Get out of the defensive storytelling posture

Be prepared with stories of your own about why your ideas for infrastructure are so good.

Facts persuade no one.

Advertisers have known this and acted on it for almost 100 years. I’m old enough to remember this commercial that taught us to shun and mock smokers. I’m not old enough to remember the 1950s ads 

I’m not old enough to remember this commercial:

 

Storytelling wins and loses infrastructure projects.

Imagine the smoking commercial retold like this: “Traffic engineers are busy people, and they need to act quickly to make streets safer for you. What sort of street do they recommend the most? A 6-lane arterial with a 45 mph speed limit to keep traffic moving at just the right pace.”

If you happen to know that’s a recipe for a disastrous street design, then you’re on your heels. You’ll feel the urge to “nuh-uh” the expert’s commercial with some stats about how many people drive faster than 45 mph. And you know the response you’ll get? “You’re right–we should increase the speed limit.”

Learn from my mistakes.

Any boring politician or statistician can deliver point-counterpoint stories, and they persuade no one. One way to change the stories is to get out of a defensive posture. You will face resistance when you make public claims, no matter how safe you think the topic is. Infrastructure projects can generate hot debate and brutal press coverage. Someone gloms onto a typo in your speed study, and that’s all she wrote.

It’s natural to enter a defensive posture when someone lashes out at your design ideas. Your instincts tell you to protect your ideas.

Here are 5 examples of things I’ve said more than once over the years:

1️⃣ “No, I don’t think it’s fair to call this design a war on cars.”

2️⃣ “No, I don’t think every American is going to start bike-commuting 20 miles to work.”

3️⃣ “No, you won’t be that late to work with traffic calming through the neighborhood.”

4️⃣ “No, I don’t think we should let America’s bridges fall down.”

5️⃣ “No, I don’t hate freedom.”

Those are painful memories. Learn from my mistakes! Intellectual debate is important. A defensive posture means you’re responding to attacks before formulating a position statement. You’re reacting to the opposition’s anecdotes and biases rather than creating your own. People watching will assume the burden of proof rests on the person defending the new ideas.

Tell completely new stories to put the opposition on their heels.

Create your own heroes and conflicts and resolutions. Be the storyteller everyone else reacts to. Make them either want to hear more or scurry for some boring graphs and charts while they’re in defensive mode.

Here are 5 ideas for making a new narrative, again related to infrastructure projects I’ve worked on:

1️⃣ “Imagine if our kids could safely bike to school.”

2️⃣ “My neighbor works one mile from her house. She’d like to walk, but there’s no safe path.”

3️⃣ “My elderly parents want to ride bicycles more. Half of their car trips would be easy 10-minute bike rides.”

4️⃣ “The mall employs tons of people who don’t own a car. Let’s make it possible for them to get to work with some dignity.”

5️⃣ “This is America. Let’s repeal the prohibition on walking across the street. You deserve the freedom to move around on your own terms.”

Learn from my mistakes. Put a new twist on old ideas and avoid the defensive stories.