How much do you care?

Stanley Kubrick once said that “either you care or you don’t, there is no in-between.”

Now, how much do you care for finding the right words?
For their clarity and simplicity?
Their truthfulness and beauty?
Their relevance and respectfulness?

You can always choose to care less. But that, according to Kubrick, is the same thing as not caring at all.

Careless words can diminish the impact of your message. They can create confusion and lead to misunderstandings, conflict, and disengagement. And they can even damage relationships and morale within the team.

How much do you care for finding the right words?

Who cares?

It’s just details.

It’s just decoration.

It’s just the back side.

It’s just a corner case.

It’s just implementation.

It’s just a meeting.

It’s just a trainee.

Who cares?

And yet, if you’re the one who does care, you’re going to be blown away by the difference that makes.

The longevity of a story

Most stories can be told in a couple of minutes, sometimes less.

Good stories resonate way longer. Great ones even for years and decades.

Most stories of the latter kind are not told on a cinema screen but by people we interact with personally.

It’s not the big budget of Hollywood that makes for a great story but the relevance of it being the right story in the right moment.

When we care deeply

When we care deeply, we’ve got a problem. Because often, we find ourselves competing with others who don’t care as much. Or, to be more precise, who do care as much, yet not for the cause but for the deal.

These people have no problem with hyperbole and exaggerations. With promising the blue from the skies. With using sneaky or pushy sales techniques. With saying this while meaning that.

And therefore, these people have no problem with finding clear messages that resonate.

It really can feel like an unfair advantage.

Here’s the thing: It is an unfair advantage. But for you. Precisely because you care. Because the thing that’s at stake is trust. And trust is the basis which any sustainable success is built upon.

In a way, these people who are just in-it-for-the-deal are a little bit like Charlie Brown’s Lucy. Every time they get the deal, they get a devilish fun out of it. But also every time, trust on the customer’s side erodes a little bit. Drip by drip. So, they have to try harder every time. Which they do. It’s what makes competing with them so hard.

But.

Don’t forget that you’ve got an unfair advantage. Because you care.

That’s why you’ve done the work. Your idea, your product, your project is actually great. It’s not just a claim. It’s a fact. You deliver what you promise. You’ve sweated the details.

And that means that when you manage to nail it, it will build trust, not destroy it. Because the results will prove you right. And so, for you, it’s going to get easier each time. Drip by drip. All you need to do is to tell true stories about the things you care deeply about.

I seldom have time to practice

That’s what more than 12% of executives who were surveyed by Distinction Communication answered when they were asked how much time they spent practicing for a high-stakes presentation.

And I get it. You’ve got a company to run. Your schedule is chock-full. There just isn’t room for nice-to-have stuff when all your time is reserved for the important stuff. (Also, what do we have a marketing agency for, right?)

I get that.

But our audiences couldn’t care less about how full our schedule is or how busy we are. And neither does our competition. And rightly so. They don’t have to care for how well we prepare. They don’t have to care for what we consider important or nice-to-have.

All they have to care for is what matters to them. If our competition cares more than we do for nailing the pitch, it’s perfectly ok that they have an advantage. That the customer likes their pitch better.

Yet, it’s always a choice. We can decide what we consider important work and what we consider nice-to-have. We can choose what we care for. And then we can choose to go all the way.

What perfectionists care for

Perfectionists care about not embarrassing themselves. They will go all the way to avoid embarrassment, even if that means not shipping their work.

What that also means is that as a perfectionist you care more for your embarrassment than for your cause.

If you care for your cause, shipping is inevitably part of the caring. It’s even a responsibility. When we genuinely care to make things better, we’d steal the world from better if we didn’t ship. When we care for our cause, we inevitably care for shipping, too.

What gets us into trouble is when we get distracted along the way. When we start caring about what people think. What the critics will say. How many sales we’ll make with this.

Then, we’ve gone off track and stopped caring for the thing we set out to make. Because you can’t care for two things at the same time. They will inevitably get into conflict. When you go all the way into one direction, it’s impossible to go all the way in another direction at the same time.

It’s a double choice. You choose what you care for and you choose to go all the way.

Either you care or you don’t

Either you care or you don’t, there’s no in-between. And if you care, then go all of the way. – Stanley Kubrick

Almost compelling is another way of saying “not compelling”. Almost sold means not sold. Almost inspired is not inspired.

If we aren’t willing to go all of the way, then we don’t actually care, according to Stanley Kubrick: either we want people to get it or not. Either we want to inspire or not. Either we want to sell or not.

Keep in mind, though, that the crucial word here is “not”. By saying “not important” to most destinations it becomes feasible to say “important” to the right ones and mean it. Dismissing the paths you’re not willing to go ’til the end allows us to follow the right path to its end and invest the effort that is necessary to reach our goal.

(Interestingly, your audience will often sense it when you are not willing to go all of the way.)

Spread the Word

Picture of Dr. Michael Gerharz

Dr. Michael Gerharz