Sun Communicators' Group Blog

Communicating CHANGE

The past few days have been a whirlwind in NH....

Tomorrow is the First in the Nation, US Presidential Primary in  NH.   The final weekend before the polls actually open are just madness... All of the campaigns are bombarding NH voters with their communications - local rallies & townhalls, endless phonecalls , direct mail and the last few knocks on the door.  

I love the townhalls and rallies - it's a chance to get up close and personal to the candidates and I had the opportuntiy to get my fill of such events a few times this weekend. (I am not a fan of the direct mail pieces - especially at a time when candidates are touting their environmental policies.  It would be different if these pieces were easy to recycle, I think that's an issue with thick glossy paper with lots of color.)

The theme of ALL campaigns this weekend was CHANGE.   If you watched the ABC/WMUR/Facebook debates, you heard the word CHANGE in every other sentence.  If you were in NH or watched the live politcal coverage of NH on any of the cable channels or on CSPAN, you saw the word CHANGE on campaign buses, campaign signs, buttons, etc.  

CHANGE was everywhere - but things are still the same. 

Not one of the candidates (even the ones whom I really like!) have communicated any depth about change.  Charlie Gibson, moderator of the Saturday debates brought up the notion with the Democrats that change acceptance, especially in Washington, "is hard." 

Charlie is right - change acceptance is hard.   We communicators at Sun know and live this all too well!

His comment about change acceptance was a great opportunity for any of the candidates  to jump in to differentiate themselves regarding how they will MANAGE CHANGE in the role of President.  This is where the idea of change meets the tough work to implement the change (and why many change efforts fail). 

I think that the candidates can learn a lot from the communications professionals at Sun  - both our internally and externally focused communicators have a lot of experience with helping to drive change at Sun.  You can't just talk about change, you've got to talk about the future state that the change will bring -- and it has to be something tangible. 

I believe that the candidate who finally steps up to specifically outline how he or she will manage change will be the one to differentiate her/himself in a business-like, rather than a political manner.   This could be very powerful. 

Imagine the candidate who specifically tells us in a very non-political and transparent way.  We will finally hear:
What they are going to change;
Why it needs to be change and who will be affected;
How and When the change will happen.

This is candidate who will gain mobilized support and commitment in the US for any kind of change to happen.

Posted at 07:06AM Jan 07, 2008 by sandyb in Best Practices  |  Comments[0]