July 15, 2025 • 51 mins
Tell us what you thought about this episode
What happens when two podcast hosts named Anthony—one Australian, one Kiwi—discover they both run shows called "Biz Bytes"? Magic, that's what. This special crossover episode dives deep into communication as the fundamental cornerstone of business success.
Drawing from Anthony Pearl's extensive background in broadcast journalism and talk radio, we explore why truly effective communication extends far beyond simply delivering a message. The conversation uncovers why the same announcement might be heard completely differently by various team members—one person hearing opportunity while another hears threat in the exact same words.
Through fascinating parallels between sports commentary, podcasting techniques, and business leadership, we unpack the critical elements that make communication stick. Why do radio commentators describe the action in such detail while TV presenters focus more on analysis? The answer reveals profound insights about how we must adapt our communication style to different mediums, audiences, and contexts.
The most compelling revelation? Stories transmit meaning far more effectively than facts alone. From ancient tales that have persisted for centuries to modern business narratives, storytelling creates connection and comprehension unlike any other communication tool. We explore how today's leaders can leverage this innate human tendency to process information through narrative.
Technology now offers unprecedented opportunities for real-time feedback and engagement. From simple QR codes to sophisticated polling platforms, today's communicators have powerful tools to gauge whether their messages are landing as intended—provided they're willing to listen to the responses.
If you're struggling to get your message across, feeling misunderstood by your team, or simply wanting to become a more effective communicator, this conversation offers practical insights you can implement immediately. Remember: if communication isn't listed as a core deliverable in every role in your organization, you may be overlooking the most fundamental skill for business success.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to a crossover episode of Biz Bytes.
Today my guest Anthony Pearljoins us from his podcast Biz
Bytes for Thought Leaders Nowslightly different focuses,
slightly different audiences,but we thought two Anthony's
with a podcast, each called BizBytes, was too good an
opportunity not to pass up,Despite our utterly different
(00:23):
accents.
See if you can pick up on thatand program emphasis.
We got together.
I joined Anthony on his andtoday he's on mine In this
episode.
Anthony and I dive deep into thefundamental topic of
communication.
We draw on Anthony's extensivebackground in broadcast
journalism, talkback radio andhis current business focused on
(00:44):
Podcast Done For you to explorehow effective communication is
the core to engaging audiences.
We're going to discuss some keythemes, including two-way
communication.
It's not a one-way street.
It still requires listening toyour audience, understanding
your audience crucial formarketing and internal
businesses.
Engagement tool how to fosterinteraction beyond just
(01:05):
listening.
Tailoring messages, adaptingyour content to different
medians and expectations.
The power of storytelling, howstories convey values and
simplify complex information.
The nuance of message delivery,why the same message is heard
differently and how to preventmisinterpretation.
Leveraging technology forfeedback.
Using those modern tools toensure your message lands.
And communication as a coredeliverable, why it's
(01:28):
fundamental to organizationalsuccess.
So get ready for an insightfulconversation between two
Anthonys about how to trulyconnect and communicate with
your audience, both inside andoutside your business.
Anthony, welcome to BizBytes.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
And it's good to be on another BizBytes program.
Welcome, Anthony, it's nice tobe with you again.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Likewise for those who haven't picked up through
the introduction, Anthony Pearl,my guest today, also has his
own channel called BizBytes.
And when we found that twoAnthony's across two different
countries I can't pick up fromthe accents One of us is
Australian, One of us is KiwiI'll let you work out who's who
but both of us have our ownchannel called Biz Bytes and we
thought it was too good to notdo a crossover between us.
(02:13):
So we've already done AnthonyPearl's Biz Bytes and today it's
Anthony McMahon's Biz Bytes.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
A lot of fun and it's so weird how it happened.
And it's so weird how ithappened.
I think we kind of shared it alittle bit on my program, but it
came from a mutual contact ofours that you asked to be on
your program and said, but hangon, I've been on Biz Bytes with
Anthony already and it turns outshe'd been a guest on my
program.
So I love it.
(02:39):
There's room for two of us andwe do have slightly different
programs and slightly differentemphasis on things.
So it keeps it interesting.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Absolutely.
It's a good point.
There's a very, very minutedifference in that.
Obviously, mine has atechnology focus, so it bites
with a Y and yours is just bitespelt normally.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
It is and mine is BizBytes for thought leaders, so
it does have that extension alittle bit.
But you're right, If you're notpaying close attention, people
won't know they can hardly tellthe difference in the accents
either.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
I know, I know we joked about this before, but
there's people out there whowon't even know the difference
between the accents and they'llbe like what are you guys
talking about?
You sound the same.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
No one in Australia or New Zealand will ever think
that?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
No, not at all.
So, anthony, tell us a bitabout yourself.
How did you get to your journeyof creating a podcast?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah, it sort of probably goes back to my youth.
I was always fascinated withradio.
I grew up with that fascinationand I'm not quite sure why, but
it always played an importantpart.
I remember very young beinggiven a little radio set that
you had to make and run longwires out the window and I'd be
(03:53):
listening to the cricket fromother parts of the world.
And I was always fascinatedwith radio and the idea of
storytelling and being the firstthen to be able to get
information from there and shareit with other people.
So it was almost like if Ithink back on it now, it was
almost like having my own radioprogram based on the radio
programs I was listening to,because I'd go to school and say
(04:13):
, did you hear about this anddid you hear about that?
And invariably there werepeople that hadn't listened to
what you'd listened to.
So you were able to share thatnews and it kind of fed from
there.
And I went to university and dida BA in broadcast journalism
and communications and fromthere I ended up working in the
media, particularly in talkbackradio, but also in TV for a
(04:35):
little while, and it was allabout the creating stories and
that was really what it boileddown to engaging audiences and
creating these images for peopleand I just absolutely
fascinated with it and I guessafter after I worked in the
industry for a few years, Iended up gravitating into the
(04:55):
corporate sector where I wasdoing what was the early days of
a communications manager.
It really was a new title atthat point and kind of an
extension of what I'd been doing.
But it's taken some time for itto come back fully to the whole
podcasting thing, probably acouple of years ago now where
I'd been dabbling with my ownpodcast Biz Bites for Thought
(05:17):
Leaders and it led to a fewpeople asking me that knew about
my background if I would helpthem with their podcast and we
found some gaps in the marketand it's sort of taken a life of
its own from there, so reallyhas now become the day-to-day
focus of my business.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
It's solely around podcasts done for you and
there's an interesting pointthat you put in there that I'm
going to drive a little bittowards as we have our
conversation going, and that'swhere you went through a
communications manager role andI think you'd agree with this
statement.
But I'm going to throw it outthere and you can challenge it
if you don't in that a podcastis purely about communicating to
(06:02):
an audience, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yes, and I think the important point here is
communication is a two-waystreet.
A lot of people think of itreally as one way, but it's not.
You have to be listening toyour audience, because if you're
talking to everybody and notmember is sitting there
listening and thinking you'retalking to me and that's what we
want to happen in any givenpodcast, because that's how you
(06:32):
make them then feel the need toengage with you.
Beyond that, which is obviouslywhat part of the purpose is,
for a podcast is deliveringpeople's expertise to the
audience, and I think a lot ofthat.
People get wrong and a lot of itthere's an people fall into a
few different patterns inpodcasts and I've seen them go
(06:55):
astray for that reason.
But I think when you dumb itdown, it should be that and
that's the big, biggest lessonthat I learned when I was in,
you know, talk radio was that,even though you've got hundreds
of thousands of listeners at anygiven time, it's when people
think that you're talking tothem, that they feel involved in
(07:17):
the process.
You want them in a sense, intheir own home, talking back to
the radio going.
No, I don't agree with that, orI agree with that, or yes,
you've got it right.
And obviously you want them tocall in that particular sense as
well, but that's really whatyou want people doing, even if
it's not actually saying it andjust nodding their head or
ticking that off in their mind.
That's what's important,because that's how it endears
(07:40):
people to you.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yeah, and the parallel there and I'm going to
keep bringing this back to thethemes of BizBytes in terms of
what we're talking about isexactly the same way that
organizations need to managetheir change when they go
through a process of change fortheir systems, for their people,
for their processes is you'vegot to communicate, and that
communication has got to be bothways.
(08:03):
And in the research I've doneon Project Failure, one of the
biggest reasons projects fail ispartly because they never
achieve the outcomes that theyset out to do, but also partly
because the communication justwasn't there and the audience
never found out why that changewas happening, so they just
carried on doing what they did.
And I think there's a lessonthere that can be taken from the
(08:24):
podcast world, the radio world,the radio world, the
communication world and to anyleader in a business, of how you
communicate and who you'recommunicating to.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
It's so important.
You know, I think a lot of thetime people forget particularly
when the companies start to geta little bit larger that you
can't just tell people.
This is what we're doing.
You not only have to have aconversation with them and
explain it to them, but you haveto listen to what their
concerns are and address themand get out in front of them,
(08:56):
and that, in a sense, is alsobasic marketing.
I mean, I remember years agodoing a marketing exercise for a
company that did put waterslides into people's homes,
right Home swimming pools.
Now, as a parent, immediately inyour mind, you're going why
would I do that?
Like there's just so many,there's so many hazards and
(09:19):
things that you can think ofimmediately, and so the job
really had to be in excuse me inunderstanding the audience and
understanding what thoseconcerns would be and jumping on
them in advance, so that we hada whole lot of marketing around
these ideas that had safetyfeatures and all of that kind of
stuff that might be a concernof parents, to get out in front
(09:41):
of them and it's no different ina business sense as well.
You have to understand whatpeople's concerns might be, no
matter how small they might beand you want to get in front of
addressing them, so they feellike they've been heard, and
then you're talking to them andaddressing them.
They still might not agree, butat least you've got them out
there.
But I think it's also thenequally providing channels for
(10:03):
people to bring forward theirideas or their concerns, so that
you can, in turn, get a morepersonal approach in addressing
things.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Absolutely.
And that channels is a reallygood one because at the end of
the day maybe much like radiopodcast is almost a very one
directional flow.
If you're not careful, almost avery one-directional flow.
If you're not careful, I meanwe're sitting here, we've got
our microphones running, we'retalking, we're having a
conversation, but it's not tillthe episode plays and maybe
someone gives you feedback thatyou actually know how it lands.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Yeah, and that's why, you know, obviously comments
and things like that are reallyimportant and people wanting to
engage with you separately, butit's also why things like social
media are important, becauseyou can take elements of the
podcast and you talk to them ona social platform and it gives
people an opportunity to engageand say they agree, they
disagree or they might have afurther thing to say about it,
(10:59):
which indeed might make them apotential further guest on your
program as a result of it, totake the conversation to the
next level.
