Emotionsmithing vs. Wordsmithing (5-24-17)

Last week was about doing dope poems. In order to be able to perform dope poems, you have to not only choose the right words, but you have to be able to hit on the right emotions. I’m sure you’ve all heard the term wordsmithing, where you are focused on finding the right words for a given communication. This week I want to challenge us to do more emotionsmithing (New word in the dictionary of Andrew).

A wordsmith is an expert in the use of words (Dictionary app). Wordsmithing is the action of editing a document and trying to find the perfect word for a specific situation. An emotionsmith is an expert with the ability to leverage emotions in order to get people to think, feel, or do something (Andrew dictionary). Where a wordsmith would ask, “Is this the word we want?” an emotionsmith would ask,

“Does this communication drive the emotions we want to drive?” When I write poems, I try to emotionsmith things first. I ensure that the poem is evoking the emotions I want the audience to feel. Only after I feel like I am clear on what emotions I’m trying to stir do I ever go back and wordsmith. I’ve had to redo entire poems, not because the words were bad, but because the emotions weren’t right. Likewise, I have written a lot of poems and told a lot of stories where the words weren’t particularly fancy, but the emotions were right on point. The audience never cared that the words were basic. The audience just cared that they felt an emotional connection.

So what does this have to do with work? I’m guessing we’ve all been involved in some wordsmithing where we painstakingly edit a powerpoint slide or Word document. Now sometimes wordsmithing is important, but how often do we wordsmith and spend countless hours on something that doesn’t really matter in the grand scheme of things? Instead of always focusing on wordsmithing I wish we would spend more time emotionsmithing. When you create any communication, either internally or for customers, are you clear on what emotion you’re trying to drive?

Embry example: I work in market research. When I do readouts I don’t just think about data. I think about the data and the story and the emotions these create. I ask myself, how should my business partners feel about the results of this? Should they be surprised? Should they feel confident we are moving in the right direction? Should they feel worried, because something is sneaking up on them? Should they feel this is easy to implement? Should they feel concerned, because there are significant hurdles? I emotionsmith first, and then work on finding the right words to convey this idea.

The challenge: Are you emotionsmithing AND wordsmithing?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Just do Dope Poetry (5-17-17)

Last week was about finding your voice. This week we will dive a little bit deeper into this this concept. I want to share something I learned from a slam poetry mentor named Danez Smith. His lesson is, “Just do dope poetry.” If you want some poetry from Danez click one of these links “Principles” or “Dinosaurs in the Hood”. (There is a little strong language at times.)

In case you didn’t know, here is how a poetry slam competition works. Imagine someone performing poetry on stage while 5 random judges score that poem from 1 to 10. You never know who the judges will be, what their knowledge of poetry will be like, and what personal tastes they might have. This makes things extremely interesting, because I’ve had situations where I’ve performed the same poem in two different venues and received very different reactions. The points aren’t the point of a poetry slam. The point is to throw down some amazing poetry that moves the audience.

Our team was all together trying to brainstorm ideas for potential poems for Nationals and somewhere during the conversation we became obsessed with scoring. We started saying things like, “I don’t know about doing a poem about ____, because I don’t know how it will score.” We were limiting ourselves and ideas, when Danez steps up and says, “We’re talking a lot about scores. We can either try to write poetry based on what we think will score well or we can make sure we perform dope poems. It’s like teaching just to the test. When I’ve been on teams that tried to cater to the random judges, the poetry wasn’t good, we didn’t advance, and we weren’t proud of what we put out there. When I’ve been on teams focused on doing amazing, mind blowing stuff, then that’s when we’ve had success.” We made a decision to just do dope poems. We didn’t win Nationals, but we made it further than we had in years. More importantly, everywhere I went that week I heard poets and audience members saying things like, “Did you hear that stuff from team Madison. That was amazing!”

Now think about work and life. I don’t know about you, but as I’ve gone through my career I’ve often felt the tension of doing things the way I think things are supposed to be done versus making sure I do my version of great work. I get wrapped up thinking that if I don’t do X, Y, and Z like everyone else, then I’ll never be able to move anywhere in my career. Do you ever feel this way? How often do we spend our days trying to line up with the “test” that we think is in front of us versus doing our version of dope poems? I recently was talking to a mentor/coach about how I could be the best market researcher I could be. During our conversation he said something along the lines of, “You need to decide what it means and what it looks like for Andrew to be a legendary market researcher. The way Andrew gets there will be different from the way Bob or Susie will get there.” Essentially, he was telling me I need to perform my market research version of dope poetry.

The challenge: We can try to do things based on some invisible test or we can go be awesome, blow some minds, and let everything else sort itself out. Are you trying to do something based on an invisible test or are you performing dope poems?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Finding my Voice (5-10-17)

This week I’d like to kick off a new series inspired by lessons I’ve learned from writing and performing poetry. My goal each week is to share a lesson I’ve learned and also share some poetry from other people or myself, so if you have a few moments check the poetry out too. This week is about finding your voice.

