselves. Getting past the curse of knowledge is important in all aspects of organizational behavior. If a manager is trying to communicate with one of the people he/she is in charge of and the manager has several more years of experience, he/she is going to have to put themselves in the shoes of the listener. If the manager does not do this than the message he or she is conveying will be lost and the problem will be right back to square one. Another example is if a CEO tells the company’s employees that their job is to “maximize shareholder value”. Now to the CEO that makes perfect sense but to a simple employee that idea is way too abstract. It is important to observe the world around you because it holds more sticky ideas than a single creative person. The next villain is decision paralysis. This can affect anyone in almost all aspects of organizational behavior. When giving information it important to make your idea more precise by stressing a couple main ideas instead of touching on several ideas. A lawyer will do this during the closing arguments. Instead of stressing ten arguments, the lawyer needs to only focus on the strongest couple of ones.

            It takes time to master these five things so you can avoid the “villains”. Using this SUCCES strategy will make ideas stickier. Keeping idea simple and to the core will make the idea more understandable. Making your presentation of the idea unexpected will keep the audience’s attention.  Making your idea concrete will allow the listener to easily picture what you are saying and it keeps an idea from being abstract. You may be an expert but the people in your audience are not. Make sure your information to support your idea comes from a credible source or your audience will be less inclined to believe and accept your idea. Keep your message emotional; make the audience care about your idea. Finally surround your idea in a story; it will keep your listeners attention and will be easier to convey your idea. Using these five ways to make idea sticky can be used in all aspects of a person’s daily life.