Working Up

by Dwayne Phillips

We each get one chance to share an idea with others. I cannot overemphasize the need to be ready for that chance.

I have been working with a colleague for several years now. This colleague has an idea he wants to present to others. He has been talking about the one idea to others for several years now. He is finally reducing the one idea to a set of clear statements.

Now that he has the clear statements, no one is listening.

Why not? Because he has exhausted the audience. Now that he is ready to share his one idea, the audience turns off at his first statement. They have heard it all before. Actually, the have heard lots of murmuring before. They have never heard the clear statements that my colleague has. And they never will hear them. They are exhausted.

We each get one chance to share an idea with others. We should present that idea to ourselves and friendly advisers a dozen times first. We should pound the fluff out of the idea until we have reduced it to a minimal set of words in a minimal set of points.

After we have worked the idea to death, we are ready to present it to others—not a second earlier than that boring, beat-it-to-death point in time.