So it is important that it isan engagement tool and not
simply a delivering a message.
I think you know there arethose that podcast and it's
almost like a how-to or it's andit's delivering almost a
(11:23):
webinar.
That's one of the big mistakesthat people make.
There is a very big differencebetween what you would deliver
in a webinar and how a podcastshould run, and I think that's
something people need to thinkabout quite a bit when they're
doing a podcast, because it'seasy to get.
I understand how you can fallinto a pattern and easily get
(11:43):
that confused.
People go with differentexpectations and you've got to
remember the atmosphere in whichpeople are listening to
podcasts Most people.
I've challenged the people thatare listening.
You know they send somecomments in about where you're
listening to this podcast at themoment.
You know, are you doing someexercise?
Are you, you know, doing somework, and you're in another
browser window doing that, orwhat is it that you're doing at
(12:06):
the time, whereas when you'resitting in a webinar, there's an
expectation that you're goingin to be educated and to learn
certain things.
You're also going in with anexpectation that, more than
likely, they're going to sellyou something at the end of it,
and a podcast is not about thatat all.
So I think there's a place forboth of them, but they're not
the same thing, and a podcast isnot about that at all.
So I think there's a place forboth of them, but they're not
(12:26):
the same thing.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
And a really good point there.
I'm going to use my ownpersonal experience of being a
podcast listener as opposed to ahost on this one.
People will consume theircontent in different ways.
There's a parallel to that tocorporate communication, again,
and communicating change.
People will respond indifferent ways to different
mediums.
For me, I listen to podcastswhen I'm walking the dogs.
(12:48):
Others will listen to themwhile they're in the car or at
the gym, as you said, or mayberelaxing on the couch with a
glass of wine.
So the way you present that isgoing to your audience will have
a big bearing on that andknowing how that's happening.
The best example I can think ofof one that works for me
because I've probably seen thefootage beforehand, but locally
(13:12):
there's the Aotearoa Rugbypodcast, which is produced by
Sky TV, and it's produced in atelevision format that's then
played back in an audio format.
So occasionally they havefootage of a game over the
weekend that they analyze andbreak down and from a listening
experience, it's very hard toget that on board and I think
that's something for people anymessage, podcast or not to talk
(13:35):
to is understanding what they'representing, who's consuming it
and how they might want toconsume it and not trying to do
too much in one go.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Yeah, and it is even to a similar point around sport
is.
Listen to the differencebetween commentary on radio
versus commentary on TV.
Yeah, tv is restricted by thepictures it can show, whereas
radio is not restricted by that,because you're painting the
picture with your words.
Also, the difference is TV canallow the visuals to speak for
(14:04):
themselves, whereas on radio youcan't have more than a second
of silence before alarms startsounding and that becomes a
problem.
So there really are verydifferent mediums and I think
it's important to not get thatconfused, particularly if you
are going to do a video-basedpodcast.
There's nothing wrong withvideo-based podcast, but do
(14:25):
understand that the word podcastis there for a particular
reason, but the expectation isthat people will be listening.
So if you are going to showsome footage in that particular
scenario, then you would have togive some pretty clear
commentary as to what ishappening, so that people that
are not watching are notpenalised and understand that,
(14:49):
because otherwise you do loseyour audience.
I mean, there's nothing worsethan saying just oh, you know,
look, as you're seeing on screenhere now and you're going.
Well, hang on.
I'm out for a run and I'mlistening into the podcast while
I'm out running.
I'm not watching it on YouTube,I'm listening to it on Apple or
Spotify, so I don't even havethe opportunity to pick up the
(15:11):
visual, even if I wanted to.
So it is important tounderstand the medium that
you're using and how you'reusing it, and I think that's
again that applies in businessas well.
People forget that the mediumthat they're using is really
important and also that peoplelearn differently, so some
(15:32):
people will love the video,other people will prefer the
audio and some people will justprefer the text, and that's the
beauty of being able to producethings in multiple platforms is
so that you can account forthose different people that
learn in different ways, but youdo have to be cognizant of all
of them when you're doingsomething like that, so that no
(15:54):
one platform feels isolated.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Definitely and that you're covering that broad
spectrum.
And I think your point thereabout commentary you've got me
thinking about some of the rugbygames I've listened to on the
radio which are, as a listener,a very different experience and
the level of detail, yeah, Ithink the one line that keeps
coming back to me is the ballgoes into touch 10 meters out
(16:19):
from halfway on the left-handside of the field.
Now I know exactly what thatmeans.
You're never going to get a TVreporter commentator saying that
because you saw it.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Well, I mean it's very simple.
I mean, if you listen to thecommentary on TV, they're doing
mostly calling names.
Because that's what youstruggle with as a viewer is,
you might not be as au fait tobe able to quickly and easily
identify who the people are.
So they'll name the differentplayers, but whereas in radio
(16:52):
they'll not only name theplayers, they'll say passes the
ball or kicks the ball, all ofthose kinds of things they're
adding in that bit, Whereas inTV they tend to add more
commentary.
And actually one of my biggestfrustrations in TV sports
particularly I'm more of a rugbyleague fan, but it applies to
rugby union as well is that whenthe TV commentators spend an
(17:13):
inordinate amount of timetelling you that this player
used to be at a different club10 years ago, Like who cares?
Seriously, stop telling me this.
You know my team's full ofplayers that played somewhere
else.
So what you know, but they dohave those fillers.
That's the point is that in TVthey're normally filling in with
things, the extra information,whereas in radio it's different.
(17:35):
Again and again, if you want tolook at really different, you go
to the cricket commentary,because cricket is completely
different, because it's a muchslower pace, particularly if
you're talking about test matchcricket, that the pace of which
the game is played is completelydifferent.
So listening on radio, that'swhat I grew up with, because I
remember listening to the BBCcommentary and the cricket
component would be, you know,like 5% of what they were
(17:58):
talking about.
They were talking about thecake that someone had brought
them or the golf that theyplayed on the weekend or other
amusing things that arehappening around the ground,
which was that colour fill,Whereas on TV, you know, they
could allow the pictures tospeak for themselves and it was
often the poignant littlecomments that made an impact,
that were more important thanfilling the space, because they
(18:22):
didn't need to fill the space.
So really is contrasting in inhow you approach those different
mediums, yeah, and and thatfilling the space.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
I think there's a lot of business leaders out there
who could probably take awayfrom that when communicating um
of how and when to fill space.
Because when you are deliveringa message to your people about
change that impacts their jobs,impacts potentially their
livelihoods, you've got to beclear that during that message,
if you're just standing up in ahalf hour presentation and
(18:52):
throwing a wall of words at themfor 30 minutes and some
PowerPoint deck, slide deck,that may not add any value to
that audience and they may comeacross more confused because you
haven't left any pauses or anyspace for any gaps to fill
themselves in.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Yeah, I was going to say the power of the pause is
huge and the power of the paceof which you deliver.
Different scenario to this, butit was to a community.
I was delivering a message itwas really a fundraising message
and it was an opportunity toget in front of them and speak
(19:30):
passionately about theparticular community
organization and what it wasdoing and how it needed people's
support.
And one of the things thatpeople said to me afterwards was
wow, I didn't know that youcould speak and project in that
way.
And it came across completelydifferently to the way you
(19:50):
normally deliver.
And I said, yeah, because itcalled for that.
I needed the messages to beshort and sharp.
I needed the messages to beshort and sharp.
I needed pauses, I needed thepace to which you were
delivering it to put emphasis onparticular words as you were
going through or particularideas so that they stuck there.
(20:10):
I remember one particularmessage was discounting a belief
that most people had thatfunding was coming from a
particular area and it wasn't.
So I made a very deliberatepause after I delivered that
message in a very short but slowpace, and that kind of thing
(20:33):
can make all of the differenceand I think people forget that a
lot, lot as well is how youdeliver messages is just as
important as what the messagesthemselves actually are.
And then I think it's so muchpainting the story around all of
that as well, because I thinkthat's where it often gets lost.
Yeah, is that the power of thestory is so huge?
(20:58):
It's the place where people getto understand a lot more about
who you are, your values, whatyou see as important, the way
you treat people in the scenarioof the picture that you've
painted.
I often use the example from abusiness scenario.
If we're having a conversationnow and you start talking about,
(21:21):
well, yesterday I was dealingwith a startup business, as
opposed to you coming on andsaying, well, yesterday I was
working with a company and theyhad about a hundred employees
that we were talking to, so inmy mind, I've got a completely
different view from one versusthe other as to who you deal
with.
It also gives a completelydifferent as you move through
(21:42):
that story.
How you engage with thosepeople will also demonstrate
your values, without youactually saying well, these are
my list of values and these arethe things that I do, and I
think that's the power of story.
We remember that and I thinkpeople hear this idea of story
and don't fully grasp it, and Ithink that is such an important
(22:04):
thing.
I often use this example withpeople where I say, if you want
to know the power of story, goand choose a hundred random
people anywhere and ask them totell you the story of Noah's Ark
.
Yeah, because everybody will beable to tell you that story in
a pretty similar way.
Whether they believe it or notis irrelevant, but they will
(22:32):
tell you that story.
Now, that is an incrediblypowerful thing to have a story
that is hundreds of years oldand still people will tell it in
the same way.
And we've got lots of examplesof that.
And it shows how the storiesare so powerful in a business
sense because, again to thatscenario where you might be
talking about some kind ofchange in a business sense, that
(22:55):
how people will hear it will becompletely different unless you
paint the picture with a story.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
And on that storytelling, this is going back
a few years now, but I was at aMicrosoft Ignite industry
conference 2015, 2016,.
I don't remember the year, butMicrosoft's chief storyteller
was there and he had a keynotesession and he had some really
good points about the power ofstories, both in writing and
(23:24):
visually as well and I'll comeback to the visual point in a
moment.
But one of the things hereferenced was that Microsoft,
with a few of the products theydeveloped over time,
particularly for the campusmanagement system, for their
core campus, they told the storythemselves and he said that
they were getting feedback frommainstream media big mainstream
(23:47):
media in the States saying whyare you telling this story?
That's our job.
And his point was yeah, butyou'll filter it.
If I'm telling the story, it'sunfiltered and I can tell it the
way I want to and get the keypoints across in the way I want
to.
I guess that's a reallyvaluable part of where you're
coming from with that story side, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, it is.
And I think the way you tell astory I mean we've all got
stories that we've told athousand times, but we rarely
tell them in the same waybecause it is about who's in
front of you at the time, and itis about not just the scenario
but the time you have.
I could tell you a story aboutwhat I ate for breakfast and I
(24:29):
could go and say, well, I gotout of bed and I walked to the
cupboard and et cetera, etcetera.
