by Emily Chan
In English, “face-saving” carries a derogatory flavor. People say, “We are doing that just to let them save face” implying that a little pretense has been created to allow someone to go along without feeling bad. The tone implies ridicule.
This is a grave misunderstanding of the role and importance of face-saving. Face-saving reflects a person’s need to reconcile the stand he takes in a negotiation or an agreement with his principles and with his past words and deeds (this reconciliation is the “golden bridge”). . . .
Often in a negotiation people will continue to hold out not because the proposal on the table is inherently unacceptable, but simply because they want to avoid the feeling or the appearance of backing down to the other side. If the substance can be phrased or conceptualized differently so that it seems a fair outcome, they will then accept it. . . . (The importance of face-saving) should not be underestimated.5
Herb Cohen, negotiation consultant to some of the largest corporations and government agencies in North America, who has also taught at Harvard University, wrote about the same idea in You Can Negotiate Anything:
Face is who I want the others to think I am. It is how a person wants to be seen publicly. When I am concerned with my saving face after a difficult negotiation, I want to make sure that the stature I have always projected in terms of prestige, worth, dignity, and respect will not be diminished. . . .
You must always keep in mind the physical law that “for every action there is a reaction.” The gist of this was verbalized by Bernard Baruch when he said “Two things are bad for the heart—running up stairs and running down people.”6
It is important to “save face” for the other party. So build a golden bridge. Make sure there is a face-saving way for the other side to agree with your proposal. Roger Fisher and William Ury gave this example of face saving: a major city government and its Hispanic community made an agreement on municipal jobs for this minority community. But the mayor refused to endorse the agreement. This was because he was not involved in the negotiation and he felt he would lose face. In the end, the only way for the terms of this agreement to be implemented was for the agreement to be withdrawn, allowing the mayor to announce the exact same terms as his own initiative. He got his “face.”7
Notes
1. Pankaj Ghemawat, British Satellite Broadcasting Versus Sky Television (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1993).
2. Michael D. Watkins and Sarah G. Matthews, “Strategic Deal-Making at Millennium Pharmaceuticals,” Harvard Business Review (September 1999), available for purchase online at www.harvardbusiness.org (access date: January 25, 2009).
3. David A. Lax and James K. Sebenius, “3-D Negotiation: Playing the Whole Game,” Harvard Business Review (November 2003) 65–74; available for purchase online at www.harvardbusiness.org (access date: January 25, 2009).
4. Tom Peters, “Getting Things Done: The P&I 34”, available online: www.tompeters.com/slides/uploaded/PandI34_091604.ppt, slide 9 (access date: January 14, 2009).
5. Roger Fisher and William Ury, Getting to Yes (New York: Penguin Group, 1992), 28–29.
6. Herb Cohen, You Can Negotiate Anything, (New York: Bantam Books, 1982), 189–191.
7. Roger Fisher and William Ury, Getting to Yes, (New York:, Penguin Group, 1992), 29.
3
SPEAK SO PEOPLE WILL LISTEN
“A” FOR ARTICULATE
HBS is well-known for its “case teaching” method. The classes are almost never in lecture format. Instead, students are given cases to read before each class. (See the sidebar for explanation of what a case is.) During class, the professor will use questions to lead a group of 80 people into discussions of the case. You may be called on by the professor or you may raise your hand to volunteer to tell the class your views. Usually, over 50 percent of your grade is based on such class discussion participation. Therefore, you must work very hard to get the opportunity to speak—and when you get airtime, you must speak very well to have any chance of getting the top grade.
What Is an HBS Case?
HBS has an official explanation of what a case is and how it is taught:
“Typically, an HBS case is a detailed account of a real-life business situation, describing the dilemma of the ‘protagonist’—a real person with a real job who is confronted with a real problem. Faculty and their research assistants spend weeks at the company that is the subject of the case. The resulting case presents the story exactly as the protagonist saw it, including ambiguous evidence, shifting variables, imperfect knowledge, no obvious right answers, and a ticking clock that impatiently demands action. Though every case is different, nearly all center on one overarching question: What should the protagonist do? In their two years at HBS, students study more than 500 cases—500 chances to join their classmates to test themselves against the rock-hard realities of life in business.”1
HBS is extremely competitive. When you get to speak, you will only have about a minute or two before other people will try to interrupt you with their viewpoints. At least 40 hands will be raised as soon as people think they can attack your point or when they think they have a better point (if you are simply a boring speaker) or even when you are still in the middle of your speech. Whatever point you make, you must also be prepared to think on your feet to defend your views when you are challenged by the professor or your classmates. I have had classes when a student had to go on the defensive against the professor and 79 other students!
