Last week I shared an update on Linkedin (screen shot below )
A reader requested an example and I am most thrilled when I am asked more questions because in finding answers to these questions I learn.
So, thank you for asking.
This is a great example of how Beyond war made 5,000 ( a statistic ) meaningful. I got this example from Made to Stick by Chip & Dan Heath
Who is Beyond War?
Beyond War is a movement founded in 1984. It seeks to end war, on the premise that, in the broad view, the continued practice of war will ultimately lead to a global catastrophe.
Beyond war was started by group of citizens who were alarmed by the arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. At that point, the combined Soviet and Americans nuclear arsenals were sufficient to destroy the world multiple times. The Beyond War participants went door to door in their neighborhoods, hoping to galvanise a public outcry. The struggled with the problem of how to make credible their belief that the arms race was out of control
The thought that ran through their mind was, Grappling with the nuclear arms race requires us to grapple with the scale of it. Scale relies on numbers.
So beyond war would arrange house parties and in the parties they would demonstrate like this.
Now, imagine if I said to you that the world had 5,000 warheads when a single one is enough to destroy a city. It doesn’t mean much to you . The trick here was to make this large number 5,000 meaningful.
Where can you apply this learning?
This can be applied in sales storytelling or where ever you are trying to prove a point with statistics.
What relationship can the statistic illustrate?
What am I wanting the audience to think, feel, say and do ?
This is the only way to inject life in to statistics that we think mean the world, but mean nothing to the world.
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