Communication is the real work of leadership—Nitin Nohria, dean of Harvard Business School.
Perhaps, one of the most critical responsibilities of a leader of any organisation is to communicate the vision, policies and objectives of the organisation to the stakeholders—the people whose lives, and aspirations depend on that organisation.
The organisation needs the stakeholders as much as the stakeholders need the organisation. To effectively serve them, the organisation needs to walk together with the stakeholders at all times.
The organisation must anticipate and understand the needs of the stakeholders. It must think through how it can meet the needs and, thereafter, communicate the decisions it makes to meet the needs and, finally, ask them to take certain actions that best meet their needs.
The organisation is constrained to engage them, thanks to the constitutional injunctions to consult the stakeholders in thinking through what the organisations ought to do and how to do it.
At the centre of this relationship is communication. The main person who links the organisation and the stakeholders is none other than the chief executive officer. Any other person who speaks on behalf of the organisation does so on behalf of the CEO.
Being the face of the company, the CEO is largely expected to communicate the vision, values and purposes of the organisation whenever the occasion demands.
Communication is not a given. It is delicate. The reason why the CEO needs a speechwriter or speechwriters at his beck and call.
The rank and file of an organisation may look at speech writing as a very simple process.
But nothing can be further from the truth. Formulating a speech fit for an occasion is not mechanical replication of the mandate, policies and nature of the programmes and projects the organisation is undertaking.
By all accounts, unless the policy, programme or project is new, the stakeholders know about it already. Even if they don’t know the new policy, programme or project about to be announced or launched, stakeholders want something more, something connected to their hearts and souls—less to their minds.
They want affirmation and recognition of their role in the whole scheme of things. They want the chief executive officer to raise their hopes and calm their fears.
That is why speechwriters are so critical to an organisation. They add enormous value—although intangible—to an organisation. They write speeches for the CEO with a panoramic eye view of the organisation and the wider horizon.
A speechwriter brings perspective, clarity and purpose to whatever issue, challenge or crisis the organisation is addressing. He or she cuts through the complexity of policy, making it—the policy thrust of the moment—resonate with the outside world.
And this brings us to the complexity inherent in communication as a process and as an activity. All communication is persuasion; it is about influence. Regardless of the situation, all our communication initiatives—be they personal, small group, organisational, mass or public communication—have one goal: To influence another person’s attitudes, beliefs, values and behaviour.
It is not communicating policy or decisions that chief executives are expected to do, important as it might be. It is communicating hope, understanding and empathy. All communication to a people is a lot of hot air without hope, understanding and empathy.
Embedded in any speech are three fundamental pillars of persuasion: Logos, ethos and pathos. Associated with the Greek philosopher Aristotle, they are strategies that speechwriters must embed in speeches.
A speech must appeal to the logical or reasoning powers of the stakeholders. It must appeal to their emotions and last but not least, the speaker must be likeable. Before you convince an audience to accept whatever you tell them, they must accept you. Things are not a given.
This is the reason why the speechwriting process of a defining occasion must start with an initial meeting with the CEO to get a broad understanding of the main points he or she wants to make.
Thereafter it is sustained conversations with policy wonks in the organisation. Closeness to the chief Executive places the speech writer in a position to appreciate language, tone, temperament and personal beliefs—all these are embedded in the speech.
With the broad understanding of the thrust of the speaker, conversation with policymakers or technical advisers on the issue at hand, the speech now requires quiet solitude. This is where he or she mentally surveys the lay of the land—the current state of affairs and where the speaker wants the organisation to go and how.
The writer is not part of the policymaking process. If he is, he cannot look at the forest. He will look at individual trees and therefore fail to transmute the enduring vision, values and purpose of the organisation into the policy issue, problem or challenge at hand.
What is worse is if the speech lacks appreciation of the personality of the speaker—a critical element in communication. Powerful speech must have the personality of the speaker as well as the hearts and souls of the audience. Not just facts and figures. Politicians know that you cannot persuade people using numbers.
In my secondary school education way back in the early 80s, while studying History, I learnt about a phenomenon called a standing army. Our History teacher told us that this is a professional army composed of full-time career soldiers and not disbanded during times of peace.
We learnt that Shaka Zulu built a modern standing army that consolidated rival clans and built a large following establishing a Zulu Empire after conquering surrounding tribes.
Communities that depended on militia could not withstand the military strength and preparedness of Zulu and were dispersed to the four winds.
I personally believe that organisations can best improve their persuasive capabilities by establishing an office dedicated to speechwriting. The staff will be able to devote their intellects, energies and time to speech writing.
Called to address the rhetorical or communications situations—purpose, audience, topic, speaker and context of speech writing assignment—they will carry out the necessary background information and prepare real appropriate speech fit for the varying occasions that the chief executive officer is called upon to speak to different audiences.
Organisations need dedicated speechwriters at all times—like a state needs a standing army in war and in peacetime.