You discuss two to three cases, each for an hour to two, every day for two years. People, especially professors, often joke that HBS has such a system so that professors do not have to prepare for class since there is no lecture. Also, professors are never wrong in such a system, as they only facilitate class discussions and never have to lecture on their own views. In reality what the case teaching method highlights is that most business situations have no obvious right or wrong answer. The key skill is to be able to analyze and evaluate the situation and the options. Most importantly, you must be able to articulate and defend your analysis and your views intelligently and succinctly; and you must be good on your feet.
In business, you need to be articulate to get a good job, attract investors, motivate your staff, negotiate with your suppliers, and sell to your customers. Ability to speak in a logical, persuasive, and confident manner is invaluable. “Brilliant but inarticulate” may be a description that would apply to a nuclear scientist but not to any of the head honcho business types we see in business school. They are all brilliant and articulate. If they are not articulate when they enter HBS, they will be when they graduate.
I have found three techniques particularly useful in helping me articulate logically, persuasively, and confidently: structured logic, storytelling, and detailed practice.
Structured Logic
This technique involves using logic to structure facts and data to make a point. Structured logic helps both you and the audience. It helps you because it forces you to think clearly and logically. It ensures your point makes sense. It helps the audience because it is easy to follow and understand.
Structured logic comes in two types, deductive and inductive. Deductive logic looks like this:
A = B, B = C, therefore A = C. “A = C” is the “so what,” the logical conclusion.
Inductive logic looks like this:
A, B, and C lead to D as the “so what” or conclusion. A, B, and C are “parallel,” which means they are different arguments supporting D and they do not bear a cause-and-effect relationship with each other.
Thinking and speaking (and writing) in bullet points is often very helpful in organizing data into logic. The bullet points should either be deductive or inductive. For example:
I like gentle and clean cats.
Milo is a cat.
Milo is also gentle and clean.
→ Therefore, I like Milo.
Here, the point is deduced from the data and facts.
Alternatively, I could argue that I
like Milo (the point induced from the list of data and facts) because:
He is fond of me.
He is gentle.
He is clean.
He is a cat.
People who speak well often have very tight logic. Tight logic means three things. First, the data and facts should clearly support the argument. Second, any given argument is either deductive or inductive and not a mix of the two. The following is an example of loose and relatively ineffective logic:
I like Milo because:
He is gentle (inductive).
His fur is an ugly grayish color (unclear how this supports “I like Milo”).
I will be very sad when he dies one day (logic changed from inductive in first bullet point to deductive).
Third, for a single argument, it is usually more effective to have only three to five bullet points than to have a long laundry list. In the HBS classroom, you have no other choice. Each time you speak, the professor and your fellow classmates usually have patience for only one or two arguments, each supported by one or two (at most three) bullet points. It is not uncommon for a long deductive argument to get cut off by the professor’s, “Where is this argument going? What is your point?” (A similarly long inductive argument is apt to get cut off with: “You have made your point. Let’s move on to someone else.”)
In consulting, we have a “rule of three.” This rule of thumb is to have three bullet points for each argument, for a number of reasons. Too many bullet points can confuse and overwhelm the audience. It is generally believed that people tend to remember at most three things, not more. With too many bullet points, I usually find it possible to group some of them together or to eliminate some of the less important ones. Fewer than three bullet points will make it seem that the supporting data is rather thin. Of course, three is only a rule of thumb. It is not uncommon to have a range of two to five.
Structured logic can be used to make a simple, single argument, but it can also be used to organize more complex arguments. In the following example, a more complex argument, the central question is “How many favorite pets do I have?” There are five levels of argument, distinguished by Roman numerals, indentation, and bullets.
I have three favorite pets (“so what” or conclusion induced from below) I
(i) Milo the cat. I like Milo because (“so what” or conclusion induced): II
• he is fond of me. I know this because (“so what” induced) III
– he kisses me whenever he sees me IV
– he does not let anyone hug him except me IV
– he runs away whenever my mother and dad try hug him V
– he screamed last time my school friends tried to hug him V
– he scratched the postman who tried to hug him V
– he purrs whenever I call his name IV
• he is gentle III
• he is clean III
(ii) Kilo the dog. I like Kilo because (“so what” deduced): II
• my father bought Kilo for me III
• I like everything my father bought me III
• So I like Kilo II
(iii) Silo the fish (and so on through the argument.) II
Storytelling
I have been taught two types of storytelling. While they look mutually exclusive, they are actually complementary. I will first explain each of them and then how they can be interwoven.
The first type is what I term “factual storytelling.” It was taught to me in my consulting days and what I typically use in my presentations. Basically, it just means using structured logic to solve whatever strategic, investment, or operational issue I was given. It is similar to the previous five-level example of pet preferences, except for having more levels with more complex quantitative and qualitative analyses and arguments.