Or I could say, yeah, I had abowl of cereal this morning.
Now I'm telling you the samestory, that I had breakfast, but
the detail is differentdepending on the scenario.
You know, if there was ascenario about where, where you
are trying to judge you know thetime that I eat, you know what
(24:51):
time I eat breakfast, whetherI'm being healthy, about my
choices in breakfast, all ofthose kinds of things is very
different to, hey, just taking abox that I ate some breakfast.
And I think the point is as wellthat when people are listening,
what they hear are differentthings as well, like the
scenario in a business sense isso we're going to introduce this
(25:12):
new piece of technology that'sgoing to be whiz, bang right,
because some people will sitthere and they'll hear my job's
at risk.
That's all they will hear is ohmy goodness, I'm going to lose
my job.
The next person will hear wow,there's a great opportunity to
learn about new technology.
The third person will only hearwow, we're going to be really
(25:34):
churning out some more stuffhere.
This is going to switch on thepace.
I'm going to have to keep up.
So you could probably listabout another four or five
different ways that people couldhear exactly the same story.
So it's really important tounderstand that, even though
you're telling a story, that theway people will hear it will
depend on who they are and whatthey're about, and the real
(25:56):
challenge for any organizationis to try and get all of those
people onto the same page.
So the person sits there andgoes well, my job's not at risk.
What they're actually going todo is they're going to retrain
me and I'm going to give me newskills and I'm going, or they're
going to move me into anotherarea, because they know my core
skill is probably not matchedwith the technology but can move
me here, or indeed, maybe it istime to move on.
(26:21):
Maybe I'm not a match for thiscompany anymore, and maybe they
feel that way.
So, again, each individualscenario has different
potentials of where it can go,so that the filtering from the
storyteller is important as well, because if it's not that main
person that's telling it, thenthe risk is that the way the
(26:42):
second person tells it will beinfluenced by their own
individual bias and perceptionof what is happening, for better
or for worse, and so we allhave to understand that.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
Yeah, and I've drawn this before and used it on
LinkedIn and I'll drop a link toit in the show notes as well.
But what you've just describedis something I came across years
ago which I've branded thepyramid of knowledge, but it's
just a pretty way to put it, andit's the idea that you have
different tiers of knowledge andexpertise based on where the
(27:14):
message has been either received, heard or read, and so right at
the top of that pyramid is theexpert.
In your case, you're the expertof producing and creating and
developing podcasts.
The next layer, down from thatis people who have had a
conversation with you, mayberead your books, maybe gone
through your program.
They're not the expert, butthey're at least as close to you
as they're going to get.
But then, as they startdiluting that message further
(27:37):
and further away, you start toget more and more layers and
eventually you'll be at thefourth or fifth layer where
someone will be portrayingthemselves as an expert, but the
knowledge has been diluted downbecause they heard it from me,
who heard it from someone else,who heard it from someone else
who read it a book that youwrote and that message has it's.
It's chinese whispers, um, orthe old game of telephone.
(27:58):
It's just changed ever so much.
By the time it gets that fifthperson, they're sitting there
going I'm an expert.
Are you really, though?
Are you really an expert insomething that you have never
done at that top tier?
And that's something that,again, coming back into a
corporate world is, particularlywhen the leadership team stands
up there and says one thing,and there's someone in their
(28:19):
role who's been there for 20, 30years, they're an expert at
what they do.
They're going to hear a verydifferent message from someone
who's just been in there for 10minutes and has an MBA and not
much else.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, and I think as well, the features is a good way
of focusing in on that.
Someone's delivering somethingand it's saying, well, we've got
this new piece of technologyand it's going to do A, b, c, d,
e.
What people focus on goes well.
I didn't mention this thing,and this is where the biggest
problem is in the organization,and it doesn't have that feature
(29:04):
.
In fact, it's missing a featurethat we had in the previous
version now.
So now there's even more work.
You know that could be the waythat they go, and so it is
important to understand.
That's how we'll do it, and Ithink we've.
You know the thing.
The interesting thing about aChinese whisper scenario is that
it's going down the line, butsometimes you also have to
(29:25):
remember that people arestanding in the room and they're
hearing the same peoplespeaking at the same time, and
they will hear completelydifferent things, and I think
we've all had that in our, inour personal lives.
You know that you can bestanding there with it, whether
it's with your partner andfamily, or it could be just
friends, and what you hear andwhat they hear can be two
(29:49):
completely different things.
Yep, and that's just humannature, and so the important
thing is to try and grapple withthat and to bring people along
and understand where they mightbe because of their own
individual scenarios.
And so it is about trying tomake people feel comfortable but
(30:10):
understand where they areindividually address them.
Sometimes the mass message isnot the best way of delivering
it.
Sometimes it's important togive people that as an initial
opportunity, but then to takethat and drill it down to a much
more core level really is moreimportant, I think, than the
(30:33):
overall message.
It's because, particularly whenyou're talking about any kind
of change, no matter whetherthat change is a new piece of
technology or it's movinglocations, it's merging.
It's because, particularly whenyou're talking about any kind
of change, no matter whetherthat change is a new piece of
technology or it's movinglocations, it's merging, it's
any number of different thingsthat could be happening in a
business at any time.
How you deliver, that iseverything you know, absolutely
(30:53):
everything to the success thatyou'll have moving forward.
Because you can guarantee thatif you do just the mass message,
the Chinese whisper thing willhappen and that's how rumors
start flying.
I mean it's again let's use thesports analogy Anyone who's
listened to any sports programat any time anywhere in the
(31:14):
world will hear about some kindof rumor.
Where do those rumors start?
They start usually fromoverheard or misheard
conversations or even someonehypothesizing.
I've had that happen to me in awork scenario where I was on
work experience.
I wasn't even employed and Igot on particularly well with
someone in a control room and hewas joking oh you know, if I
(31:39):
ran the network, I'd do thisdifferently.
And I'd say, yeah, it'd begreat, if I ran the network, I'd
do this.
And it was just, we were justmessing around.
What we didn't know was thatsomeone who was a reasonably
junior at the time but employed,overheard our conversation,
then started a rumor that theythought that I was about to try
(32:02):
to work out a way to take overthe network.
I was on work experience andfortunately I heard it back from
someone that I was friendlywith on the team and said listen
, you've got to be carefulbecause they've heard this.
And we were able to confrontthe person and go.
You know it was a joke, youknow that, you know.
And so we shut it down, whichis great, right, and but I
(32:22):
learned that lesson very earlyon.
You don't know who's listening.
You don't know how they'regoing to perceive things.
You don't know what's on theirmind.
He he was a junior reporter atthe time.
He felt a little bit insecure.
I was coming in on workexperience, potentially with a
better background than what hehad in.
But you know, I wasn't workingin that way and maybe he felt
insecure about his job.
Actually I wasn't after his jobat all.
(32:42):
If he'd have bothered to havehad that conversation with me.
He was a on-camera journalist.
I wanted to be behind thescenes, so we weren't even
talking the same language andthat.
But that happens all the timein a business sense and I think
that's what's important tounderstand is where people's
mindset is at any given point isgoing to be different, and if
(33:04):
you're a CEO of a larger company, you're not going to know the
details of every individualemployee at that level.
But you have to, I guess, tryand find a way to make sure any
core messages are being filtereddown in the right way, and that
means delivering them inmultiple ways to multiple groups
(33:26):
and understanding that if it'sgoing to have a big impact on an
organization so we're nottalking about something small
hey, we've just.
You know, we decided we're goingto.
You know we're going to have aluncheon today.
You know we decided we're goingto.
You know we're going to have aluncheon today.
No, but if you're talking about, as I said, you know things
(33:47):
like mergers or relocating ornew technology or things that
are going to.
You know new people that arecoming into at a higher level in
the organization, all thosekinds of things that are going
to have a significant impact,it's worth your time to be
delivering those messages at asmaller level and not just
dismiss them as one simple ideaand off they go.
And again, if we bring it backto podcasting, one of the powers
(34:09):
of podcasting is that you'vegot that message that people can
go back and hear in their owntime and over time, and I think
also, then, that you've gotsomething that can then be
extracted and delivered inmultiple different ways.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
I was just going to say that you've got the ability
to, depending on what channelsyou're using.
If you're using video, you'vegot the ability to caption the
conversation as part of thevideo.
If it's audio only, which Itend to do, you've got show
notes, you've got a transcript,you've got everything else that
goes with it and obviously I'mstarting to establish a sub
stack channel that goesalongside the podcast, which has
(34:47):
more insights that go withemail, so you can build on a
whole range of different mediumsand still have a single podcast
and still have it all linked toeach other.
But the message has becomequite clear to everyone as to
what it actually is meaning.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
The one thing I love about the podcast platform is
that it has a cascading effect,that the authentic stories and
commentary that you provide in apodcast can then be transferred
into multiple different waysand multiple different platforms
.
So, yes, if you're recordingthe video, you can extract the
(35:24):
audio, you can extract thetranscript.
From the transcript you canextract multiple different short
forms or longer forms ofcontent.
You can write a short post, youcan write a longer blog article
, just as an example, from thevideos you get shorter videos
and indeed from the audio aswell.
And catering for all thosedifferent audiences because I
(35:47):
think that's the important thinghere too is for people to
understand is just the old daysof where I decided I'm going to
put out a newsletter on thethird Wednesday of the third
month, you know, every threemonths.
Great, that's wonderful for you.
Is that convenient for thepeople that are reading it?
You know, 20, 30 years ago, wedidn't have a choice.
(36:09):
The expectation was oh, this iswhen the newsletter comes out.
It's a bit like people used toqueue for the paper to be
released.
We knew the paper was atnewsstands at 5 am.
Therefore, we want to be thefirst to get the news, so we'd
be there waiting at 5 am.
Nowadays it's a 24-7 news cycle,and people are used to picking
up news on multiple platforms ina format that they want when
(36:32):
they want, and so, as a business, it's incumbent upon you to
deliver that in the same way,whether it's internally or
externally.
That's the expectation that hasbeen set, and if you are not
giving information into each ofthose different channels on a
consistent basis, then you'redoing yourself a disservice.
(36:53):
And you can't be everywhere allof the time, but you do have to
find where are the peopleplaying that are most important
to you.
You have to be thereconsistently for them and
understand that feeds aredifferent for everybody, no
matter what platform you're on,so they may or may not see it.
You want them to subscribe tothings so that they do see it,
(37:15):
and just because you post it at9am doesn't mean they're going
to see it at 9.01.
They may not see it until thenext day, tuesday, or two or
three days later.
I mean, for example, I lookedin my Facebook feed this morning
and I saw a really interestingpost and I thought, oh, I was
(37:36):
reading that maybe I'll share itwith a couple of people.
