Blanchard's Wisdom Proves Useful Beyond The Message He Conveys

By Rob Wright, Chief Editor, Life Science Leader
Follow Me On Twitter @RfwrightLSL

By  Rob Wright

Over the years I have had the opportunity to read a variety of leadership books written by Ken Blanchard and his various co-authors. Perhaps one of his best is The One Minute Manager with co-author Spencer Johnson — one of the bestselling business books of all time. However, my personal favorite is Gung Ho, which he co-wrote with Sheldon Bowles. The book has three basic principles for motivating and inspiring your employees. Blanchard and Bowles utilize creative storytelling to convey the principles which is probably why they were so easily remembered  —
worthwhile work (the spirit of the squirrel), in control of achieving the goal (the way of the beaver) and cheering each other on (the gift of the goose). But this isn’t why Gung Ho is one of my Blanchard favorites.

Public Speaking 101
If you have done a lot of public speaking, you have probably experienced technical glitches during your presentation, such as projector bulbs burning out or computers freezing up. I have had this happen to me on more than one occasion, and it’s the reason Gung Ho is one of my favorite books. I had been introduced to give a presentation and experienced a computer glitch. While the technical glitches were being worked out, rather than attempt to start my presentation without slides or stand there looking stupid, I decided to share a story about a book I was reading at the time, which I was able to tie it into my presentation once the glitch was resolved. I think I was able to do this because of Blanchard’s storytelling style and use of metaphors, which aided my recall.

I first witnessed the importance of having a story to tell while attending a national meeting with Mead Johnson Nutritionals (NYSE: MJN). The executive, Jerry McCabe, had been announced to provide an update to the audience of more than 1,000 people, but he experienced the dreaded computer glitch. Not missing a beat, he vamped into a story about Tim Allen — who, at the time, was the star of the popular TV sitcom Home Improvement. Once the issue with the computer was resolved, he continued with his presentation, successfully tying in the story about Allen and its applicability to his discussion.

Full Steam Ahead
I was reminded of the importance of having a story to tell as I recently attended a program where I witnessed one of the presenters experience a computer problem. Coincidentally, I was reading a book, Full Steam Ahead, sent to me by Jesse Lyn Stoner, Blanchard’s co-author. Truth be told, I am not sure if I could have pulled off a successful vamping of the book if the glitch had happened to me. However, the book does have some useful information conveyed in the Blanchard storytelling style about how to create and communicate an organization’s vision. In their model, the authors suggest two equally important aspects in creating a compelling vision — content and process. Content describes what the vision says and comprises three things: purpose, a picture of the future, and values. Process describes how you create, communicate, and live a vision. For me, the most important take away (which I wrote down on p. 36) was the importance of developing a purpose statement. In my career, I have tended to be motivated more by making a difference, or as Zig Ziglar puts it, “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” If you are in a leadership or management position, let me remind you — placing a vision on the wall without employee participation in the creation process does not gain employee buy-in. If your organization is struggling with this, perhaps a review of this book could get you back on track, as well as provide you with a story or two should you experience a computer glitch during your next public speaking engagement.