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MEDIA | Noah Brier

Telling the Story of Process

What value is there in "process stories" that explain how things in politics, or elsewhere, came to fruition?

September 29, 2009 | RSS | EMAIL | PRINT | 4 COMMENTS

George Packer makes a very interesting point about Obama's press strategy, which shies away from stories that explain the political process. Packer writes that people in the administration "say that the Obama hates 'process' stories because they end up focussing on trivial matters of personality. They also say that the White House wants to give the impression that everything flows from the top."

To which Packer replies:

This last is the one that troubles me most. Even if such a thing were possible, it isn't healthy. I'd even say it's undemocratic. Something as vast and complex as the U.S. government cannot be presented to the public along the same lines as a Presidential campaign. In the end--I saw this happen to the Bush Administration in Iraq--the result is that the White House doesn't seal information in, but, instead, it seals itself off from information. The levers of government eventually stop working because no one in the bureaucracy wants to explain what's going on for fear of the White House press office, which means the ability to think clearly grows sclerotic.

Two things I find interesting about this: First, it's a non-partisan criticism of the way the Obama administration does stuff. We don't have enough of that in politics. Second, I am in complete agreement that there is really value in the process. Actually it reminds me of something Robin wrote over at Smarkmarket about what makes Packer's New Yorker colleague, Atul Gawande, so good: "It's a first person narrative -- and not tentatively so. There are I's everywhere in this piece, and it's wonderful." I think politicians (and the media, frankly) underestimate the value of this sort of narrative.

I was amazed by this during the financial crisis last year. As politicians were trying to figure out what to do with TARP there was an incredible lack of clarity about what was going on. I suspect this was because the politicians were being brought up to speed on how the financial system works and they didn't want everyone to see, but I think it could have been a real calming influence to have someone sit down America and explain what the hell was going on. (For what it's worth, Rick, COO of The Barbarian Group, wrote one of these for the company and I think it went a long way (I know it did for me).

Also, while I'm on the topic of writing, I've been thinking a lot lately about the difference between the way I was taught to write and the way I actually do. Like everyone else I was taught the basic essay structure: Tell them what you're going to say, say what you're going to say, tell them what you've said. However, the way I write here is far more off the cuff. I had no idea I was going to write about my writing style at the end of this post (in fact, this post started as a link to the Packer quote and eventually started to go a little long for the sidebar). I prefer to just flow through ideas, something that doesn't feel quite right in other media (which probably explains why it's seldom done by journalists), but works quite well for the relatively intimate setting of a blog. I guess it speaks to something I've mentioned before: Blogs are more like interpersonal communication than mass.


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COMMENTS

1faris

when the audience is passive, creative things are products

when the audience is active, or thinks that way, creative things are processes.

process is more interesting that product.

FX

September 29, 2009

2Farrah

i think one of the pieces of this is trust. i think the person (or organization or brand) trying not to expose the process, trying to control the flow of the information, trying to dazzle with the results, simply doesn't trust the audience.

they don't trust them to understand the process and the system, to be willing to reserve judgment, to support the players, to wait, or to help.

i say this because i have an audience (clients) that i'm not always sure i can trust. i'm not sure they'll take thinking out loud as an iterative rough draft that will eventually require a leap to the final, hopefully fantastic product. i'm worried they'll hold me to that one thing i said that one day before i'd read and seen everything and thought about it in a fresh way.

and the reason i don't always trust them is that so many of them are happy for me to do this in a different way so long as i still follow their process & expectations. they want the process to go the way they're used to instead of the way i do it.

so now i'm wondering what the meeting of the minds should be... how do we earn the trust of people who have invested valuable resources in our thinking if we're not going to share that thinking? how do we share that thinking if we can't trust the people buying it to accept that this is a flow of information and insight and that you never step in the same river twice?

big challenge. and a worthy one.

October 2, 2009

3Robinson

I tend to write off the cuff and then cram it into the essay format through editing.

October 18, 2009

4Sriram Venkitachalam

To the last bit about writing—I guess it has to do with the medium on which we write. Offline you'd have to plan your flow before putting pen to paper because editing is cumbersome. With mass media you'd wanna make sure most people find your format familiar. Not so with digital content. With Google Wave I think we are going to see a lot of changes to flow and syntax, simply because a post can spring out with branches from anywhere.

November 17, 2009