“The two words ‘information’ and ‘communication’ are often used interchangeably, but they signify quite different things. Information is giving out; communication is getting through.”
— Sydney J. Harris
The skills of everyone, especially an Authority or Thought Leader, can be categorized into two basic groups:
- The clinical/technical/trade skills you employ to do your job.
- The communicative skills required to inform people of the value of your work, and to grab their attention so that they hear you out.
In fact, you’ll probably be more successful if you’re really good at the second category more than the first.
If you look around, you’ll realize that we tend to minimize the value of the second category, mistakenly thinking that all the value in your business is related to the clinical/technical/trade skills in the first category.
Let’s look at a few examples:
One of the most common mistakes of a new business owner is thinking that the benefits of their product or service are so fantastic that they are self-evident, and that customers will buy with very little provocation simply because it’s the right thing to do. So they fall into the “if I build it they will come” trap.
Most people who have been to college have a story of a professor who seemingly knew about their subject that there was to know, but could not teach.
Many experts tend to think that as long as they teach good information, they can be an authority and be rewarded for their expertise.
Those are mistakes.
Stop doing that, okay?