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Collection: Flashcards

Sightline Flashcards are quick reference tools for effective communications strategies. They’re messaging memos distilled from experts and savvy communicators—to help you do your job and save you time.

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Sightline Flashcards are quick reference tools for effective communications strategies. They’re messaging memos distilled from experts and savvy communicators—to help you do your job and save you time. The Flashcards focus on values-based communication: strategies for talking about important policies or issue solutions in terms of shared values. Browse the Flashcards to gain insight into particular sustainability issues or simply to hone your values-based communications strategies.

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Got Policy Solutions? Think: Brownies

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We’re policy nerds here. (You may have gathered that.) It means sometimes we know just about every last detail of a particular policy solution. It means we sometimes go a little overboard telling other people about all those details—because we’re excited about the possibilities. (Okay, maybe a lot overboard!)

Most of the other nerds we know do this too. And even quite a few of our non-nerd friends do it. It’s mostly because we are keen on fixing problems.

Of course, knowing the specifics is important for us. We put policy ideas through the wringer for a living. And all the little details are really, majorly, crucial for making any policy work correctly.

But as we’re talking about policy solutions, we sometimes get bogged down in the details. That’s when our audience can miss not only the basics and our enthusiasm, but also the most important thing: The Big Picture.

What people want to know—what they really need to know, in fact—is what good a policy will do and why it matters. In other words, our job is to help them see what it’s going to look like.

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2014’s Five Fave Flashcards

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Sightline’s messaging memos—Flashcards—cover all kinds of sustainability topics and best practices in strategic communication, from storytelling techniques to smarter ways to frame government and taxes. We draw on all kinds of research and experts. But this year, our audiences of professional communicators, electeds, and advocates have told us—with their clicks—that their favorite Flashcards in 2014 … Read more

Reporte Completo del IPCC en 19 Haikus Ilustrados

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Los reportes publicados por el Panel intergubernamental sobre el Cambio Climático (IPCC) pueden resultar abrumadores, aún para quienes están iniciados en ciencia y política. La evaluación completa de ciencias físicas, la primera entrega del quinto reporte de evaluación (pdf), publicado en formato manuscrito el año pasado, contiene más de 2000 páginas.

Incluso el resumen para los responsables de las políticas públicas, llamado de manera optimista “folleto”, tiene una extensión de 27 páginas.

¿Y si pudiéramos comunicar la esencia de esta importante información en lenguaje sencillo y en imágenes? Pues es justo lo que un oceanógrafo del noroeste hizo. Destiló el reporte completo en 19 haikus ilustrados.

How (Not) To Talk About Politicians

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As the fine folks at Public Works remind us, how we talk about public officials matters. It’s easy to default to bad habits. We all do it. And, all too often there are reasons to be frustrated with our representatives in government. But those habits (yes, I’m talking about the slamming, badmouthing, demonizing, name calling, grumbling…) trigger deeply entrenched, negative frames about government.

We have a lot of work to do reminding Americans that government is our best tool for getting important work done together as communities. Research commissioned by Public Works has shown that what comes to mind when Americans think about government is politics and politicians rather than the actual work of government. When we think of politicians, we think of bickering, corruption by corporate money, and self-interest.

You can see why it’s counterproductive to join in the politician bashing. In the end, it not only further erodes faith in government, it ignores the good work of all the upstanding electeds AND sets ridiculously low expectations for those whose job it is to represent us.

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The Hero’s Journey: Pro tips from Star Wars

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Variations on a basic, familiar story have been told over and over across centuries and cultures, knitting communities together through shared values and beliefs. Joseph Campbell, scholar of religion and mythology, gave us a name for it: the hero’s journey.

The hero’s journey does indeed manifest in all kinds of stories—from creation myths and folk legends to children’s books and blockbuster movies. These are the stories we tell to shape and reinforce how we understand ourselves and our world. These stories can call us to action too, rallying people around a common purpose when things aren’t right. As Campbell put it, when you hear such a story, you respond “Aha! this is my story. This is something I always wanted to say but wasn’t able to say.”

