No way to disrupt a bias that quickly. Moreover, s/he will never read 500 words from “a low-status member of their own tribe”. Here is one classic strategy that gives you a fighting chance.
You have about 30 seconds of attention (hence the elevator pitch metaphor) to present your verbal or written argument. You cannot hope to disrupt their bias in 30 seconds, so you shoot for something else: more attention, maybe some face time. Again, forget about disrupting biases for the moment. You have to become a sales person for an instant and make a difficult sale with the odds stacked heavily against you.
Now your task is reduced to the standard elevator pitch formula:
a hook (a one-liner that grabs attention),
a simple but passionate statement of potential benefits to your audience of one,
a concise and catchy summary followed by a request/offer/promise that is too intriguing to refuse outright.
The details and variations are all over the net and in a bunch of popular TV shows.
From personal experience: busy high-level executives don’t read past the subject line of your email, unless they are hooked (i.e. if you are a low-level underling, they don’t normally click to open your email), so your hook absolutely must be in the subject line.
Now, suppose you win some face time (your status is temporarily elevated to that of a person worth spending 5 min on). What do you do then? Stay tuned for the next installment of… Changing Minds!
P.S. I have intentionally structured this comment using the elevator pitch format. The first 20-30 characters of this message is all that appears on the right in the RECENT COMMENTS section, so I tried to plant my hook there. Whether I have succeeded or not, we will see shortly—feedback is most welcome!
The second paragraph hooked me much better than the first paragraph did. I have a strong bias to ignore hooks without any interesting bait on them, though :)
Agreed—I was mildly interested with the first line, much more interested with the second paragraph. I’d condense it to:
No way do you have 500 words. You have about 30 seconds. Forget about disrupting biases for a moment—you are a salesperson making a difficult sale with the odds stacked heavily against you. Your goal is to obtain more attention and face time.
(Long winded communication is a problem of mine, which I should be doing more to correct)
Some changes to tighten it up a bit. Wiggle words aren’t good hooks, and they rarely add useful information content:
You don’t get 500 words. You get 30 seconds. Forget about disrupting biases—you are a salesperson making a difficult sale with the odds stacked heavily against you. Your goal is to obtain more attention and face time.
Also re-arranged the flow somewhat in the third and fourth sentences, but I think that’s iffier:
You don’t get 500 words. You get 30 seconds. Forget about disrupting biases—your goal is to obtain more attention and face time. You are a salesperson making a difficult sale with the odds stacked heavily against you.
Practically certain to counterproductive, unless you’re talking about your own center of mass and combining it with further strategies, in which case it’s only virtually certain to be counterproductive.
You’re thinking business. It’s politics. Thus, crazier-looking strategies — say, an associated hunger strike; not a suggestion, just an example — are allowable and justified, but you still only get 500 words. In particular, you do not care about any loss of status if you fail. Also, low-probability impacts — anything > one in a thousand chance — are still worth it.
As for “they’ll never read 500 words”, assume that that problem is resolved. You have elevator time or at least a guarantee that they will read through your pitch.
No way to disrupt a bias that quickly. Moreover, s/he will never read 500 words from “a low-status member of their own tribe”. Here is one classic strategy that gives you a fighting chance.
You have about 30 seconds of attention (hence the elevator pitch metaphor) to present your verbal or written argument. You cannot hope to disrupt their bias in 30 seconds, so you shoot for something else: more attention, maybe some face time. Again, forget about disrupting biases for the moment. You have to become a sales person for an instant and make a difficult sale with the odds stacked heavily against you.
Now your task is reduced to the standard elevator pitch formula:
a hook (a one-liner that grabs attention),
a simple but passionate statement of potential benefits to your audience of one,
a concise and catchy summary followed by a request/offer/promise that is too intriguing to refuse outright.
The details and variations are all over the net and in a bunch of popular TV shows.
From personal experience: busy high-level executives don’t read past the subject line of your email, unless they are hooked (i.e. if you are a low-level underling, they don’t normally click to open your email), so your hook absolutely must be in the subject line.
Now, suppose you win some face time (your status is temporarily elevated to that of a person worth spending 5 min on). What do you do then? Stay tuned for the next installment of… Changing Minds!
P.S. I have intentionally structured this comment using the elevator pitch format. The first 20-30 characters of this message is all that appears on the right in the RECENT COMMENTS section, so I tried to plant my hook there. Whether I have succeeded or not, we will see shortly—feedback is most welcome!
The second paragraph hooked me much better than the first paragraph did. I have a strong bias to ignore hooks without any interesting bait on them, though :)
Agreed—I was mildly interested with the first line, much more interested with the second paragraph. I’d condense it to:
(Long winded communication is a problem of mine, which I should be doing more to correct)
Some changes to tighten it up a bit. Wiggle words aren’t good hooks, and they rarely add useful information content:
Also re-arranged the flow somewhat in the third and fourth sentences, but I think that’s iffier:
Very interesting. Thanks for the comments! I apologize to homunq for unintentionally hijacking the post.
Double tap to the center of mass?
Practically certain to counterproductive, unless you’re talking about your own center of mass and combining it with further strategies, in which case it’s only virtually certain to be counterproductive.
You may have been joking, but apparently homunq is open to your idea, according to his reply.
You’re thinking business. It’s politics. Thus, crazier-looking strategies — say, an associated hunger strike; not a suggestion, just an example — are allowable and justified, but you still only get 500 words. In particular, you do not care about any loss of status if you fail. Also, low-probability impacts — anything > one in a thousand chance — are still worth it.
As for “they’ll never read 500 words”, assume that that problem is resolved. You have elevator time or at least a guarantee that they will read through your pitch.