Then I went back and looked.
Actually, it was from threedays ago, so that's just how it
landed in my feed at the time.
There's nothing wrong with that, but the chances are the people
that I might have wanted toshare it with have probably
already seen it, so that's okay.
It's not a problem, it's justhow it came to me, and that's
the thing, that a lot of thisstuff is even out of our own
(37:57):
control, let alone the fact thatI may not have looked at
Facebook for five days, for oursake.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
And your point there on the news cycle is relevant to
all of this as well.
My wife and I actually weretalking yesterday about.
We both grew up in homes wherethe six o'clock news bulletin
was sort of sacrosanct anddinner had to be ready and
everything had to be done sothat mum and or dad or both
could watch the six o'clock newsand thinking about it as you're
(38:27):
talking, I haven't watched thesix o'clock news in probably the
better part of a decade and infact the last time I really
thought about it was probably inthe car and I remember joking
with a family member about this.
I was in the car and the advertfor the six o'clock bulletin
came up at like 4.30 and theanchor was something happened at
America Day.
(38:48):
We'll reveal what happened nextat six o'clock.
And I'm like you mean revealwhat happened next.
I read about that 12 hours agoon the news side.
What are you revealing to me?
That's not new, this is old andI guess that's to play that
into a corporate communicationslens as well.
That's something you've got tobe careful of with the way your
employees not just how rumorsstart, but employee will talk
(39:09):
and information will get sharedpretty quickly.
And if you are scrambling tocatch up on that, you've already
probably failed to deliver themessage.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Yeah, and you're right and, with all the best of
intentions of trying to keepthings secret, things slip.
Whether they're deliberate ornot, they slip and or there are
signs that people read andinterpret you might be.
For example, you might beplanning to buy a major piece of
capital equipment for it, andthe only person that, the only
(39:42):
person that might know, is theCFO.
But the people in the accountsdepartment are going well, hang
on, there's money that's beingput aside here that you know
they're going to spend it.
What are they going to spend iton?
It looks like it's a fairlysignificant piece.
Ah, they must be buying.
They'll put two and twotogether and work it out and
they'll tell 10 people withouteven thinking about it because
(40:03):
they don't know that it'sconfidential.
They're just looking at it andgoing well, it looks like
they're going to be.
They're shaping up to do thisand get it again.
Use the sports analogy.
I mean you hear players beingtraded.
So we're really interested in.
You know, this team is reallyinterested in getting this
player and you, and immediatelyyou go.
If we're releasing this player,that must mean we're freeing up
(40:23):
money so that we can go and buythis player over here and go
hang on.
How do we work that out?
Like is that?
There are, you know, but it'sthe nature of human beings and
and how we, how we think andwhere we go.
So, with all of that in mind,you have to be really cautious
in how you approach things,whether it's your existing
(40:45):
internal team or whether it's anexternal audience.
You need to understand thatthese things will happen,
they'll get out.
So better to be on top of itand better to be proactive in
what you're doing and talking topeople about where you're going
, because, equally, equally, youdon't know where those
opportunities lie.
I get sometimes there arethings that have to be kept
confidential for legal reasons,and I understand that that that
(41:07):
can happen and you usually tryand keep a very tight rein on
that.
But the majority of stuff thathappens in business often it can
be.
You know, we were actuallythinking of doing this and
actually putting that out therefor a conversation, both
internally and externally, canreveal lots of things.
It's really interesting whenyou look at it again.
(41:28):
It's easy to bring it back tothe media because people
understand that and I won't usean Australian example because I,
you know, realize that noteveryone would be familiar with
it, but there are programs thatwe watch on TV that get axed
right and we often don't have anidea as to why they're being
axed Now.
Sometimes the TV stations makea decision going well the
(41:50):
ratings are poor, thereforewe'll stop supporting this
program and we'll bring onanother program.
Now the interesting thing aboutthat is could they have twisted
?
Do they know what the audiencethinks and why they've stopped
watching?
Could it be that there was aparticular person on the program
or a particular storyline orsomething that was happening
(42:10):
that has had a negative impact?
That could be shifted, or youcould experiment with that,
versus taking the extremeexample of removing the program
and putting something else back.
I mean, there's even a simplething that happened recently.
There's a program where theyasked the host.
Now, if they had bothered toask the audience, they would
(42:32):
have heard that the one thingthat was not wrong with that
show was the host, the one thingthat everyone loved the most
and that why people kept comingback was because of the host.
There were other things on theprogram that could have been
changed, but the host isdefinitely not the thing that
they should have changed.
And what does that lead to Awhole outpouring of people that
are saying no and signingpetitions and all of that kind
(42:56):
of stuff.
The deed is done, I assume, andso they're unlikely to go back
on their word.
Now the question will be whathappens?
Because you see the audienceall going well, if they're going
to change it to this person I'mnot watching anymore so will
they have attracted more peoplewho do like the new one versus
(43:17):
the people that they're going tolose because of the old one?
Again, having that conversationwith the audience, there's lots
of different ways to try andtest it out.
There's market research thatcan be done if you want to be
formal about it, but there'sinformal conversations that can
happen.
Hey, we're thinking of doingthis in the business.
What's your take on that?
(43:37):
We're thinking of doing this inthe business, what's your take
on that?
And you'll get some greatopinions, and there'll be some
you'll discard immediatelybecause you realize that they're
biased or they're just not yourflavor, and sometimes you'll
just ignore them anyway, but youtake them on board so you
understand what you can learn.
Speaker 1 (43:56):
And technology is a good note to start to close on
here.
But technology gives us theability to get in front of that
audience much faster and muchquicker as well.
And the example I'm thinking ofhere.
Bringing it right back to sport, on Saturday night the
international calendar kickedoff for rugby, so the All Blacks
had their first test againstFrance, and something that I
(44:17):
noted hadn't seen before in thebroadcast was they were using QR
codes for fan engagement.
So they had QR code at thestart to say it was basic
five-question poll how do youfeel about the team, what are
our chances and that wasdynamically updated in real time
as people were scanning thecode and so it was being
broadcast in real time.
But then later on they hadanother QR code for fan
(44:37):
engagement to pick man of thematch.
Now, that's not a new thing.
Fans have been able to pick manof the match before, normally
with a text in or with a writein, but you're able to see that
in real time all of a sudden.
And that lesson can go back tocorporates, it can go back to
television studios who arelooking for that feedback,
because you can actually getsome some.
You can use some very simpletechnology qr codes, arc
(44:57):
conflicts to get real-timefeedback and get that mood, or
even even if it's slightlydelayed feedback.
We've delivered our message.
We've given you time to thinkabout it.
Now come and give us yourfeedback through a, through a
poll, or through a forum, orthrough it, through a, through a
, through a very simple surveythat's anonymous, because we
know people don't want to puttheir name against this.
You're going to get that, toget that feedback that you can
(45:18):
then take and respond to in thenext part and say, hey, we
listened and this is what we'rechanging as a result.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Absolutely, and I've seen it done with very simple
apps that people can downloadfor free, and I've been in a
room where there's maybe 20people and we're learning about
something and the persondelivering it saying, well,
where do you think this could go?
What's your take on it?
And it might be an ABCDscenario, and in real time you
(45:45):
get where people's heads are atand it's really interesting
seeing that.
And what's also interesting isseeing the pack mentality,
because what you will see,depending on when you decide to
deliver the results, it's reallyinteresting If you put up the
results live, so people areseeing it.
(46:05):
How people are responding willinfluence how the other people
are responding in one of twoways.
They'll either want to be withoh, everyone's picking A, so I
better pick A or they'll goeveryone's picking A.
I therefore want to pick, orthey go everyone's picking A.
I therefore want to pick D, andI want everyone to know that
I'm picking D, because suddenlyit'll go from 100% down to 75%
(46:28):
and 25% here and then so on aswe're going through it.
So I think that's one of theinteresting things too, and to
understand that mentality.
You know, even in I know marketresearchers will tell you this
as well, that when you and I'vedone this myself when you are
asking for people's opinions onthings, and particularly if
(46:50):
you're in a group, the bestthing to do initially is to get
them to write it down beforethey discuss it.
And yet, where anyone says aword because otherwise people
will have a reaction to whoeveris the loudest voice initially,
and that can be a good and a badthing, and it's fine in a
conversation sense.
But it's also interesting toknow where that is, because
we've all been in conversationswhere someone says oh yeah, I
(47:11):
was going to say that, were youreally?
I don't know if you really weregoing to say that, and so it is
actually interesting to measurethat.
And I think the lesson here, atthe end of the day, is that
technology can help you reallyunderstand where people's
mindsets are at and thereforeadjusting your messages or
(47:34):
getting more personal with themto in order to be able to engage
them better, which is going toextract better performance for
your business and betterperformance, you know, for teams
and job satisfaction, andultimately, the business grows
as a result of all of that.
And I think it's simple, butcommunication is absolutely the
fundamental key to the successof an organization and I always
(47:58):
used to say to business ownerswhen I dealt with them more
directly on this sort ofscenario, is that if every job
description does not havecommunication as a core
deliverable, then you have aproblem.
It has to be For every positionin every business.
You have a problem.
It has to be For every positionin every business.
(48:18):
Communication is a coredeliverable, no matter what they
are doing, and I think that'soverlooked too often and it's
where things just go astray,definitely definitely, and I
think that's a great note tofinish on that communication
being a fundamental element ofevery business.
Speaker 1 (48:33):
Just to wrap up, anthony, is there anything else
you want to add, anything wehaven't covered you wanted to
bring in, or a final thought?
Speaker 2 (48:41):
look, I just I think the biggest lesson that I would
give to people that are outthere listening that the more
that you can share yourauthentic stories, the more that
you can deliver things morepersonally to an audience
consistently, the more that youare going to stand out.
You know, for my podcast it'sabout thought leadership and
(49:02):
that's you can't be a thoughtleader if you don't have an
outlet for delivering yourmessages to a broader audience.
You know, the power ofpodcasting is very much about
being able to deliverconsistently to educate and
nurture an audience, bothinternally and externally, and I
think to me that's such a corething.
Don't be afraid to communicate,because if you are and if
(49:23):
you're holding back, no matterwhere you are within a business,
then the chances are thatsomeone is going to end up being
dissatisfied and somewherealong the way someone is going
to make a crucial mistake.
And if you care at all, thencommunicating is core.
Speaker 1 (49:42):
Absolutely.
Thank you very much for that,Anthony, and for anyone looking
for Anthony's show, we'll put alink in the show notes, but it's
Biz Bytes for Thought Leadersand it's available on all Goods
podcast channels.
Speaker 2 (49:53):
Absolutely, and thank you so much for having me on
your show.
