Reading time: 2 - 4 minutes
Video Time: 38 minutes 29 seconds
Communication, regardless of the message, has a singular goal that it must achieve to be considered to have some degree of success. This simple goal isn’t necessarily comprehension or change or anything of the sort: communication is to disrupt. Disruption isn’t anything negative or anything like rather; rather, it just has to force people stop and think about something. While changing their minds to think about something in particular is a perk, it is by no means the sole measure of achievement. Patrick Dixon, author, consultant, founder of the AIDS agency ACET and chairman of Global Change, Ltd, believes that this disruption is the key element in communicating with people and creating the future.
There are three distinct areas that are disrupted, and react, differently. The individual, the community, and the company are all unique and must be managed accordingly. Of these three, the clearest relationship is with the individual. Quite logically, as people are individuals. However, the behavior of the individual is heavily influences by its peers, the individuals that surround it, or its community. Companies are not exempt from this web of interaction, as they exist in relationship to their market as a whole.
In the first segment, in discussing working with people, Dixon emphasizes two specific elements. People, especially with the advent of the internet, have a greater desire for immediate gratification than ever. In one point, Dixon claims that nearly half of the people out there are lost after a delay of fifteen seconds, whether it be waiting for a website to load or an automated phone call. Secondly, and quite related, people are irrational. People talk to inanimate objects despite knowing full well that there is no actual effect. Equally tied to impatience, Dixon notes, with some amusement, people will press elevator buttons multiple times. That sentiment is echoed by nearly the entire audience.
Understanding people is vital to communicating. Indeed, it forms the very essence of communication. Determining how people, and their surroundings, react is of the utmost importance in successfully communicating, or disrupting them. Irrationality is an effect of emotion, and one that cannot be changed. However, companies and communities, both entities of plurality, are quite different.
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