What Corporate Communicators Can Learn from the Fiscal Cliff Debate
While I’m not sure there were any clear winners in the recent fiscal cliff debate, I give the most points for message discipline to Team Obama.
Whatever your politics, I think any professional communicator would agree that -- at least on this issue -- the White House demonstrated the classic fundamentals of message strategy:
1. Be relevant
2. Appeal to reason
3. Keep it simple
4. Be consistent
They boiled down an otherwise complex tax plan to two simple ideas:
- No tax hikes for the middle class
- The wealthiest two percent of Americans would be asked to pay more
The message was relatable and reasonable for many middle class Americans. Case in point: Look how many people jumped on the band wagon of the White House’s social media #My2K Twitter campaign in which middle class Americans were asked what they would do with a $2,000 tax savings.
And in terms of consistency, the president hasn’t wavered from this position since he first hit the campaign trail in 2008.
Breaking Through the Clutter Requires Discipline
With all the noise that competes for the public’s attention on any given day, it takes tremendous discipline to break through the clutter and deliver messages that are heard let alone resonate. By my scorecard, the Obama Administration did that more effectively than their Republican counterparts.
Those two simple messages weren’t knock out punches by any means. But the precision and consistency left their opponents wobbly.
As communicators, pushing the C-suite to distill an issue down to its simplest form is some times the hardest task and keeping everyone on message even harder.
That’s why seeing message discipline in action, like we did from the White House in recent weeks, can be a helpful lesson for communicators in the trenches.
Obama Stumbles on Message As Often As He Succeeds
And by the way, Obama doesn’t win every round when it comes to message discipline. Look at the second debate of the presidential election this fall when he was anything but “on message” or the complete lack of message during the health-care reform debates in the summer 2010.
Professional communicators can learn from the president’s messaging missteps just as much as we can from his successes.
Of course, the fiscal cliff debate isn't over yet. We'll see how he does in the next round over the debt ceiling.
