Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/56529
From the Editors Six Little Words Say It All? Lately I've been mesmerized by some of the shortest biographies in the world—six words long, in fact. These abbreviated memoirs started pouring in to Smith magazine a couple of years ago after the publication asked readers to boil their life stories down to the allotted word count. Some of the resulting submissions, from folks both famous and unknown, turned into a 2008 book, Not Quite What I Was Planning, and a sequel on love and heartbreak. I find the encapsulations fascinating and addictive, ranging as they do from Deepak Chopra's "Danced in fields of infinite possibilities" to a recently dumped young man's lament that "I still make coffee for two." I've been checking out new submissions daily on Smith's Web site, www.smithmag.net/sixwords/. Then I came across the blog of Alden Keene, who writes about "cause marketing," or products and organizations that exist to publicize specific initiatives. He, too, was entranced with the six-word theme and thought any cause marketer should be able to develop such a pithy pitch. He offers a sample tagline for (RED), a network of global businesses, including Apple and Windows, that donate a portion of sales to fight AIDS in Africa. Keene's suggestion is "Help stop HIV. Buy like Bono." In truth, business folks have always understood the benefits of brevity. Most great advertising slogans meet or beat the six-word rule, as proved by famous lines from some of the world's best-known companies. Volk- swagen: "Think small." Nike: "Just do it." Coke: "It's the real thing." L'Oreal: "Because I'm worth it." There are advantages to reducing a complex concept into a sound bite. Simple, catchy phrases tend to be easily remembered. And they require that the phrasemakers carefully review their subjects and condense them to the most relevant and vivid points. But, as any politician will tell you, there are hazards as well. The subtleties get lost. The supporting data vanishes. That's particularly true when you're trying to dissect a busi- ness phenomenon. In a few sentences, you can't chart the market forces that have driven the success of a wildly popular new product—or explain the mistakes that have led to the implosion of the entire financial industry. Some things just can't be summed up. I discovered that when I tried to find six words to describe "Tomorrow's Leaders," my piece on what businesses of the future will want from the b-school graduates they hire today. My first attempt resulted in "Socially conscious problem solvers thinking integra- tively." Next I thought of "Leaders who are ready for anything." Both were accurate, but neither conveyed the breadth of information, the thoughtful analysis of the possibilities provided by the five executives-in-residence whom I interviewed for my article. For the full story, I needed 3,000 words, not six. Having spent a considerable amount of time on this endeavor, I think I came away with six words of hard-earned wisdom that any fresh MBA could appreciate: That was harder than it looks. And its corollary: There's so much more to learn! 6 BizEd SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2009 STOCKBROKER/PHOTOLIBRARY RAQUITA HENDERSON