Last week, I posted my Communication Faux Pas Hall of Fame. This week, it’s the successes that get the ink, profiling those who went the extra mile and communicated well. Unfortunately, to come up with my 11, I really had to look since there are not nearly as many to choose from to induct into the Successes HOF than the Faux Pas HOF. This is no surprise, but disappointing and depressing nonetheless.
So, here goes. As with the last post, if there is someone or some act I overlooked and you think should be included, let me know and I’ll see about including it in updates with appropriate attribution.
1. Hillary Clinton at the November 15 Democratic debate where she looked like she was actually having fun.
2. Rudy Giuliani for demonstrating that a candidate does not have to pander to the base about every single thing to get ahead.
3. Mike Huckabee for showing the country that communication style matters.
4. Winston Ma for being a creative and generous networker.
5. Steve Jobs for giving a great presentation, like he does every year, at MacWorld, and selling tons of product as a result.
6. Kelley Flatley, CEO of Bear Naked Granola, for zeroing in on the fact that people who eat granola are buying into a lifestyle. She built this lowest of low-tech companies from scratch, made it a fun place to work and sold it for 100 million after just 5 years.
7. Life is Good clothing line for showing simple ideas that work.
8. Blendtec blender manufacturer, which, through creative use of YouTube, showed the world what a great blender should be able to do (like blend glass marbles into powder) and sold a lot of blenders as a result.
9. Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook for his straightforward apology for its handling of “Beacon,” an application that purported to do subscribers a favor, but in fact was more about spying on them for the benefit of advertisers.
10. Captain Denny Flanagan, United Air Lines pilot orders 200 MacDonalds meals for stranded passengers, sends pix of pets in the cargo hold to their owners and calls anxious parents of children flying alone to update them on flight status.
11. Fastcompany.com and Fast Company Magazine for revitalizing a great brand and making it the source for business people the world over.
I won’t be writing next week. Have a great holiday and Happy New Year.
2007 Copyright Ruth Sherman. All Rights Reserved.