Perhaps we most often miscommunicate when we get the proverbial “cart before the horse,” but need to get “heart before the discourse”! Communication is first and foremost about relationship. Why then do we typically launch straight away into the factual content of our message, and marvel at the recipient’s rebuff?
This is not a new concept. A 300s B.C. Greek salesman, if you will, named Aristotle penned “The Art of Rhetoric.” His core theory, which has withstood the ages, is that there are three parts to every conversation.
The first part of conversation is ethos. This refers to an appeal based on the messenger’s character. Character is where trust begins. The messenger must first establish good rapport with the listener (i.e., establish credibility).
Pathos, the second part of conversation, invokes the listener’s emotions by appealing to his or her needs, values and sensibilities. Only after rapport is built will the recipient let you into his or her inner sanctum of feelings.
Finally, logos appeals to reason or logic. This is where a messenger pitches the factual message.
Understand that Aristotle’s rhetoric model has a mandated order. If the messenger does not first establish character and then connect with the recipient’s emotions, his or her message content becomes irrelevant. To borrow Teddy Roosevelt’s words, People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.
As an illustration, consider the union organizer in “Norma Rae” (1979 film starring Sally Field; the story of a minimum-waged textile worker in the South). Reuben Warshovsky travels from New York City to the southern factory to persuade its employees to unionize. Notably, Warshovsky commences his impassioned speech as follows:
On October 8, 1970, my grandfather, Isaac Abraham Warshovsky, age 87, died in his sleep in New York City. On the following Friday morning, his funeral was held. My mother and father attended. My two uncles from Brooklyn attended. And my aunt Minnie came up from Florida. Also present were 862 members of The Amalgamated Clothing Workers and the Cloth, Hat and Cap Makers Union of America – also members of his family.
In death, as in life, they stood at his side. They had fought battles with him, had bound the wounds of battle with him, had earned bread together and had broken it together. And when they spoke, they spoke in one voice and they were heard. And they were black and they were white and they were Irish and they were Polish and they were Catholic and they were Jews – and they were one. That’s what a union is – one.
Warshovsky knew he was not a “welcomed” visitor to the factory. To begin his message with his perceived attributes of the union would have fallen upon deaf ears, at minimum, possibly even incited a riot. He wisely began by building credibility, humanizing himself in their minds. Next, he played to their emotions:
Ladies and gentlemen, the textile industry in which you are spending your lives and your substance, and in which your children and their children will spend their lives and their substance, is the only industry in the whole length and breadth of these United States of America that is not unionized. Therefore, they are free to exploit you, to lie to you, to cheat you and to take away from you what is rightfully yours – your health, a decent wage, a fit place to work.
Movie viewers will note that the workers’ facial expressions and body language have evolved. At this point, he has their emotions stirred. He has them in the palm of his hand. The time had come for him to cut to the chase:
I would urge you to stop them by coming over to Room 31 at the Golden Cherry Motel and pick up a union card and sign it.
Yes, it comes from the Bible, according to the tribes of your fathers: “Ye shall inherit.” But it comes from Reuben Warshovsky: Not unless you make it happen.
Thank you.
Warshovsky not only delivered his intended message, that message resonated resoundingly. The workers were whole-heartedly committed to his cause. But had he organized his message in any other order, the workers would have thrown him out on his ear.
We would be wise to construct our communication with others in like manner.
© 2012 Russ Riddle. All rights reserved.