It's great that we'll be ableto do the swap, and so we've
both been on BizBytes kind oflike stereo, isn't it?
Bizbytes and two Anthonys howmuch better can you get?
Speaker 1 (50:08):
And for those of you who have listened all the way to
the point, your feedback isvaluable.
Communication goes both ways,so please do put some comments
in or respond to the email whenit comes out via sub stack.
Speaker 2 (50:26):
Thanks very much for having me.
I really appreciate it and, yes, we will definitely continue
this conversation.
Excellent Thanks, anthonyno-transcript.
Welcome to a crossover episode of Biz Bytes.
Today my guest Anthony Pearljoins us from his podcast Biz
Bytes for Thought Leaders Nowslightly different focuses,
slightly different audiences,but we thought two Anthony's
with a podcast, each called BizBytes, was too good an
opportunity not to pass up,Despite our utterly different
(00:23):
accents.
See if you can pick up on thatand program emphasis.
We got together.
I joined Anthony on his andtoday he's on mine In this
episode.
Anthony and I dive deep into thefundamental topic of
communication.
We draw on Anthony's extensivebackground in broadcast
journalism, talkback radio andhis current business focused on
(00:44):
Podcast Done For you to explorehow effective communication is
the core to engaging audiences.
We're going to discuss some keythemes, including two-way
communication.
It's not a one-way street.
It still requires listening toyour audience, understanding
your audience crucial formarketing and internal
businesses.
Engagement tool how to fosterinteraction beyond just
(01:05):
listening.
Tailoring messages, adaptingyour content to different
medians and expectations.
The power of storytelling, howstories convey values and
simplify complex information.
The nuance of message delivery,why the same message is heard
differently and how to preventmisinterpretation.
Leveraging technology forfeedback.
Using those modern tools toensure your message lands.
And communication as a coredeliverable, why it's
(01:28):
fundamental to organizationalsuccess.
So get ready for an insightfulconversation between two
Anthonys about how to trulyconnect and communicate with
your audience, both inside andoutside your business.
Anthony, welcome to BizBytes.
Speaker 2 (01:45):
And it's good to be on another BizBytes program.
Welcome, Anthony, it's nice tobe with you again.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
Likewise for those who haven't picked up through
the introduction, Anthony Pearl,my guest today, also has his
own channel called BizBytes.
And when we found that twoAnthony's across two different
countries I can't pick up fromthe accents One of us is
Australian, One of us is KiwiI'll let you work out who's who
but both of us have our ownchannel called Biz Bytes and we
thought it was too good to notdo a crossover between us.
(02:13):
So we've already done AnthonyPearl's Biz Bytes and today it's
Anthony McMahon's Biz Bytes.
Speaker 2 (02:19):
A lot of fun and it's so weird how it happened.
And it's so weird how ithappened.
I think we kind of shared it alittle bit on my program, but it
came from a mutual contact ofours that you asked to be on
your program and said, but hangon, I've been on Biz Bytes with
Anthony already and it turns outshe'd been a guest on my
program.
So I love it.
(02:39):
There's room for two of us andwe do have slightly different
programs and slightly differentemphasis on things.
So it keeps it interesting.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
Absolutely.
It's a good point.
There's a very, very minutedifference in that.
Obviously, mine has atechnology focus, so it bites
with a Y and yours is just bitespelt normally.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
It is and mine is BizBytes for thought leaders, so
it does have that extension alittle bit.
But you're right, If you're notpaying close attention, people
won't know they can hardly tellthe difference in the accents
either.
Speaker 1 (03:08):
I know, I know we joked about this before, but
there's people out there whowon't even know the difference
between the accents and they'llbe like what are you guys
talking about?
You sound the same.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
No one in Australia or New Zealand will ever think
that?
Speaker 1 (03:25):
No, not at all.
So, anthony, tell us a bitabout yourself.
How did you get to your journeyof creating a podcast?
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah, it sort of probably goes back to my youth.
I was always fascinated withradio.
I grew up with that fascinationand I'm not quite sure why, but
it always played an importantpart.
I remember very young beinggiven a little radio set that
you had to make and run longwires out the window and I'd be
(03:53):
listening to the cricket fromother parts of the world.
And I was always fascinatedwith radio and the idea of
storytelling and being the firstthen to be able to get
information from there and shareit with other people.
So it was almost like if Ithink back on it now, it was
almost like having my own radioprogram based on the radio
programs I was listening to,because I'd go to school and say
(04:13):
, did you hear about this anddid you hear about that?
And invariably there werepeople that hadn't listened to
what you'd listened to.
So you were able to share thatnews and it kind of fed from
there.
And I went to university and dida BA in broadcast journalism
and communications and fromthere I ended up working in the
media, particularly in talkbackradio, but also in TV for a
(04:35):
little while, and it was allabout the creating stories and
that was really what it boileddown to engaging audiences and
creating these images for peopleand I just absolutely
fascinated with it and I guessafter after I worked in the
industry for a few years, Iended up gravitating into the
(04:55):
corporate sector where I wasdoing what was the early days of
a communications manager.
It really was a new title atthat point and kind of an
extension of what I'd been doing.
But it's taken some time for itto come back fully to the whole
podcasting thing, probably acouple of years ago now where
I'd been dabbling with my ownpodcast Biz Bites for Thought
(05:17):
Leaders and it led to a fewpeople asking me that knew about
my background if I would helpthem with their podcast and we
found some gaps in the marketand it's sort of taken a life of
its own from there, so reallyhas now become the day-to-day
focus of my business.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
It's solely around podcasts done for you and
there's an interesting pointthat you put in there that I'm
going to drive a little bittowards as we have our
conversation going, and that'swhere you went through a
communications manager role andI think you'd agree with this
statement.
But I'm going to throw it outthere and you can challenge it
if you don't in that a podcastis purely about communicating to
(06:02):
an audience, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yes, and I think the important point here is
communication is a two-waystreet.
A lot of people think of itreally as one way, but it's not.
You have to be listening toyour audience, because if you're
talking to everybody and notmember is sitting there
listening and thinking you'retalking to me and that's what we
want to happen in any givenpodcast, because that's how you
(06:32):
make them then feel the need toengage with you.
Beyond that, which is obviouslywhat part of the purpose is,
for a podcast is deliveringpeople's expertise to the
audience, and I think a lot ofthat.
People get wrong and a lot of itthere's an people fall into a
few different patterns inpodcasts and I've seen them go
(06:55):
astray for that reason.
But I think when you dumb itdown, it should be that and
that's the big, biggest lessonthat I learned when I was in,
you know, talk radio was that,even though you've got hundreds
of thousands of listeners at anygiven time, it's when people
think that you're talking tothem, that they feel involved in
(07:17):
the process.
You want them in a sense, intheir own home, talking back to
the radio going.
No, I don't agree with that, orI agree with that, or yes,
you've got it right.
And obviously you want them tocall in that particular sense as
well, but that's really whatyou want people doing, even if
it's not actually saying it andjust nodding their head or
ticking that off in their mind.
That's what's important,because that's how it endears
(07:40):
people to you.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
Yeah, and the parallel there and I'm going to
keep bringing this back to thethemes of BizBytes in terms of
what we're talking about isexactly the same way that
organizations need to managetheir change when they go
through a process of change fortheir systems, for their people,
for their processes is you'vegot to communicate, and that
communication has got to be bothways.
(08:03):
And in the research I've doneon Project Failure, one of the
biggest reasons projects fail ispartly because they never
achieve the outcomes that theyset out to do, but also partly
because the communication justwasn't there and the audience
never found out why that changewas happening, so they just
carried on doing what they did.
And I think there's a lessonthere that can be taken from the
(08:24):
podcast world, the radio world,the radio world, the
communication world and to anyleader in a business, of how you
communicate and who you'recommunicating to.
Speaker 2 (08:34):
It's so important.
You know, I think a lot of thetime people forget particularly
when the companies start to geta little bit larger that you
can't just tell people.
This is what we're doing.
You not only have to have aconversation with them and
explain it to them, but you haveto listen to what their
concerns are and address themand get out in front of them,
(08:56):
and that, in a sense, is alsobasic marketing.
I mean, I remember years agodoing a marketing exercise for a
company that did put waterslides into people's homes,
right Home swimming pools.
Now, as a parent, immediately inyour mind, you're going why
would I do that?
Like there's just so many,there's so many hazards and
(09:19):
things that you can think ofimmediately, and so the job
really had to be in excuse me inunderstanding the audience and
understanding what thoseconcerns would be and jumping on
them in advance, so that we hada whole lot of marketing around
these ideas that had safetyfeatures and all of that kind of
stuff that might be a concernof parents, to get out in front
(09:41):
of them and it's no different ina business sense as well.
You have to understand whatpeople's concerns might be, no
matter how small they might beand you want to get in front of
addressing them, so they feellike they've been heard, and
then you're talking to them andaddressing them.
They still might not agree, butat least you've got them out
there.
But I think it's also thenequally providing channels for
(10:03):
people to bring forward theirideas or their concerns, so that
you can, in turn, get a morepersonal approach in addressing
things.
Speaker 1 (10:13):
Absolutely.
And that channels is a reallygood one because at the end of
the day maybe much like radiopodcast is almost a very one
directional flow.
If you're not careful, almost avery one-directional flow.
If you're not careful, I meanwe're sitting here, we've got
our microphones running, we'retalking, we're having a
conversation, but it's not tillthe episode plays and maybe
someone gives you feedback thatyou actually know how it lands.
Speaker 2 (10:36):
Yeah, and that's why, you know, obviously comments
and things like that are reallyimportant and people wanting to
engage with you separately, butit's also why things like social
media are important, becauseyou can take elements of the
podcast and you talk to them ona social platform and it gives
people an opportunity to engageand say they agree, they
disagree or they might have afurther thing to say about it,
(10:59):
which indeed might make them apotential further guest on your
program as a result of it, totake the conversation to the
next level.
So it is important that it isan engagement tool and not
simply a delivering a message.
I think you know there arethose that podcast and it's
almost like a how-to or it's andit's delivering almost a
(11:23):
webinar.
That's one of the big mistakesthat people make.
There is a very big differencebetween what you would deliver
in a webinar and how a podcastshould run, and I think that's
something people need to thinkabout quite a bit when they're
doing a podcast, because it'seasy to get.
I understand how you can fallinto a pattern and easily get
(11:43):
that confused.
People go with differentexpectations and you've got to
remember the atmosphere in whichpeople are listening to
podcasts Most people.
I've challenged the people thatare listening.
You know they send somecomments in about where you're
listening to this podcast at themoment.
You know, are you doing someexercise?
Are you, you know, doing somework, and you're in another
browser window doing that, orwhat is it that you're doing at
(12:06):
the time, whereas when you'resitting in a webinar, there's an
expectation that you're goingin to be educated and to learn
certain things.
