It's Not Manipulation, It's Strategic Communication | Keisha Brewer | TEDxGeorgetown

good morning good morning i'm excited to be your first speaker of today by a show of hands how many of you have heard of the phrase it's not what you say it's how you say it do you remember the person who told that to you tell them they lied repeat after me what you say is just as important as how you say it your turn what you say is just as important as how you say it and that is called strategic communications and strategic communications is probably the very thing you've been needing this entire time

to help you get what you need out of life see most people stop going after the bigger things that they want in life simply because well they're just not getting it but what they don't realize is that they're causing some sort of resistance in the way that they're communicating that's helping them not get what they want out of life how many of you have been in the situation where no matter how much you talk and talk and tell someone your viewpoint they're just not getting it right no matter how much you change your approach and

your delivery they just not understanding your viewpoint whether that's to a family member whether that's to your spouse whether that's to your boss or just not getting it i think we've all experienced that type of frustration today i'm going to give you the tools to strategically communicate through all of those issues and combat that resistance and i'm going to do that first by taking you through two parallel situations very such very real situations to me one personal and one professional starting with professional so i started my career in communications a few years ago starting with

news writing and reporting then going on to advertising specialists then landing a job as a communications specialist in my communications specialist role i was able to do things such as email marketing mission-driven partnerships writing speeches for the ceo things of that nature on the first day of my communication specialist role my boss said i know this is a lot it's your first day you're supposed to be doing paperwork things of that nature but do you mind if you reach out to google and see if they can land a partnership with our next event next month

and i'm like you're right that's a very big ass for the first day i am supposed to be doing paperwork where's hr so either way it's my job right it's the first day you want to make a big impression i shoot my shot that's millennial talk for just get it done and so i look up google's mission i figure out what they're interested in the type of partnerships that they're interested in then i think about my company's mission what type of partnerships are we interested in what is our mission what are we trying to convey

i wrap that up into an email i send it to their communications department i express the need send it on its way transition into my personal life i get home and i'm scrolling on instagram like us millennials do and i get a dm from my friend jessica and she's like oh my gosh keisha the guy i like just damned me i'm like okay she's like and he liked my picture on instagram okay so what do you want to do now she's like well you're a communication specialist now teach me how to communicate with him as

if that's what we did right so i'm like okay well i'll go with it what's the goal what do you want him to do what do you want to get out of the conversation she says well i want him to be my boyfriend again it was a like on instagram right how far are we going to take this but i let her keep going and i'm like okay so what do you know about this man she's like well i know that our values they pretty much go together because on his instagram i see that he

posts music and i like music and he likes food and i like food and he likes his mom i like my mom and i'm like okay sure fine okay and i'm like out of all the people on instagram that he's engaging with why you and she goes on to tell me about how she thinks their missions of being successful in the entertainment industry will align all right so here's what i tell her to do slide into his dm that's millennial talk for send a private message and just organically have a conversation like you normally would

allow him to organically express his values allow him to organically express his interest and then you express yours and see how they mutually align at the end of it see if you guys can go out hang out grab a drink or something cool long story short six months later here they are i played matchmaker kudos to me moving on into my professional life i go back to work the next day and my boss is like keisha remember how i told you to email google about that partnership yeah less than 12 hours ago she's like well

they emailed us this morning and they said they actually want to partner on the event and it was at that very moment that i realized i need a raise but it was always it was also at that moment that i realized i just strategically communicated into very different scenarios using the same exact method and that method is what i'm going to share with you today now let's take a step back what does strategic communications really mean how many of you have taken a strategic communications class or communications course by a show of hands great so

what you probably learned is something along the lines of strategic communications is communicating the best message through the right channels measured against well considered organizational communication specific goals great right but through my two scenarios which you can probably see is that strategic communications is simply communicating with purpose while showcasing value in order to achieve a goal and at the heart of it all strategic communications helps you evoke specific responses out of your target audience whether that be a spouse a love interest your boss and in those responses it helps you get what you want out

of the situation as well now you can also be thinking is she teaching us how to manipulate people maybe but not really because strategic communications creates mutually beneficial situations strategic communications allows both parties to feel like they're getting what they want out of the deal okay so if you were paying attention here's what i did in both scenarios to help them get what they want out of the situation number one i identified the goal in the professional situation the goal was to land the partnership with google in the personal situation the goal was to land

the boyfriend step two understand your audience in the professional situation i researched everything about google to understand what type of partnerships they'd like to align with in the personal situation i was able to allow jessica to go into his instagram and say what does he like to do understand what his values are step three communicate the value communicating the value in the partnership with google look like helping them understand what they get out of a partnership with us in the personal situation she communicated what value their interests would have with one another and step four

express the need in both situations i was able to use the value that they both share to express the need that they both want and so by doing this and using this method i'm able to combat the resistance commonly felt when people are communicating through challenges even like today i was able to use strategic communication standing right here on this stage and not because i was able to memorize my lines on hearing speech and not because i was able to put together this presentation but because i took you through those same four steps standing right

here number one i identified the goal which was to get you guys to understand what communication strategic communications really was two i took the time to understand my audience by asking you guys two questions to help me know who was in the room today step three i communicated the value of what strategic communications can do in your life in step four i expressed the need for why you need strategic communications and see usually the reason why people are faced with a lot of resistance in the way that they're communicating is because they're skipping these four

steps or at least one of them for example if you don't identify the goal you'll be speaking without purpose you ever had those conversations where you realize it started off one way and it ended another and you're trying to figure out how you even got there didn't identify the goal step two i was able to step i'm sorry step three i was able to communicate the value and then express the need here on this stage why do you need strategic communications why this is going to help you in your life and how you can combat

that resistance so at the heart of it all realize it's not what you say what you say is just as important as how you say it thank you