The second type, I first learned when I was involved in a media start-up in 1999 and 2000. I was the chief executive officer. My chief operating officer was a retired movie director. I was preparing a presentation to potential investors. I rehearsed it in front of him and a few of my key managers. My COO dozed off after the first half of my slides. I did not mind as he was in the company because of his creative mind, not for his business sense. At the end of the rehearsal, I asked everyone for their comments. The Coo woke up and commented, “It is so boring. Why don’t you tell a story?” I said, “But this is a story.” He answered, “This is not a story.”
I did not think much about that incident until I was interviewing to hire a new sales manager. The interviewee was a lady whose résumé was only marginal. I had my usual list of questions. I asked her to describe her latest achievements. Instead of giving me a list such as the number of new clients she signed or the number of staff people she oversaw, she told me,
My last company was almost in bankruptcy. The sales manager and assistant manager both left for better opportunities. The CEO was so busy fighting off bankers and creditors that he had no time to organize the remaining, totally demoralized sales force. I was the only experienced person left. The other four left on the team were all young and inexperienced. I could have found another job but I did not want to leave the rest of the team behind. The company would definitely fall apart very quickly with no sales team and everyone would lose their jobs very soon. So I stayed on and worked hard. We worked out a strategy of focusing on the long-term clients as the sales cycle would be shorter. The company declared bankruptcy last month. But I felt I tried my best. My CEO thanked me in tears when he gave me my severance check.
I was very moved by the story. First, it was more interesting and engaging than the typical self-touting laundry lists most interviewees would give. Second, the story, if really true, told me a lot about this person—she is loyal to her company, considerate to her staff and colleagues, and able to handle a crisis. The image of the CEO in tears handing her the check was vivid. I did not hire her in the end because there were other people more qualified, but she definitely left a strong impression. She was bottom of my list before the interview but within the top five after.
I did not put the COO incident and the memorable interview together until I read a Harvard Business Review article a year or two later. The article, titled “Storytelling That Moves People—A Conversation with Screenwriting Coach Robert McKee,” has the following introduction in bold print:
“Forget about PowerPoint and statistics. To involve people at the deepest level, you need stories. Hollywood’s top writing consultant reveals the secrets of telling them.”2
In the article, McKee explains, “I know the storytelling method works, because after I consulted with a dozen corporations whose principals told exciting stories to Wall Street, they all got their money.”3
After I read the article, I had a revelation. This is another kind of storytelling. In my mind, I call it “emotional storytelling.” It is not just factual. It is like anecdotes but used in a more extensive, organized, purposeful, and dramatic way. I did more research to understand its key success factors. I found that a good emotional story in business has a lot of similarities with the kind of age-old classics like “Beauty and the Beast” or “Cinderella” that we tell our children and that they love listening to over and over again:
A beginning tailored to entice the audience. “Once upon a time in a faraway place lived a beautiful young lady” attracts the attention and imagination of young children. In the same way, the most powerful emotional business storytelling deliberately starts with a beginning that catches attention of the target audience, such as “my last company was almost in bankruptcy” to an interviewer or “either we change the way we do business or we may as well fold the company today” to a group of executives. Great stories start with a dramatic momentum that can be built on rather than with unnecessary and boring details. For example, “Cinderella” does not start with how Cinderella’s father chose his new wife and the interviewee did not start with what the company did or how she first joined it.
An engaging and exciting middle. Great fairyta
les are full of suspense and emotional ups and downs, with the hero or heroine fighting and then overcoming antagonists and obstacles. The bigger the difficulties and the greater the suspense, the more interesting the story. Cinderella had no clothes, no carriage, and a rigid deadline. She had lost her shoe. Cinderella was sad, then happy because of the fairy Godmother, then scared again when the clock struck 12. The interviewee faced an employer going bankrupt, saw her superiors resign, and was left with a weak team. Both of these examples have a central character: Cinderella and the interviewee. Audiences generally identify more with people and characters in the stories than with abstract discussion.4 When there is no one central character, characters can be woven into the body of the story. For example: “In the next 10 minutes, I will show you five reasons why our business will disappear within five years if we continue with business as usual.” Then, one reason could include the story of how a big customer was disappointed and another reason could include the story of how a group of salesmen felt helpless.
A strong conclusion that drives the message home. When the audience realizes that the story is about to finish, their attention generally goes up. Fairytales usually end with a glamorous, happy ending with the good getting rewarded and the evil defeated: “And the Prince and Cinderella lived happily ever after” while the evil stepmother and stepsisters were left to gnash their teeth in frustration. In business, stories should end with a purpose, such as reinforcing a message or defining the course of action against current challenges. The ending should tie the story up “without wandering, but without being too abrupt . . . (and not) merely summarize what you’ve said so far.”5 The interview example demonstrated an effective ending: “My CEO thanked me in tears when he gave me my severance check.” It brought the story to an end concisely and smoothly, reinforcing the message that she had made sacrifices for her last company that would make any boss thankful.