You're also going in with anexpectation that, more than
likely, they're going to sellyou something at the end of it,
and a podcast is not about thatat all.
So I think there's a place forboth of them, but they're not
the same thing, and a podcast isnot about that at all.
So I think there's a place forboth of them, but they're not
(12:26):
the same thing.
Speaker 1 (12:28):
And a really good point there.
I'm going to use my ownpersonal experience of being a
podcast listener as opposed to ahost on this one.
People will consume theircontent in different ways.
There's a parallel to that tocorporate communication, again,
and communicating change.
People will respond indifferent ways to different
mediums.
For me, I listen to podcastswhen I'm walking the dogs.
(12:48):
Others will listen to themwhile they're in the car or at
the gym, as you said, or mayberelaxing on the couch with a
glass of wine.
So the way you present that isgoing to your audience will have
a big bearing on that andknowing how that's happening.
The best example I can think ofof one that works for me
because I've probably seen thefootage beforehand, but locally
(13:12):
there's the Aotearoa Rugbypodcast, which is produced by
Sky TV, and it's produced in atelevision format that's then
played back in an audio format.
So occasionally they havefootage of a game over the
weekend that they analyze andbreak down and from a listening
experience, it's very hard toget that on board and I think
that's something for people anymessage, podcast or not to talk
(13:35):
to is understanding what they'representing, who's consuming it
and how they might want toconsume it and not trying to do
too much in one go.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Yeah, and it is even to a similar point around sport
is.
Listen to the differencebetween commentary on radio
versus commentary on TV.
Yeah, tv is restricted by thepictures it can show, whereas
radio is not restricted by that,because you're painting the
picture with your words.
Also, the difference is TV canallow the visuals to speak for
(14:04):
themselves, whereas on radio youcan't have more than a second
of silence before alarms startsounding and that becomes a
problem.
So there really are verydifferent mediums and I think
it's important to not get thatconfused, particularly if you
are going to do a video-basedpodcast.
There's nothing wrong withvideo-based podcast, but do
(14:25):
understand that the word podcastis there for a particular
reason, but the expectation isthat people will be listening.
So if you are going to showsome footage in that particular
scenario, then you would have togive some pretty clear
commentary as to what ishappening, so that people that
are not watching are notpenalised and understand that,
(14:49):
because otherwise you do loseyour audience.
I mean, there's nothing worsethan saying just oh, you know,
look, as you're seeing on screenhere now and you're going.
Well, hang on.
I'm out for a run and I'mlistening into the podcast while
I'm out running.
I'm not watching it on YouTube,I'm listening to it on Apple or
Spotify, so I don't even havethe opportunity to pick up the
(15:11):
visual, even if I wanted to.
So it is important tounderstand the medium that
you're using and how you'reusing it, and I think that's
again that applies in businessas well.
People forget that the mediumthat they're using is really
important and also that peoplelearn differently, so some
(15:32):
people will love the video,other people will prefer the
audio and some people will justprefer the text, and that's the
beauty of being able to producethings in multiple platforms is
so that you can account forthose different people that
learn in different ways, but youdo have to be cognizant of all
of them when you're doingsomething like that, so that no
(15:54):
one platform feels isolated.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Definitely and that you're covering that broad
spectrum.
And I think your point thereabout commentary you've got me
thinking about some of the rugbygames I've listened to on the
radio which are, as a listener,a very different experience and
the level of detail, yeah, Ithink the one line that keeps
coming back to me is the ballgoes into touch 10 meters out
(16:19):
from halfway on the left-handside of the field.
Now I know exactly what thatmeans.
You're never going to get a TVreporter commentator saying that
because you saw it.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Well, I mean it's very simple.
I mean, if you listen to thecommentary on TV, they're doing
mostly calling names.
Because that's what youstruggle with as a viewer is,
you might not be as au fait tobe able to quickly and easily
identify who the people are.
So they'll name the differentplayers, but whereas in radio
(16:52):
they'll not only name theplayers, they'll say passes the
ball or kicks the ball, all ofthose kinds of things they're
adding in that bit, Whereas inTV they tend to add more
commentary.
And actually one of my biggestfrustrations in TV sports
particularly I'm more of a rugbyleague fan, but it applies to
rugby union as well is that whenthe TV commentators spend an
(17:13):
inordinate amount of timetelling you that this player
used to be at a different club10 years ago, Like who cares?
Seriously, stop telling me this.
You know my team's full ofplayers that played somewhere
else.
So what you know, but they dohave those fillers.
That's the point is that in TVthey're normally filling in with
things, the extra information,whereas in radio it's different.
(17:35):
Again and again, if you want tolook at really different, you go
to the cricket commentary,because cricket is completely
different, because it's a muchslower pace, particularly if
you're talking about test matchcricket, that the pace of which
the game is played is completelydifferent.
So listening on radio, that'swhat I grew up with, because I
remember listening to the BBCcommentary and the cricket
component would be, you know,like 5% of what they were
(17:58):
talking about.
They were talking about thecake that someone had brought
them or the golf that theyplayed on the weekend or other
amusing things that arehappening around the ground,
which was that colour fill,Whereas on TV, you know, they
could allow the pictures tospeak for themselves and it was
often the poignant littlecomments that made an impact,
that were more important thanfilling the space, because they
(18:22):
didn't need to fill the space.
So really is contrasting in inhow you approach those different
mediums, yeah, and and thatfilling the space.
Speaker 1 (18:31):
I think there's a lot of business leaders out there
who could probably take awayfrom that when communicating um
of how and when to fill space.
Because when you are deliveringa message to your people about
change that impacts their jobs,impacts potentially their
livelihoods, you've got to beclear that during that message,
if you're just standing up in ahalf hour presentation and
(18:52):
throwing a wall of words at themfor 30 minutes and some
PowerPoint deck, slide deck,that may not add any value to
that audience and they may comeacross more confused because you
haven't left any pauses or anyspace for any gaps to fill
themselves in.
Speaker 2 (19:10):
Yeah, I was going to say the power of the pause is
huge and the power of the paceof which you deliver.
Different scenario to this, butit was to a community.
I was delivering a message itwas really a fundraising message
and it was an opportunity toget in front of them and speak
(19:30):
passionately about theparticular community
organization and what it wasdoing and how it needed people's
support.
And one of the things thatpeople said to me afterwards was
wow, I didn't know that youcould speak and project in that
way.
And it came across completelydifferently to the way you
(19:50):
normally deliver.
And I said, yeah, because itcalled for that.
I needed the messages to beshort and sharp.
I needed the messages to beshort and sharp.
I needed pauses, I needed thepace to which you were
delivering it to put emphasis onparticular words as you were
going through or particularideas so that they stuck there.
(20:10):
I remember one particularmessage was discounting a belief
that most people had thatfunding was coming from a
particular area and it wasn't.
So I made a very deliberatepause after I delivered that
message in a very short but slowpace, and that kind of thing
(20:33):
can make all of the differenceand I think people forget that a
lot, lot as well is how youdeliver messages is just as
important as what the messagesthemselves actually are.
And then I think it's so muchpainting the story around all of
that as well, because I thinkthat's where it often gets lost.
Yeah, is that the power of thestory is so huge?
(20:58):
It's the place where people getto understand a lot more about
who you are, your values, whatyou see as important, the way
you treat people in the scenarioof the picture that you've
painted.
I often use the example from abusiness scenario.
If we're having a conversationnow and you start talking about,
(21:21):
well, yesterday I was dealingwith a startup business, as
opposed to you coming on andsaying, well, yesterday I was
working with a company and theyhad about a hundred employees
that we were talking to, so inmy mind, I've got a completely
different view from one versusthe other as to who you deal
with.
It also gives a completelydifferent as you move through
(21:42):
that story.
How you engage with thosepeople will also demonstrate
your values, without youactually saying well, these are
my list of values and these arethe things that I do, and I
think that's the power of story.
We remember that and I thinkpeople hear this idea of story
and don't fully grasp it, and Ithink that is such an important
(22:04):
thing.
I often use this example withpeople where I say, if you want
to know the power of story, goand choose a hundred random
people anywhere and ask them totell you the story of Noah's Ark
.
Yeah, because everybody will beable to tell you that story in
a pretty similar way.
Whether they believe it or notis irrelevant, but they will
(22:32):
tell you that story.
Now, that is an incrediblypowerful thing to have a story
that is hundreds of years oldand still people will tell it in
the same way.
And we've got lots of examplesof that.
And it shows how the storiesare so powerful in a business
sense because, again to thatscenario where you might be
talking about some kind ofchange in a business sense, that
(22:55):
how people will hear it will becompletely different unless you
paint the picture with a story.
Speaker 1 (23:00):
And on that storytelling, this is going back
a few years now, but I was at aMicrosoft Ignite industry
conference 2015, 2016,.
I don't remember the year, butMicrosoft's chief storyteller
was there and he had a keynotesession and he had some really
good points about the power ofstories, both in writing and
(23:24):
visually as well and I'll comeback to the visual point in a
moment.
But one of the things hereferenced was that Microsoft,
with a few of the products theydeveloped over time,
particularly for the campusmanagement system, for their
core campus, they told the storythemselves and he said that
they were getting feedback frommainstream media big mainstream
(23:47):
media in the States saying whyare you telling this story?
That's our job.
And his point was yeah, butyou'll filter it.
If I'm telling the story, it'sunfiltered and I can tell it the
way I want to and get the keypoints across in the way I want
to.
I guess that's a reallyvaluable part of where you're
coming from with that story side, isn't it?
Speaker 2 (24:06):
Yeah, it is.
And I think the way you tell astory I mean we've all got
stories that we've told athousand times, but we rarely
tell them in the same waybecause it is about who's in
front of you at the time, and itis about not just the scenario
but the time you have.
I could tell you a story aboutwhat I ate for breakfast and I
(24:29):
could go and say, well, I gotout of bed and I walked to the
cupboard and et cetera, etcetera.
Or I could say, yeah, I had abowl of cereal this morning.
Now I'm telling you the samestory, that I had breakfast, but
the detail is differentdepending on the scenario.
You know, if there was ascenario about where, where you
are trying to judge you know thetime that I eat, you know what
(24:51):
time I eat breakfast, whetherI'm being healthy, about my
choices in breakfast, all ofthose kinds of things is very
different to, hey, just taking abox that I ate some breakfast.
And I think the point is as wellthat when people are listening,
what they hear are differentthings as well, like the
scenario in a business sense isso we're going to introduce this
(25:12):
new piece of technology that'sgoing to be whiz, bang right,
because some people will sitthere and they'll hear my job's
at risk.
