Lessons in Communications: Things Bob Dylan Taught Me

Originally published on LinkedIn on August 6, 2018

I started my Communications career in Hong Kong back in August 2011 when I became speechwriter to Manulife Asia's CEO. My arrival in the city was too late to see one of my heroes, Bob Dylan, who had just stopped by for a one-night show. Fast forward seven years and Dylan was back in town - and this time there was no missing it! Seven years conveys special significance in this city: the trigger to qualify as a Hongkonger. The coincidence of my personal milestone being bookended by Dylan’s shows put me in a reflective mood. Looking back, seven years and four CEOs into this phase of my career, what have I learned about communications? What tips might I pass on to someone starting out now? By way of my own little Bob Dylan tribute, here are seven things I’ve learned.

1) Communicate on purpose: More than anyone else, Dylan taught me to appreciate the power of words. Songs like Subterranean Homesick Blues, Love Minus Zero, Mr Tambourine Man, and Series of Dreams show how common words can open the mind to what’s already there but half-hidden, truths beyond facts. In communications, there’s no point trying to come up with something so sublime. It’s a question of purpose. Dylan doesn’t sing for something. For him it’s not about effect. Dylan doesn’t communicate - he emotes. For communicators words matter just as much, but for the opposite reason. Dylan doesn’t mind if you can’t decipher his meaning (from his viewpoint, all the better!). In contrast, we have the double concern of catching the speaker’s authentic voice and ensuring the receiver understands. Our means may be creative, but our purpose is functional. With that distinction, we are free to be inspired by artists like Dylan without feeling pressure to aspire to their level.

2) Change the channel: Dylan has never been one to stand still. Just as he becomes popular as a folk singer he shifts to electric, from there to rock, then to gospel, and on to country, blues, Christian, Sinatra, traditionalist and more. In communications, I’ve found that what your audience hears is to a large extent dependent on what they think they are going to hear. For someone getting electric when they expected folk, the result can be jarring. And sometimes in communications, that’s what you want. Sure, when introducing something new, it can certainly be helpful to guide the audience along. But sometimes, especially when reinforcing an existing message, it’s often more effective to surprise them, in terms of channel, visual, platform or content. In the past I’ve seen executives revert to type quarter after quarter, year after year, with essentially the same kind of comfortable output. It took me a while to realise - or admit to myself - that most staff weren’t paying attention. Whatever we were selling, they weren’t buying. As I began to give more concern to recipients, I realised the importance of shaking things up. In recent years, for example, our CEO messaging has switched from email to blog, letter to newsletter, speech to fireside chat, informational video to movie trailer, studio recording to Periscope, animation to Instagram, Yammer to LinkedIn, and sometimes combinations of them all.

3) Experiment: Dylan rededicated himself to live performing 30 years ago and has been touring non-stop ever since - the famous Never Ending Tour, taking in three thousand concerts across five continents. Dylan has used this ever-expanding canvas to continuously try out new directions. Aside from the fascination this generated in his audience - and sometimes fear in his band - this approach has helped lead to 16 new studio albums (more than triple the output of the Rolling Stones in the same period, and more than Michael Jackson or Pink Floyd over their entire careers). As I step into the latter half of my own career, I’m a shade less than certain I will still be here doing this 30 years from now. But for as long as I am, I will never cease to be inspired by Dylan’s work ethic and openness to trying something new.

4) Wear a mask: Dylan is notorious for adopting new personas (not least of which the one known as “Bob Dylan”!). Among his many characters, he starred in a film as the perfectly-named character “Alias”. In the '60s he sang, “He not busy being born is busy dying”. In the '70s, he would arrive on stage hidden by facepaint. In his '90s MTV Unplugged set one of the biggest rounds of applause was for simply lifting off his famous sunglasses: “Yeah, it’s me!”. Devotees seeing him live ask themselves, “who will he be this time?” In communications, we can also wear a mask, imagine ourselves in another role. A year ago, when our outgoing Asia CEO Roy Gori had one last big staff event, I had been reading a lot about the CIA and American spycraft. What, I wondered, would a spy do to make this event more special? The answer, it dawned on me, was to turn it into a covert operation. So, we actually arranged two events in parallel - one Roy expected and a second one to hijack it once he reached the stage. The result? Many laughs, a few gasps, and a CEO himself out of character - lost for words.

