TONE AND HABIT

A piebald duck, the Puzzle-maker, and your own bashful questing beast

There are hours that return to you after many years, sometimes in dreams.  These revenant hours linger through your morning shower ... a half-recalled turn of phrase, a tug in the heart, shapes of faces and emotions, a fog of sentiment that evaporates even as the mirror over the sink dries to reveal the man of the moment.  By the time you turn the key in the ignition and drop the stick into reverse, the hour is gone.

Unless someone has captured it somewhere on page, in the words that the Puzzle-maker himself might have invoked when he created that hour for you.  A ear that can discern those weird noises is a rare gift.

Bucky McMahon hears them, and his new (and first) collection Night Diver is that dream you forgot over the morning coffee.

I remember some of the pieces from their original run in the Tallahassee Democrat's Limelight section in McMahon's Barmadillo column.  The Friday Democrat was a treasure when the Barmadillo was out in the world and writing, something anticipated.  Bucky already covered it in the foreword, but I'll also say thank you to Mark and Zilpha and Janey for making that column happen.  As a young man (this was maybe 1990 ... I would have been 19), I read those columns and I saw a path.

There's a lot of good writing in here, much of it in the travel and adventure categories, a great deal of it from in and around Florida, and there is an illustrated dream journal.  Night Diver is eclectic and sublime.

The title of this post is taken from words that appear on page 187 of Night Diver in a piece called Lake Ella.  An hour walking around Lake Ella, while a cold front creeps over town.  We all forget important things, sometimes, in the circuits that we walk in our waking lives.  Thank God for those few who, in our march along the water's edge, can pick up the sound of the unaccented beat.

The science of leadership

Leadership Tallahassee Class 26 kicks off on Tuesday, so it was timely this week to see a cover story on leadership in the latest issue of New Scientist, a very readable magazine from England that I recommend to anyone.  Evolutionary social psychologist Mark van Vugt explores the evolution of leadership from 2.5 million years ago to today -- from hunter-gatherer bands to Toyota's corporate structure, and everything in between -- but some of his most interesting insights aren't into leadership.

He also asks the question, why be a follower?  Why would you subordinate yourself when it puts you at a clear disadvantage in terms of power, status and resources?

Well, first, by observing good leaders, you prepare yourself for future leadership.  Also, the disadvantages of following can be offset by the benefits of belonging to a well-led group.

On the flip side, distributed leadership -- delegated decision making, and even letting subordinates choose their own executives -- is gaining more currency today.  Shared goals and interdependence can transform alienated and self-interested employees into "committed collectivists," van Vugt suggests.

In the end, the most useful insight may be that leadership strategies must be different based on the situation an organization faces.  It's much more like jazz than conducting a symphony sometimes.  But no matter what kind of music you're making, it is vitally important that the band leader actually listen to the band.  If not, you're just lost in the dissonance.

Is this message authentic?

Of all the charges leveled against Hillary Clinton this year, the most devastating may have been that she was fake.  Inauthentic.  That she was poll-driven and coached, her true personality and opinions long buried under a politician’s cleverly calculated persona.  It is now looking like we will have two candidates whose personal appeal revolves around a compelling appearance of authenticity.  John McCain and the Straight Talk Express.  Obama and his public disavowal of policy placebos like the gas tax holiday.

 

If authenticity is what is selling today’s candidates, it’s no different in marketing.  The Dove Campaign for Real Beauty made waves when it joined this current of public sentiment by mixing up the sizes and shapes of its beauty models. 

As authenticity is coming to dominate the zietgeist, the public relations industry is taking heed.  Edelman Digital recently relaunched under the banner of Authentic PR, espousing a set of qualities that include trustworthy, transparent and straightforward.  (See more here at http://www.edelmandigital.com/blog/about.html) 

If trustworthy and transparent aren’t the first words that come to mind when you think of public relations, you aren’t alone.  The profession gets a bad rap, mostly undeserved.  On a recent rant about Scott McClellan’s new tell-all, CNN’s Anderson Cooper actually wondered on air, “Isn’t it the job of PR people to spin constantly? Wasn’t lying for the administration his job?”

No, that’s not really our job, at least among the professionals I work with.  If we do “spin,” then Steve Bousquet, the St. Pete Times editor and columnist, had one of the best definitions of it I’ve seen (and one that I can live with if you insist on using the word), calling spin “the clever mixing of fact and opinion.”  That’s actually pretty close. So, if the public is craving more authentic communication from the people who bring them products and ideas, it may be because they are simply exhausted by all this cleverness.  Social media are, of course, giving that public more power than ever over the messages we send into the world.  The No. 1 lesson of 2008 is that those messages better be authentic.

Is the age of the soundbite over?