That's all they will hear is ohmy goodness, I'm going to lose
my job.
The next person will hear wow,there's a great opportunity to
learn about new technology.
The third person will only hearwow, we're going to be really
(25:34):
churning out some more stuffhere.
This is going to switch on thepace.
I'm going to have to keep up.
So you could probably listabout another four or five
different ways that people couldhear exactly the same story.
So it's really important tounderstand that, even though
you're telling a story, that theway people will hear it will
depend on who they are and whatthey're about, and the real
(25:56):
challenge for any organizationis to try and get all of those
people onto the same page.
So the person sits there andgoes well, my job's not at risk.
What they're actually going todo is they're going to retrain
me and I'm going to give me newskills and I'm going, or they're
going to move me into anotherarea, because they know my core
skill is probably not matchedwith the technology but can move
me here, or indeed, maybe it istime to move on.
(26:21):
Maybe I'm not a match for thiscompany anymore, and maybe they
feel that way.
So, again, each individualscenario has different
potentials of where it can go,so that the filtering from the
storyteller is important as well, because if it's not that main
person that's telling it, thenthe risk is that the way the
(26:42):
second person tells it will beinfluenced by their own
individual bias and perceptionof what is happening, for better
or for worse, and so we allhave to understand that.
Speaker 1 (26:53):
Yeah, and I've drawn this before and used it on
LinkedIn and I'll drop a link toit in the show notes as well.
But what you've just describedis something I came across years
ago which I've branded thepyramid of knowledge, but it's
just a pretty way to put it, andit's the idea that you have
different tiers of knowledge andexpertise based on where the
(27:14):
message has been either received, heard or read, and so right at
the top of that pyramid is theexpert.
In your case, you're the expertof producing and creating and
developing podcasts.
The next layer, down from thatis people who have had a
conversation with you, mayberead your books, maybe gone
through your program.
They're not the expert, butthey're at least as close to you
as they're going to get.
But then, as they startdiluting that message further
(27:37):
and further away, you start toget more and more layers and
eventually you'll be at thefourth or fifth layer where
someone will be portrayingthemselves as an expert, but the
knowledge has been diluted downbecause they heard it from me,
who heard it from someone else,who heard it from someone else
who read it a book that youwrote and that message has it's.
It's chinese whispers, um, orthe old game of telephone.
(27:58):
It's just changed ever so much.
By the time it gets that fifthperson, they're sitting there
going I'm an expert.
Are you really, though?
Are you really an expert insomething that you have never
done at that top tier?
And that's something that,again, coming back into a
corporate world is, particularlywhen the leadership team stands
up there and says one thing,and there's someone in their
(28:19):
role who's been there for 20, 30years, they're an expert at
what they do.
They're going to hear a verydifferent message from someone
who's just been in there for 10minutes and has an MBA and not
much else.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
Yeah, and I think as well, the features is a good way
of focusing in on that.
Someone's delivering somethingand it's saying, well, we've got
this new piece of technologyand it's going to do A, b, c, d,
e.
What people focus on goes well.
I didn't mention this thing,and this is where the biggest
problem is in the organization,and it doesn't have that feature
(29:04):
.
In fact, it's missing a featurethat we had in the previous
version now.
So now there's even more work.
You know that could be the waythat they go, and so it is
important to understand.
That's how we'll do it, and Ithink we've.
You know the thing.
The interesting thing about aChinese whisper scenario is that
it's going down the line, butsometimes you also have to
(29:25):
remember that people arestanding in the room and they're
hearing the same peoplespeaking at the same time, and
they will hear completelydifferent things, and I think
we've all had that in our, inour personal lives.
You know that you can bestanding there with it, whether
it's with your partner andfamily, or it could be just
friends, and what you hear andwhat they hear can be two
(29:49):
completely different things.
Yep, and that's just humannature, and so the important
thing is to try and grapple withthat and to bring people along
and understand where they mightbe because of their own
individual scenarios.
And so it is about trying tomake people feel comfortable but
(30:10):
understand where they areindividually address them.
Sometimes the mass message isnot the best way of delivering
it.
Sometimes it's important togive people that as an initial
opportunity, but then to takethat and drill it down to a much
more core level really is moreimportant, I think, than the
(30:33):
overall message.
It's because, particularly whenyou're talking about any kind
of change, no matter whetherthat change is a new piece of
technology or it's movinglocations, it's merging.
It's because, particularly whenyou're talking about any kind
of change, no matter whetherthat change is a new piece of
technology or it's movinglocations, it's merging, it's
any number of different thingsthat could be happening in a
business at any time.
How you deliver, that iseverything you know, absolutely
(30:53):
everything to the success thatyou'll have moving forward.
Because you can guarantee thatif you do just the mass message,
the Chinese whisper thing willhappen and that's how rumors
start flying.
I mean it's again let's use thesports analogy Anyone who's
listened to any sports programat any time anywhere in the
(31:14):
world will hear about some kindof rumor.
Where do those rumors start?
They start usually fromoverheard or misheard
conversations or even someonehypothesizing.
I've had that happen to me in awork scenario where I was on
work experience.
I wasn't even employed and Igot on particularly well with
someone in a control room and hewas joking oh you know, if I
(31:39):
ran the network, I'd do thisdifferently.
And I'd say, yeah, it'd begreat, if I ran the network, I'd
do this.
And it was just, we were justmessing around.
What we didn't know was thatsomeone who was a reasonably
junior at the time but employed,overheard our conversation,
then started a rumor that theythought that I was about to try
(32:02):
to work out a way to take overthe network.
I was on work experience andfortunately I heard it back from
someone that I was friendlywith on the team and said listen
, you've got to be carefulbecause they've heard this.
And we were able to confrontthe person and go.
You know it was a joke, youknow that, you know.
And so we shut it down, whichis great, right, and but I
(32:22):
learned that lesson very earlyon.
You don't know who's listening.
You don't know how they'regoing to perceive things.
You don't know what's on theirmind.
He he was a junior reporter atthe time.
He felt a little bit insecure.
I was coming in on workexperience, potentially with a
better background than what hehad in.
But you know, I wasn't workingin that way and maybe he felt
insecure about his job.
Actually I wasn't after his jobat all.
(32:42):
If he'd have bothered to havehad that conversation with me.
He was a on-camera journalist.
I wanted to be behind thescenes, so we weren't even
talking the same language andthat.
But that happens all the timein a business sense and I think
that's what's important tounderstand is where people's
mindset is at any given point isgoing to be different, and if
(33:04):
you're a CEO of a larger company, you're not going to know the
details of every individualemployee at that level.
But you have to, I guess, tryand find a way to make sure any
core messages are being filtereddown in the right way, and that
means delivering them inmultiple ways to multiple groups
(33:26):
and understanding that if it'sgoing to have a big impact on an
organization so we're nottalking about something small
hey, we've just.
You know, we decided we're goingto.
You know we're going to have aluncheon today.
You know we decided we're goingto.
You know we're going to have aluncheon today.
No, but if you're talking about, as I said, you know things
(33:47):
like mergers or relocating ornew technology or things that
are going to.
You know new people that arecoming into at a higher level in
the organization, all thosekinds of things that are going
to have a significant impact,it's worth your time to be
delivering those messages at asmaller level and not just
dismiss them as one simple ideaand off they go.
And again, if we bring it backto podcasting, one of the powers
(34:09):
of podcasting is that you'vegot that message that people can
go back and hear in their owntime and over time, and I think
also, then, that you've gotsomething that can then be
extracted and delivered inmultiple different ways.
Speaker 1 (34:26):
I was just going to say that you've got the ability
to, depending on what channelsyou're using.
If you're using video, you'vegot the ability to caption the
conversation as part of thevideo.
If it's audio only, which Itend to do, you've got show
notes, you've got a transcript,you've got everything else that
goes with it and obviously I'mstarting to establish a sub
stack channel that goesalongside the podcast, which has
(34:47):
more insights that go withemail, so you can build on a
whole range of different mediumsand still have a single podcast
and still have it all linked toeach other.
But the message has becomequite clear to everyone as to
what it actually is meaning.
Speaker 2 (35:01):
The one thing I love about the podcast platform is
that it has a cascading effect,that the authentic stories and
commentary that you provide in apodcast can then be transferred
into multiple different waysand multiple different platforms
.
So, yes, if you're recordingthe video, you can extract the
(35:24):
audio, you can extract thetranscript.
From the transcript you canextract multiple different short
forms or longer forms ofcontent.
You can write a short post, youcan write a longer blog article
, just as an example, from thevideos you get shorter videos
and indeed from the audio aswell.
And catering for all thosedifferent audiences because I
(35:47):
think that's the important thinghere too is for people to
understand is just the old daysof where I decided I'm going to
put out a newsletter on thethird Wednesday of the third
month, you know, every threemonths.
Great, that's wonderful for you.
Is that convenient for thepeople that are reading it?
You know, 20, 30 years ago, wedidn't have a choice.
(36:09):
The expectation was oh, this iswhen the newsletter comes out.
It's a bit like people used toqueue for the paper to be
released.
We knew the paper was atnewsstands at 5 am.
Therefore, we want to be thefirst to get the news, so we'd
be there waiting at 5 am.
Nowadays it's a 24-7 news cycle,and people are used to picking
up news on multiple platforms ina format that they want when
(36:32):
they want, and so, as a business, it's incumbent upon you to
deliver that in the same way,whether it's internally or
externally.
That's the expectation that hasbeen set, and if you are not
giving information into each ofthose different channels on a
consistent basis, then you'redoing yourself a disservice.
(36:53):
And you can't be everywhere allof the time, but you do have to
find where are the peopleplaying that are most important
to you.
You have to be thereconsistently for them and
understand that feeds aredifferent for everybody, no
matter what platform you're on,so they may or may not see it.
You want them to subscribe tothings so that they do see it,
(37:15):
and just because you post it at9am doesn't mean they're going
to see it at 9.01.
They may not see it until thenext day, tuesday, or two or
three days later.
I mean, for example, I lookedin my Facebook feed this morning
and I saw a really interestingpost and I thought, oh, I was
(37:36):
reading that maybe I'll share itwith a couple of people.
Then I went back and looked.
Actually, it was from threedays ago, so that's just how it
landed in my feed at the time.
There's nothing wrong with that, but the chances are the people
that I might have wanted toshare it with have probably
already seen it, so that's okay.
It's not a problem, it's justhow it came to me, and that's
the thing, that a lot of thisstuff is even out of our own
(37:57):
control, let alone the fact thatI may not have looked at
Facebook for five days, for oursake.
Speaker 1 (38:05):
And your point there on the news cycle is relevant to
all of this as well.
My wife and I actually weretalking yesterday about.
