In the working environment, how often do we really appreciate or remember the powerful opportunity we are presented with each and every time we communicate with others, both within the organisation or business we work for, or outside it?
Think of the best advertising slogans of the past few years. They are memorable because they said something relevant to their audience and struck an immediate chord - Carlsberg has never been just a lager, it's probably been the best lager in the world.
According to Marketing magazine, the most recalled advertising of last year belonged to supermarket chain Morrisons with its simple, yet incredibly effective, ‘Fresh Choice For You' campaign, which used various B-list celebrities to portray a very simple image of value for money fresh food. And it's not just advertising that benefits from a simple but strong message.
Take Barack Obama's victory speech in Chicago on 5 November last year. Three simple words, three syllables, just eight letters resonated around the world more than any others: ‘Yes, we can." What could have better captured the excitement felt by billions of people that night? And what better answer was there to anyone doubting the level of his intent and resolve?
What Obama, Carlsberg and Morrisons have in common is this - all three had clearly thought out their messages before uttering so much as a single word.
And the success of their messages was ultimately down to the feelings and images their simple words generated. But how often do we fail to seize the everyday communication opportunities presented to us, through lack of preparation or forethought? How often do we fail to inspire or encourage?
When working as a business journalist I always expected - and indeed wanted - people to give a good account of themselves and their company during interviews. But if they couldn't be bothered to anticipate the more probing questions or to think about what they were going to say or tell me, then why should I wax lyrical about their business in the resulting news article, feature or profile piece? As one news editor once said to me: "If you can't be bothered to get excited about this story, then why should the reader?" He had a point.
Think about it. Audi doesn't just tell us it makes cars, it ‘Vorsprung durch Technik-s' them. We may not necessarily know what it means but we know it stands for something to do with technical quality and excellence (for non-German speakers like myself it means advancement through technology, apparently).
That doesn't mean we always have to relentlessly come up with iconic buzz words and phrases of the stature of those delivered by Winston Churchill, Martin Luther King or Neil Armstrong to get our point across. But during the uncertain times we now face, the process of thinking - and I mean really thinking - about what we want to say both within and outside our businesses and organisation is of paramount importance.
When Marks & Spencer boss Stuart Rose announced plans to close 27 stores and lay off 1,200 people just a week into the new year, he immediately explained he had cut the retailer's cloth to meet the new economic realities, while at the same time announcing he would not be taking a pay rise in 2009 nor any bonus over and above what his staff would get.
"What would we do? Sit there and pretend the world is flat and there isn't a downturn? No," said a resolute Rose, while at the same time reinforcing that the chain was far from mortally wounded, just in case there were any staff or shoppers thinking it had once again become unfashionable to cross the M&S threshold: "In December we sold enough knitwear to clothe every women between the ages 20 and 80 living in Greater London, we sold enough magic knickers to take a quarter of a million inches off waistlines of British women, and we sold enough tights in the third quarter for every woman in England to have a pair," he said.
Another master of turning adversity into an opportunity is Sir Richard Branson. When one of Virgin's high-cost, high-speed Pendolino tilting trains came off the tracks in Cumbria in February 2007, killing one elderly lady, Branson was quickly on the scene to show the company cared. He also used the opportunity to praise the driver for his bravery and pointed out how it was thanks to the robustness of his tough new carriages that there hadn't been any further fatalities.
Branson's intervention is still seen in communications industry circles - both among the public relations and journalism fraternities - as a masterclass in how to turn bad news into good, especially as it later emerged that a faulty set of points had been to blame.
Not only did it restore public confidence in his brand, but showed him to be a man of the people, a loyal employer and, above all else, willing to stand up and be counted during a difficult time.
There are literally thousands of instances every day when we could take a lead from such examples, whether it be a morale-boosting morning meeting, end-of-month push to meet sales targets or an interview with local or national media to explain the challenges - and opportunities - currently facing our business or organisation.
Certainly, it's rarely been so good, or necessary, to talk.
Simon Mowbray is director of Chrome Consulting
