My friend and colleague, Marty Baum of Edgewood Consulting Group (www.edgewoodcg.com), a firm that specializes in working with major consumer packaged goods manufacturers and their retail customers, wrote to agree with me about the importance of knowing your call to action before you start speaking. He said that, as a sales consultant, in both his industry and in society, while everyone is so inundated with data and “information,” being able to communicate in a compelling way is even more important than ever. People’s attention spans are shorter, not only the younger generations but older ones as well, so nailing that call to action is more and more critical.

At Edgewood Consulting they are increasingly focused on developing the STORY as well. The focus is on creating a powerful narrative with great flow, a compelling open and strong close. Marty told me that they chide one another about how the story, or message itself is becoming more important than strong data, which goes somewhat against their training as MBAs. My colleagues would agree! Finding good data is relatively easy with the Internet but developing a powerful and “sticky” story is tricky. It takes time and expertise.

What story does your company tell?