We both grew up in homes wherethe six o'clock news bulletin
was sort of sacrosanct anddinner had to be ready and
everything had to be done sothat mum and or dad or both
could watch the six o'clock newsand thinking about it as you're
(38:27):
talking, I haven't watched thesix o'clock news in probably the
better part of a decade and infact the last time I really
thought about it was probably inthe car and I remember joking
with a family member about this.
I was in the car and the advertfor the six o'clock bulletin
came up at like 4.30 and theanchor was something happened at
America Day.
(38:48):
We'll reveal what happened nextat six o'clock.
And I'm like you mean revealwhat happened next.
I read about that 12 hours agoon the news side.
What are you revealing to me?
That's not new, this is old andI guess that's to play that
into a corporate communicationslens as well.
That's something you've got tobe careful of with the way your
employees not just how rumorsstart, but employee will talk
(39:09):
and information will get sharedpretty quickly.
And if you are scrambling tocatch up on that, you've already
probably failed to deliver themessage.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
Yeah, and you're right and, with all the best of
intentions of trying to keepthings secret, things slip.
Whether they're deliberate ornot, they slip and or there are
signs that people read andinterpret you might be.
For example, you might beplanning to buy a major piece of
capital equipment for it, andthe only person that, the only
(39:42):
person that might know, is theCFO.
But the people in the accountsdepartment are going well, hang
on, there's money that's beingput aside here that you know
they're going to spend it.
What are they going to spend iton?
It looks like it's a fairlysignificant piece.
Ah, they must be buying.
They'll put two and twotogether and work it out and
they'll tell 10 people withouteven thinking about it because
(40:03):
they don't know that it'sconfidential.
They're just looking at it andgoing well, it looks like
they're going to be.
They're shaping up to do thisand get it again.
Use the sports analogy.
I mean you hear players beingtraded.
So we're really interested in.
You know, this team is reallyinterested in getting this
player and you, and immediatelyyou go.
If we're releasing this player,that must mean we're freeing up
(40:23):
money so that we can go and buythis player over here and go
hang on.
How do we work that out?
Like is that?
There are, you know, but it'sthe nature of human beings and
and how we, how we think andwhere we go.
So, with all of that in mind,you have to be really cautious
in how you approach things,whether it's your existing
(40:45):
internal team or whether it's anexternal audience.
You need to understand thatthese things will happen,
they'll get out.
So better to be on top of itand better to be proactive in
what you're doing and talking topeople about where you're going
, because, equally, equally, youdon't know where those
opportunities lie.
I get sometimes there arethings that have to be kept
confidential for legal reasons,and I understand that that that
(41:07):
can happen and you usually tryand keep a very tight rein on
that.
But the majority of stuff thathappens in business often it can
be.
You know, we were actuallythinking of doing this and
actually putting that out therefor a conversation, both
internally and externally, canreveal lots of things.
It's really interesting whenyou look at it again.
(41:28):
It's easy to bring it back tothe media because people
understand that and I won't usean Australian example because I,
you know, realize that noteveryone would be familiar with
it, but there are programs thatwe watch on TV that get axed
right and we often don't have anidea as to why they're being
axed Now.
Sometimes the TV stations makea decision going well the
(41:50):
ratings are poor, thereforewe'll stop supporting this
program and we'll bring onanother program.
Now the interesting thing aboutthat is could they have twisted
?
Do they know what the audiencethinks and why they've stopped
watching?
Could it be that there was aparticular person on the program
or a particular storyline orsomething that was happening
(42:10):
that has had a negative impact?
That could be shifted, or youcould experiment with that,
versus taking the extremeexample of removing the program
and putting something else back.
I mean, there's even a simplething that happened recently.
There's a program where theyasked the host.
Now, if they had bothered toask the audience, they would
(42:32):
have heard that the one thingthat was not wrong with that
show was the host, the one thingthat everyone loved the most
and that why people kept comingback was because of the host.
There were other things on theprogram that could have been
changed, but the host isdefinitely not the thing that
they should have changed.
And what does that lead to Awhole outpouring of people that
are saying no and signingpetitions and all of that kind
(42:56):
of stuff.
The deed is done, I assume, andso they're unlikely to go back
on their word.
Now the question will be whathappens?
Because you see the audienceall going well, if they're going
to change it to this person I'mnot watching anymore so will
they have attracted more peoplewho do like the new one versus
(43:17):
the people that they're going tolose because of the old one?
Again, having that conversationwith the audience, there's lots
of different ways to try andtest it out.
There's market research thatcan be done if you want to be
formal about it, but there'sinformal conversations that can
happen.
Hey, we're thinking of doingthis in the business.
What's your take on that?
(43:37):
We're thinking of doing this inthe business, what's your take
on that?
And you'll get some greatopinions, and there'll be some
you'll discard immediatelybecause you realize that they're
biased or they're just not yourflavor, and sometimes you'll
just ignore them anyway, but youtake them on board so you
understand what you can learn.
Speaker 1 (43:56):
And technology is a good note to start to close on
here.
But technology gives us theability to get in front of that
audience much faster and muchquicker as well.
And the example I'm thinking ofhere.
Bringing it right back to sport, on Saturday night the
international calendar kickedoff for rugby, so the All Blacks
had their first test againstFrance, and something that I
(44:17):
noted hadn't seen before in thebroadcast was they were using QR
codes for fan engagement.
So they had QR code at thestart to say it was basic
five-question poll how do youfeel about the team, what are
our chances and that wasdynamically updated in real time
as people were scanning thecode and so it was being
broadcast in real time.
But then later on they hadanother QR code for fan
(44:37):
engagement to pick man of thematch.
Now, that's not a new thing.
Fans have been able to pick manof the match before, normally
with a text in or with a writein, but you're able to see that
in real time all of a sudden.
And that lesson can go back tocorporates, it can go back to
television studios who arelooking for that feedback,
because you can actually getsome some.
You can use some very simpletechnology qr codes, arc
(44:57):
conflicts to get real-timefeedback and get that mood, or
even even if it's slightlydelayed feedback.
We've delivered our message.
We've given you time to thinkabout it.
Now come and give us yourfeedback through a, through a
poll, or through a forum, orthrough it, through a, through a
, through a very simple surveythat's anonymous, because we
know people don't want to puttheir name against this.
You're going to get that, toget that feedback that you can
(45:18):
then take and respond to in thenext part and say, hey, we
listened and this is what we'rechanging as a result.
Speaker 2 (45:23):
Absolutely, and I've seen it done with very simple
apps that people can downloadfor free, and I've been in a
room where there's maybe 20people and we're learning about
something and the persondelivering it saying, well,
where do you think this could go?
What's your take on it?
And it might be an ABCDscenario, and in real time you
(45:45):
get where people's heads are atand it's really interesting
seeing that.
And what's also interesting isseeing the pack mentality,
because what you will see,depending on when you decide to
deliver the results, it's reallyinteresting If you put up the
results live, so people areseeing it.
(46:05):
How people are responding willinfluence how the other people
are responding in one of twoways.
They'll either want to be withoh, everyone's picking A, so I
better pick A or they'll goeveryone's picking A.
I therefore want to pick, orthey go everyone's picking A.
I therefore want to pick D, andI want everyone to know that
I'm picking D, because suddenlyit'll go from 100% down to 75%
(46:28):
and 25% here and then so on aswe're going through it.
So I think that's one of theinteresting things too, and to
understand that mentality.
You know, even in I know marketresearchers will tell you this
as well, that when you and I'vedone this myself when you are
asking for people's opinions onthings, and particularly if
(46:50):
you're in a group, the bestthing to do initially is to get
them to write it down beforethey discuss it.
And yet, where anyone says aword because otherwise people
will have a reaction to whoeveris the loudest voice initially,
and that can be a good and a badthing, and it's fine in a
conversation sense.
But it's also interesting toknow where that is, because
we've all been in conversationswhere someone says oh yeah, I
(47:11):
was going to say that, were youreally?
I don't know if you really weregoing to say that, and so it is
actually interesting to measurethat.
And I think the lesson here, atthe end of the day, is that
technology can help you reallyunderstand where people's
mindsets are at and thereforeadjusting your messages or
(47:34):
getting more personal with themto in order to be able to engage
them better, which is going toextract better performance for
your business and betterperformance, you know, for teams
and job satisfaction, andultimately, the business grows
as a result of all of that.
And I think it's simple, butcommunication is absolutely the
fundamental key to the successof an organization and I always
(47:58):
used to say to business ownerswhen I dealt with them more
directly on this sort ofscenario, is that if every job
description does not havecommunication as a core
deliverable, then you have aproblem.
It has to be For every positionin every business.
You have a problem.
It has to be For every positionin every business.
(48:18):
Communication is a coredeliverable, no matter what they
are doing, and I think that'soverlooked too often and it's
where things just go astray,definitely definitely, and I
think that's a great note tofinish on that communication
being a fundamental element ofevery business.
Speaker 1 (48:33):
Just to wrap up, anthony, is there anything else
you want to add, anything wehaven't covered you wanted to
bring in, or a final thought?
Speaker 2 (48:41):
look, I just I think the biggest lesson that I would
give to people that are outthere listening that the more
that you can share yourauthentic stories, the more that
you can deliver things morepersonally to an audience
consistently, the more that youare going to stand out.
You know, for my podcast it'sabout thought leadership and
(49:02):
that's you can't be a thoughtleader if you don't have an
outlet for delivering yourmessages to a broader audience.
You know, the power ofpodcasting is very much about
being able to deliverconsistently to educate and
nurture an audience, bothinternally and externally, and I
think to me that's such a corething.
Don't be afraid to communicate,because if you are and if
(49:23):
you're holding back, no matterwhere you are within a business,
then the chances are thatsomeone is going to end up being
dissatisfied and somewherealong the way someone is going
to make a crucial mistake.
And if you care at all, thencommunicating is core.
Speaker 1 (49:42):
Absolutely.
Thank you very much for that,Anthony, and for anyone looking
for Anthony's show, we'll put alink in the show notes, but it's
Biz Bytes for Thought Leadersand it's available on all Goods
podcast channels.
Speaker 2 (49:53):
Absolutely, and thank you so much for having me on
your show.
It's great that we'll be ableto do the swap, and so we've
both been on BizBytes kind oflike stereo, isn't it?
Bizbytes and two Anthonys howmuch better can you get?
Speaker 1 (50:08):
And for those of you who have listened all the way to
the point, your feedback isvaluable.
Communication goes both ways,so please do put some comments
in or respond to the email whenit comes out via sub stack.
Speaker 2 (50:26):
Thanks very much for having me.
I really appreciate it and, yes, we will definitely continue
this conversation.
Excellent Thanks, anthonyno-transcript.
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