The AFL-CIO profiles nonmembers
Promoting an association, union, society or other members-only group? Use members to demonstrate the benefits of membership.
Or use nonmembers.
Richard L. Trumka, secretary-treasurer of the AFL-CIO, knows how to tap the power of people. In a speech to the Industrial Relations Research Association, Trumka shows the need for unions through short profiles of individual people:
“Nearly half of all working Americans would vote to form a union tomorrow if they had the chance….
“They are workers like Miguel Matta, an immigrant from the Dominican Republic who earns substandard wages and whose family has no health benefits, even though he cooks for some of the richest folks in America at the opulent offices of Goldman Sachs in Manhattan.
“They are workers like Joe Reeves, an Atlanta resident who for nearly a quarter century has been driving a truck for Overnite Transportation, but who suddenly saw his family’s livelihood threatened and his dreams falling apart when the $1 billion corporation began to slash wages and cut full-time jobs to part-time. …
“And they are workers like Harry Thompson of Louisiana, an army veteran who 20 years ago took a job as a pipefitter at Avondale Shipyards — and who knew he needed a union when he discovered he was working at the shipyard with the lowest wages and one of the highest fatal accident rates in the country.
“It’s easy to see why … Miguel, Joe and … Harry — and so many other workers — would want to form a union. …”
If you want to bring your topic to life for your audience members, take a tip from Trumka: Look for people who aren’t getting the benefits your organization offers.
Then pile on the mini profiles to make your point.
How can you engage your readers?
As ad giant David Ogilvy famously said, “Nobody ever sold anybody anything by boring them to death.”
Most organizations seem to have missed that memo.
If so, bring Ann in to present Master the Art of Storytelling — a business-storytelling workshop — to your team.
There, they’ll leave with creative techniques for writing stories that grab attention, communicate more clearly, make your message more memorable and move readers to act.
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