Essentially, the hero’s journey is this: An (often reluctant) hero sees a threat to his—or her—values and what he holds dear. (Think: Luke Skywalker). His world is out of balance. He is not powerful but he is moved to action. He embarks on a quest to make things right. He takes on the villains who pose the threat. And he’s helped along the way by a mentor (think: Yoda) who gives him the tools to succeed (not just lightsaber skills, but confidence—lessons in using The Force). He does it all for the good of his community, not just for himself.

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Cap and Trade—In 3 Pictures

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We all rely on mental shortcuts to make sense of new information. Often, metaphor and analogy—or pictures—help us get a handle on abstract ideas.

Right now, far-reaching climate and energy policy is back in the news, this time at the state level on the west coast where California has an established cap and trade system, Oregon and Washington are thinking seriously about putting a limit on climate pollution, and British Columbia has a successful carbon tax shift in place.

The time is right to deploy the most compelling illustrations of how smart climate and energy policy works for people and our economy. Here are three mental shortcuts for talking about cap and trade:

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Empowerment Messages, Not Inadequacy

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Most of the marketing we see (especially commercial advertising) is of the inadequacy variety—messages designed to create anxiety or insecurity about what we lack (beauty, youth, sex-appeal, status). Inadequacy stories rely on our most childish impulses and emotions, jealousy, greed, selfishness, vanity. They cast the product or service being touted as the hero, something people can buy that fills a hole (a hole that the story has convinced us we need to fill).

A far more powerful, memorable, and engaging type of message is what Jonah Sachs, author of Winning the Story Wars, dubs empowerment marketing, stories that emphasize not where we’re deficient, but how we can grow and find personal satisfaction.

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Climate Change in Plain Language

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Editor’s note January 2017: Are you participating in this morning’s #ClimateFacts “Twitter storm” (details here)? We are! And we’ll look forward to keeping up the drumbeat for climate science and activism in years to come, on our Twitter feeds and elsewhere. Of course, how we message is just as important as what we message, so we’re … Read more

Messaging Basics to Live By

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As we gear up for a busy autumn, with election season looming and new legislative efforts on the horizon, it seems a good a time as any to take stock of some of our favorite, enduring strategic communication recommendations from the past year or so.

It’s three Flashcards in one!

First, communications researcher and advisor Anat Shenker-Osorio reminds us to show our true colors, saying what we really stand for—confidently and consistently—and not just because she says so, but because it’s a strategy empirically tested to fire up our base and bring the so-called “middle” our way.

Next up: Resource Media’s visual storytelling guide is a must-read in today’s digital media landscape. You can’t do social without mastering the art and science of putting photos to optimal use.

And, finally, what are six principles that can make your message “go viral”? Put a kitten on it, right? Well, that’s one way. But Wharton marketing professor Jonah Berger goes beyond cute, fuzzy animals and cracks the code on contagious content.

Take Your Messaging Strategy…to the Beach

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It’s August. We’re getting lots of “out of office” auto-replies to our emails. That means you’re on vacation or, if you’re not, half your staff is. It also means it’s time for a summer reading list.

I used to read novels. But nowadays, I’m always looking for that perfect vacation combo—a book that’s a good read—entertaining, fascinating, and well written—and something that’ll help me do my work better once I’m back at my desk. (I try not to take highlighter pens or sticky notes with me to the beach…but to my family’s chagrin, I am kind of a nerd that way.) Some of these have been on my list for a while and I’m eager to dig in!

My focus this summer: Why storytelling is the ultimate weapon—and how to wield it. Look for Flashcards based on these books in the near future.

Meanwhile, let us know if you’ve read any of the books on this list and tell us what you thought. Also, please send titles of your own favorite messaging reads our way!

And, whether you’re reading this poolside or sitting in a deserted office, I wish you the best of the summer season and happy reading.

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