Is the age of the soundbite coming to a close?  If it is, then we have Peggy Noonan to thank, in part.

One of the many positive things to emerge out of the Obama candidacy this year is the great revival of the art of the speech.  Sure, part of Obama's appeal is that melifluous voice, but the thoughts aren't bad either.  Particularly noteworthy is the absence of soundbites.

Obama's March 18 performance, The Philadelphia Speech on Race, prompted pundits to comment as much on its form as on its substance.  No soundbites! they exclaimed.  Newsweek columnist Jonathan Alter had maybe the best take on it, writing about how he'd read an advance copy of the speech, then remarked to his wife that "it was well written but contained no eight- to 15-second sound bites to counteract the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr.'s greatest hits. Under the old rules, a 37-minute speech full of complex ideas didn't stand a chance against the excitement of 'good TV.' " 

We all know what happened next.  Nearly 6 million views on YouTube is what happened next.  That phenomenon led Alter to wonder in print if the age of the soundbite may be coming to a close.

It was a good piece, but he caught the trend about 10 years too late.  In 1998, in fact, former Reagan speechwriter Peggy Noonan recounted the distinguished history of the soundbite from television of the 1960s to today, and like the great speechwriter she is advised us to "never, ever try to write one."  "It would be like being a songwriter and trying to write a great five-second section of a song," Noonan wrote.

But Noonan had hope.  In the first place, she said, the soundbite phenomenon, and the subsequent dumbing down of political rhetoric, had gotten just about as bad as they could.  Second, she said, history's great sound bites (and there are plenty ...) came because they "authentically emerged from thought."  They emerged from a sea of ideas, not a contrived tactic to get eight seconds on the evening news.

"You must be serious when you're doing serious work," Noonan says.  And finally, 10 years after Noonan lamented that things had gotten as bad as they could, we have a candidate who can express 37 minutes of authentic thought.  Hurray.

Authenticity is important, these days.  How important?  Next post ...

Local candidates have the power to inspire us

Spring in Tallahassee is the season of cynicism, especially in an election year. Almost immediately after the end of Florida's 60-day Legislative session — a little before, some would say — the campaigns for re-election begin. This can make a person skeptical of the debates playing out under the domes of the House and Senate chambers.

Monday night, however, you might have found a partial remedy for the cynicism that infects many in the political arena. City Hall was hosting a candidate forum, and many of those who spoke were running for their first office. Their speeches were, simply, heartening. Yes, they were sometimes amateurish. But in this time and place, where chilly calculation too often prevails, the unpracticed delivery only made them more heartwarming.

Some speakers were scripted; some were not. Some had professional support; some were flying solo. There were a couple who were clearly quaking in their shoes as they faced a room of fellow citizens, straining to express in words what they so deeply felt about the path of our city, our state and our nation.

It's not easy. I admired them, each and every one, for their courage, for doing one of the most difficult things any person can attempt: getting up in front of an impassive group of your fellows and trying to motivate them. That may be the most elusive skill in all of human endeavor.

Many of the candidates spoke about what they no doubt thought was expected — the FCAT, state workers, the environment, the usual parade of endorsements — but there were often unexpected and transcendent moments. Was anyone else paying attention when one candidate asked, quite sincerely, "Please give me a chance to serve this country that has done so much for me"? I know he meant it, and I felt it. That, my friends, is a love of America that simply cannot be mocked.

I was also a little sad, because I knew what would await the winners. It is a tough world. Their real education will come later, when they are inevitably caught in the pincers of public opinion. One day, they will have to vote on a tough issue, and they will be lobbied by good friends, each on opposite sides of the issue. No middle ground will seem available, and no bipartisanship. Then, perhaps, they will learn to dodge, to bob and to weave.

In politics, fiercely held opinions become fiercely held liabilities — fixed targets for the broadsides coming in the mail, on radio and in the 30-second TV spots. If they go far enough, if they rise high enough, then the stakes will become more personal. They will be in the company of people who play hardball, and every action past and present will be scrutinized. Some will become fighters, and some will decide that it is not worth the toll — and the pain.

Maybe that is why we too often view the political process with a jaded eye. Playing politics for any length of time can affect the psyche in about the same way as reading too much Nietzsche, and too much of that isn't good for anyone. After a while, you expect to be manipulated and coerced. You just don't expect to be inspired.

But they are all good people, these candidates. I imagined what it might be like if tomorrow the great engines of civilization began to seize up. What if the formal assemblies of states and nations began to dissolve, and the human race withdrew back into the small tribes that were our first governments. These are the men and women who would ask to lead us, taking charge not by force of arms, but simply by promising that our lights will stay on and our garbage will be taken away. They seemed, to a sentimental eye, to be faithful public servants, one and all. Let's give them a hand.