5) Keep on keepin’ on: if you’re going to try out new ideas, and take risks, not everything is going to work out. You’re bound to have your moments. I certainly have. Tech-glitched, crossed-wired, missed-lined, version-gremlined, own-goaled, mis-sent, swallow-me-whole, face-palmed bads! Ever tried to film with the lens cap on? Ever had a great take only to realise you forgot to press record? Ever sent up a draft shock-horrored with typos? And, of course, communications work is high profile, so our dirty laundry is washed in public. There is a lot of wise, professional advice out there on how to respond to such experiences. But to me, none is better than Dylan’s line to “keep on keepin' on”. Critics have often panned Dylan’s work. Fans rail against him. Critics dismiss him as “a minor talent with a major gift for self-hype”, with music that is “flat out unlistenable”. Even his most dedicated fans ask: ”Bob Dylan In Concert: Is It Worth It?”. And the thing is, as a longtime fan myself, I don’t disagree. Dylan has made some dirge. Thing is, so have I - except in my case without the compensating factor of selling 100 million albums, being inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame, and lining my shelf with Grammies, an Oscar, Pulitzer, Presidential Medal of Freedom, and Nobel Prize. Least not yet. Dylan has produced more than 40 albums (to say nothing of his books, films and paintings). He does more shows than Bruce Springsteen, The Rolling Stones and U2 combined. Approaching 80, he still tours the globe with more than 100 concerts a year. While I’ll never have an ounce of Dylan’s talent, I do hope to emulate him to “keep on keepin' on” and score some more career highs among the inevitable lows.: if you’re going to try out new ideas, and take risks, not everything is going to work out. You’re bound to have your moments. I certainly have. Tech-glitched, crossed-wired, missed-lined, version-gremlined, own-goaled, mis-sent, swallow-me-whole, face-palmed bads! Ever tried to film with the lens cap on? Ever had a great take only to realise you forgot to press record? Ever sent up a draft shock-horrored with typos? And, of course, communications work is high profile, so our dirty laundry is washed in public. There is a lot of wise, professional advice out there on how to respond to such experiences. But to me, none is better than Dylan’s line to “keep on keepin' on”. Critics have often panned Dylan’s work. Fans rail against him. Critics dismiss him as “a minor talent with a major gift for self-hype”, with music that is “flat out unlistenable”. Even his most dedicated fans ask: ”Bob Dylan In Concert: Is It Worth It?”. And the thing is, as a longtime fan myself, I don’t disagree. Dylan has made some dirge. Thing is, so have I - except in my case without the compensating factor of selling 100 million albums, being inducted into the rock and roll hall of fame, and lining my shelf with Grammies, an Oscar, Pulitzer, Presidential Medal of Freedom, and Nobel Prize. Least not yet. Dylan has produced more than 40 albums (to say nothing of his books, films and paintings). He does more shows than Bruce Springsteen, The Rolling Stones and U2 combined. Approaching 80, he still tours the globe with more than 100 concerts a year. While I’ll never have an ounce of Dylan’s talent, I do hope to emulate him to “keep on keepin' on” and score some more career highs among the inevitable lows.

6) Go forth and plagiarise: a professor I knew used to proudly say, “When you copy once, that’s plagiarism. When you copy a lot, that’s research”. It’s a good line, but not a lesson needed by Dylan fans. When he accepted his Nobel Prize last year, Dylan was accused of lifting lots of his speech from an online study guide. While it made the headlines, it wasn’t really news. It was the same accusation recycled from 2006 (for his new album, Modern Times), from 2004, (for his memoir, Chronicles); from 2001 (album, Love and Theft), and in fact going decades back to the start of his career. Even the most creative of people have to get their ideas somewhere. That’s why I think those accusations against Dylan are weak and why I agree with the professor in recognising the vaIue of, er, good research. In communications, I’ve learned to become comfortable copying ideas wherever I can find them. A newspaper commentary becomes the centrepiece of a speech; a passing Richard Branson quote, twisted, ends up as the key message in a staff memo; an old Dr Who Christmas special rematerialises as a tongue-in-cheek entrance video for a new CEO. I intend to go on stealing freely. If you look down on that, your criticism is welcome - just remember your comments might just end up as my next headline.

7) Dial down the doing: for much of my career, I was hardly able to enjoy any success for fear it may be my last one. A written piece might have been well received or a major event run smoothly, but I was already mentally drifting to the shadow of the next challenge. In recent years, that fear factor has started to wane a bit. Gradually, I’ve been learning to spend less energy on worrying, more on being receptive to new material I might come across. Looking back, a major inspiration for me was an interview Dylan gave in 2001, when he revealed he really only learned to sing in the late 1980s - 30 years after his first album! As he recounted it, one night in Switzerland “it all just came to me. All of a sudden I could sing anything… I found out I could do it effortlessly — that I could sing night after night after night and never get tired.” I remember being fascinated by the idea that it’s possible to learn how to doing something only years after you’ve actually been doing it. It seemed impossible, yet plausible at the same time! The idea stayed with me. Living in Hong Kong, I now realise Dylan was describing the what Chinese call wu wei: doing by not doing - or, perhaps, doing-without-conscious-effort. As for me, I’ve not quite had a wu-wei moment of my own yet. But knowing of Dylan’s example was enough to open me to the possibility, and that in itself was reassuring. I hope it might yet happen. Till then, I’ll dial down the doing and let it get done.

In case you were wondering, the concert itself on Saturday was excellent. Dylan, ensconced almost the whole time behind his piano, was on form and, by his standards, in reasonable humour. Without a single word to the audience - no ‘hello’, no ‘thank you’ - he growled and crooned through two hours of an all-Dylan setlist, punctuated by outstanding solos on the harmonica. My personal highlight was the beautiful but little-played When I Paint My Masterpiece, while the crowd’s clear favourite was the Adele-made-famous To Make You Feel My Love. Most impressive for me was hearing Dylan continuing to rework the songs. You had to listen carefully for 30 seconds or so, catch a recognisable word or riff and do a quick mental match to the studio version you know. It reaffirmed my admiration. Dylan is 77. He’s done it all. He doesn’t need to still be putting his heart into it like this. The fact he does is stunning. Dylan has unwittingly taught me so much - far more than the few lessons I’ve outlined above. I could easily expand the list. But that will have to wait until he’s back in town. Maybe seven years from now.