Nonfiction business and personal growth publishers always want something “new” and “compelling,” but how much is there left that is truly new and compelling?You’ve all heard that common phrase, “There’s nothing new under the sun…” However, few actually know the provenance of that quote. It’s not Shakespeare, as many erroneously assume, but actually comes from the Bible – Ecclesiastes 1:9, more specifically:
“What has been will be again,
What has been done will be done again;
There is nothing new under the sun.”
Yeah, if the Bible says there's nothing new, things have only gotten worse! Don't look for the new, because, frankly, there is very little that is new—but present something "old" in a new and compelling way, either through focus, model, or delivery.
- Compelling Focus: Instead of a general discussion of a subject, focus on particular things that remain universal pain-points to everyone and yet don’t receive focused attention. There are 1,001 books on effective human resources practices, but Tom Coens (RIP) and his coauthor Mary Jenkins figured out the one thing that everybody hates that is an integral aspect of HR practices globally: performance appraisals. People hate getting them and people hate giving them, and honestly, there’s little evidence to suggest that they even work well. So, instead of writing about "humane" HR practices in general, they wrote a book called (simply) “Abolishing Performance Appraisals.” People loved it.
- Compelling Model: A memorable model can make for a compelling and new way to look at an already widely-covered subject. Project management books are plentiful but also very similar to one another. However, David Schmaltz wrote a book called “The Blind Men and the Elephant,” where he used the ancient parable about six blind men’s failure to describe an elephant to explain the inability of a group of people to make common meaning from their common experience—one of the biggest pitfalls in project management. It’s a catchy model that readers remember.
3. Compelling Delivery: Find a way to discuss the topic in a different way. No one has accomplished this better than the bestselling business book author of all time: Ken Blanchard. He looked at all the intense, self-important leadership and management tomes and decided instead to write incredibly short and simple stories with characters and basic plots. These books described common issues in the workplace and used simple, easily-to-remember mnemonic devices to get his thinking across. The ideas in his books, as he himself will tell you, are not groundbreaking or revolutionary, but their delivery makes them accessible and…compelling.
Crankily yours,
Jeevan