I’m assuming that most of you know, but in case you don’t I perform spoken word poetry. When I do this in competitions it is called slam poetry. I’ve been doing this for years and when I lived in Wisconsin I won a few competitions and was even on a few national teams. Since then, I’ve performed in a couple of places around Indy and done a few Lilly events. Before you think I’m an arrogant loser for bragging, the reason I mention these things is because when I first started I was horrible. That’s not me being humble. I wasn’t good.

You’re probably wondering why I sucked so bad. Part of it was skillset and learning something new. However, the major reason is I hadn’t found my voice yet. I hadn’t uncovered and embraced who I am at my core as a person and performer. I was performing in Madison Wisconsin, where the majority of poets were political and very serious, so I tried to be just like them. I tried on poems and concepts like they were masks. It didn’t work. The poetry wasn’t authentic. That style just wasn’t me, it wasn’t Andrew Embry. This resulted in crappy poetry.

This all changed with the help of a poetry mentor named Evy. I would describe Evy as a “middle aged frumpy loving mama bear with sharp claws and nerdtastic tendencies.” And now you’re probably like, “Dude, calling her frumpy isn’t cool!” I’m calling her frumpy because she has an entire poem about how she is bringing frumpy back the same way Justin Timberlake brought sexy back. That’s the kind of woman she is. She is fiercely Evy. When she does the “Bringing frumpy back” other people kind of wish they were frumpy on her level. This works because she embraces herself, her voice, and her awesomeness. On the mic she is always Evy. Her poetry was always slightly offbeat, a little twisted, willing to go to some different places to find truth. She had a way of pulling deep wisdom out of the most unusual places like Sesame Street, Voltron, and C-sections. Her poetry could hit hard, it could hit softly with a nice twist. Regardless what it was about, it was always her. It was watching her and working with her that encouraged me to find my voice. The moment I did that, everything changed. Basically overnight my poetry went up a level, because it was truly MY poetry. My happiness went up a level, and I’ve tried never to come back down again. If you’re interested, here is a poem Evy did with Ali about love, the Road Runner, and Wile E Coyote. Evy is the one on the left. Click HERE.

So what does this have to do with work? Have you found your voice? What does it sound like? What kind of stories does it tell? Have you embraced your voice yet? Much like great poetry, great people and great leadership can come in a variety of styles. There are a lot of leaders I love, who I think are very effective, and I can’t quite do it like them. It’s not me. It works great for me, but me trying to copy them exactly just wouldn’t work. I have to find and live my voice.

If you’re wondering, I would describe my poet voice as real, unfiltered storyteller, truth, filled with so much energy it’s on the verge of exploding like a star, clever, playful, sometimes piercing, and appreciative of the small and unseen. I think my work voice is something kind of like that. If you’d have anything else you’d like to throw in to describe my voice I’d love to hear it and learn more. Along those lines, if I can ever help you find and define your voice just let me know.

The challenge: Have you found and embraced your voice?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry

Dressing up for Halloween and our Different Selves (11-4-15)

Halloween was last week. What did you dress up as? I’ve always found dressing up for Halloween to be very fascinating. Once a year people wear a costume, and essentially there are a few ways to do it. You can dress up in order to conceal who you are, dress up in a way that accentuates who you are, or you can dress up as something you’ve always wanted to be.

When I was younger, my brother and I would dress up in different costumes in order to try and trick our family members. We’d wear masks, baggy clothes, etc. because we thought it would be cool to get candy from them and then surprise them with who we are. This year and the past few years, when I’ve dressed up it’s been to accentuate the fact that I’m a dad and part of a family. My wife likes family costumes, so last year I was the Mad Hatter in an Alice and Wonderland theme and this year I was the Scarecrow in a Wizard of Oz theme. One could argue that me being a Mad Hatter merely demonstrates my madness and that being a Scarecrow shows my lack of brains, but that is neither here nor there.

Think about work for a moment. Every day we get dressed up and we can do this one of two ways. We can either act in ways that hide who we are or we can act in ways that accentuate who we are. The tricky part is that the costumes we wear at work aren’t as easy to spot as the ones we wear on Halloween.

Now here is where we go through a twister and end up in Oz, so stick with me. The more I think about bringing my authentic self to work the more I wonder if it’s really about being able to bring my authentic selves or at least all of the different sides of myself. On some days I’m the poet, brave and articulate. Some days I’m the nervous guy filled with self-doubt. Some days I’m the driver, focused and task oriented. Some days I’m the joker finding humor in everything. Some days I’m quiet, lost in thoughts. Some days I’m all of these and more, because at my core I’m all of these things and more.

Who are you at your core? What are your different sides? When you dress up for work do you hide your different sides or do you accentuate them?

Have a jolly good day,

Andrew Embry