‘Your Capacity for Change’
Go slowly. Makes it easier if you take this one line at a time:
Authenticity is equal to your unique voice,
multiplied by truthfulness,
plus your capacity for change,
multiplied by range of emotional impact,
raised to the power of imagination.
This is the “Authenticity Formula.”
It opens designer and author Marc Eckō’s book Unlabel: Selling You Without Selling Out.
I’m looking forward to Eckō’s keynote at the HOW Live event in May. HOW is a big conference. More than 4,000 attendees. And it’s not about publishing. Not about the industry! the industry! It’s about another industry! another industry!—design. I’ve spent some of my 418-year career near design. I know “design thinking.” When it comes to design thinkers, Eckō is a Rodin.
Look at his formula again, through your author-eyes:
Authenticity is equal to your unique voice,
multiplied by truthfulness,
plus your capacity for change,
multiplied by range of emotional impact,
raised to the power of imagination.
Which line is the most important? Let me ask that another way: Which line is the hardest to achieve?
In his book, Eckō takes apart the traditional artsy lies about “brand.” He nails it: “I am a brand, but I’m also a creator.” Here’s one way he spins this:
When you unlabel and create an authentic personal brand, you will broadcast yourself differently to the world. You will think of yourself more actively, not passively. You won’t just use the social network, you’ll become the social network.
McLuhan-esque. Message and medium. And complex, to borrow a term important to Eckō. A branding artist if ever there was one. He makes it clear that Unlabel “is not a how-to business book about how to make millions.” He’s made those millions. But Eckō is into process, principle, selfhood.
And the line that’s most important?—the second one: “multiplied by truthfulness.”
How good are you at truthfulness? That’s my provocation for you today.
Why don’t we tell the truth more in publishing? And especially in writing?
Praise in Daylight
What got me thinking about this—about how a lack of truthfulness undermines authenticity—was an interesting experience at Author Day in London. That’s the new conference I programmed for The Bookseller to open our FutureBook Week of activities. Author Day was issues-driven. Not a how-to thumb-sucker. Not an inspi-vational communion service. We deliberately brought together trade authors, indie authors, and publishers to hear each other’s viewpoints. This first iteration of Author Day was a great experience. And Author Day sent a meaningful message to our industry-facing FutureBook Conference, too.
An added burst of energy: many tweeteurs spotted our #AuthorDay hashtag as we stormed the stream on 30th November. Especially with NaNoWriMo ending that day, the hashtag became a rallying huzzah. People in many parts of the world raised shout-outs to their favorite writers, booksellers, English teachers, patient author-spouses, faithful writing-studio dogs, you name it. Our room in Euston Square suddenly was surrounded by a trending international party of folks who simply liked the idea of it being “Author Day”. We’re proud of that effect. We look forward to rocking it again.
The truth-telling question came a bit later.
Some of the independent authors at the conference—and at least one who didn’t even attend—decided to get into a blog post and come up with reactions to the day. Criticism is just fine. In fact, we asked for it in a survey.
What’s so striking about this group blog is that many of these were authors who had gone out of their way to say glowing things about the event as it happened. But once regrouped as indies-in-arms on their blog site, they seemed to pack their mentality into a clique. One slammed the conference for not being a how-to: this writer knew perfectly well that the day was designed to avoid being a how-to. We said that, outright, many times before the event and on the day itself. One person wrote of leaving at midday because of not getting “value” from the event: this person must have forgotten telling our team weeks ahead about a schedule conflict that would require her midday exit. Oops.
So were the kind words to us at the conference venue the truth?
Or were the disparaging comments in the group blog post the truth?
No way to know, is there? And my example is just one anecdote. You see this, don’t you? The friend who praises a new book on Twitter, then confides in a direct message that the book is unreadable. Some folks in book culture seem to go far out of their way to throw garlands at everyone’s effort. Then when you speak to them later, they admit that they were “just being nice.”
How nice is a lie? No one can trust such people either way. They’ve neutralized themselves. Bye.
Critique in the Dark
Draft 3 is ready, right? Good. Who critiques it for you? That “crit group”? You know what each of them is going to say already, don’t you? So how about that author-friend you always trade reads and reactions with? Uh-huh, that’ll get you an impartial response. And remind me, when was the last time that person really ripped your worst stuff the new one it deserved? #Cmonson.
What if you could access an actual reader? A good reader, mind you, but a stranger.
A doting mom is an author’s biggest enemy.
A sharp, thoughtful reader you’ve never met—and won’t meet—could be your salvation.
I joked that Author Day was my “truth and reconciliation conference.” Let’s call this The Truth Bureau. Here’s how it works:
- A pool of 45 to 50 unidentified readers, paid, dedicated to honest reaction, trained in critical response.
- A blind submission system.
- You pay a fee to engage your manuscript in the service and you submit it without a trace of who you are on it. Not unlike you do for some writing competitions.
- You request as near a match as possible on parameters you think will fit your eventual readers. Say, 34 to 50 years old, male, likes mystery, tech-friendly.
- The submission system selects the reader who most closely matches each criterion on your list.
- Responder reads. Generates feedback.
- Submission system sends that feedback to you with a report on how closely your reader parameters were matched: age, gender, genre affinity, etc.
Now you have clean feedback. Not a whiff of relational warp on it. Your unknown evaluator has no need to kiss your ass. No need to kick it, either. Double-blind input. A truth-enriched air mix.
If you feel excited by this idea, then come and sit by me.
If you’re thinking it might be much too cold, an icy day’s crunch through scary woods, too “impersonal,” then you’re the one I’m worried about. Truth may be hard for you to take, huh? And—unfairly to your associates—truth may be hard for you to give.
I see authors gushing over each other’s work all the time. And what does that do to their brands? What do we think of them then? Like the conference critic who wasn’t even at the conference in London, there are people ready to tell you your stuff is fabulous—or to run you down as soon as you’re out of earshot—without knowing what they’re talking about. How authentic is their brand now?
Truth scares us. You see that fear on Facebook. Fawning frenzies. Over that new novel. Or baby picture. Or haircut. Why do we feel that such hyperbole is appropriate?
There’s more: Read the full story at Writer Unboxed
By Porter Anderson
Follow @Porter_Anderson
Writing Unboxed: Truth Be Told? Truth Is on Thin Ice
Originally published by Writer Unboxed
