A series · 10 pieces
landmark moments
Pivotal real-world moments in communication, told as stories, each with the lesson for an ordinary professional. Every factual claim links to a source, and where history is disputed we say so. No long quotations: we paraphrase, and keep any quote short.
- Landmark MomentsChicago, 26 September 19605 min readthe night Kennedy and Nixon met the camera, and the myth that followedIn 1960, two men stood in a Chicago television studio for the first televised presidential debate in American history. One looked rested and spoke to the lens. The other looked unwell and spoke to the room. The story that grew out of that night is famous. Parts of it are true. One part probably is not.How you look and sound is part of your message, but it never replaces having something to say.
- Landmark MomentsSan Francisco, 9 January 20075 min readthree products, one device: how Steve Jobs introduced the iPhoneIn January 2007, Steve Jobs walked onto a stage in San Francisco and told the audience he was about to introduce three new products. He named them one by one. Then he revealed that they were all the same thing. Behind that simple moment sat an unfinished phone and a carefully planned route through it.Make the new idea out of things people already understand, and rehearse until you know where it can break.
- Landmark MomentsWashington, DC, 28 August 19635 min readthe moment Martin Luther King Jr. set his text asideAt the Lincoln Memorial in August 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. was reading a speech finished only hours before. Partway through, he moved the pages aside and began to speak about a dream. It looks like a moment of pure inspiration. The record shows it was also the fruit of years of practice.The best improvisation rests on years of preparation: know your material so well you can leave the page.
- Landmark MomentsChicago area, September to November 19825 min readthe Tylenol recall of 1982: what really happened, and what the legend leaves outIn the autumn of 1982, seven people in and around Chicago died after taking Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules that someone had laced with cyanide. Johnson & Johnson's response is taught in business schools as a model of how to handle a crisis. Much of that reputation is earned. Some of it is legend.In a crisis, say what you know, act on it, and keep people informed before you have every answer.
- Landmark MomentsUtah, Alabama and Florida, 27 to 28 January 19865 min readthe Challenger charts: when the warning was there but the message did not landOn the night before the space shuttle Challenger was launched, engineers who feared the cold argued against it on a long teleconference. They were overruled. Seven people died the next morning. The way their evidence was presented has been debated ever since, and the debate itself holds a lesson.When the stakes are high, lead with your conclusion and show the one chart that answers the question.
- Landmark MomentsPortland, 28 December 1978, and Guam, 6 August 19976 min readthe hint that was not enough: what cockpits learned about speaking up to a seniorTwo air crashes, nineteen years apart, have something painful in common. In both, someone junior in the cockpit saw part of the danger and spoke, but softly. Aviation spent decades learning to fix that. What it learned is useful to anyone who has ever had to tell a boss something unwelcome.Say what you see, say what you want done, and say it early, before a hint becomes too late.
- Landmark MomentsPhoenix, Arizona, 9 October 20145 min readthe same-day correction: Satya Nadella, a wrong answer and a culture of learningEight months into his job as Microsoft's chief executive, Satya Nadella gave a bad answer on a stage full of women in computing. By the evening he had told every employee he was wrong. The episode became part of the story he told about learning in public, with a lesson for anyone who has misspoken in public.Correct yourself quickly, plainly and in the same forum, then show what you changed.
- Landmark MomentsMadras and PepsiCo, from 20065 min readthe gift of your child: Indra Nooyi's letters to her executives' parentsWhen Indra Nooyi became chief executive of PepsiCo, relatives who came to see her family in India congratulated her mother, not her. That small scene, as she tells it, led her to write to the parents of her senior executives. It is a story about a very old form of communication: the specific, handwritten kind of thanks.Specific written thanks, sent to the people behind the person, can be remembered for years.
- Landmark MomentsChicago, 11 September 18936 min readfive words to a hall of strangers: Vivekananda in Chicago, 1893A young monk from India, by his own account unprepared and close to panic, stood up in a packed Chicago hall in 1893 and opened with a greeting. The hall erupted. More than a century later, the first line of that speech is still widely quoted in India. What happened, and what can a nervous speaker learn?A warm, direct first line that treats the room as family can carry a nervous speaker.
- Landmark MomentsKerala, August 20186 min readwhen the water rose: how Kerala communicated through the 2018 floodsIn August 2018, Kerala had its worst floods in close to a century. Hundreds of people died and well over a million had to leave their homes. Alongside the soldiers, sailors and rescue teams, the response ran on words: official statements, volunteer websites, WhatsApp groups, fishermen calling to each other across flooded lanes, and a running fight against rumours.In a crisis, say what you know, say what you need, and correct rumours fast and plainly.
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