The Voices of Experience Speaker Series hosted presidential speech coach Michael Sheehan as he presented “The Three M’s of Leadership Communication: Medium, Message and the Messenger” last Friday at the Cable Center.
As a speech coach and media advisor for Bill Clinton, John Kerry, Nike and Disney, Sheehan used his experiences, along with a variety of video clips, to instruct how businesses and corporate America should handle interaction with the media.
About 210 guests filled the auditorium at the Cable Center for the free event, including a handful of students.
Many members of the business community also attended the speech. Sheehan spoke to the crowd about the types of issues businesses must deal with in the public eye.
These issues include “tragedies, oops and uh-oh’s,” all known to challenge companies and their reputations.
In order to cope with such situations from the perspective of a business, according to Sheehan, one must develop “emotional traction” to the issue.
To gain back the respect of the public, the person dealing with the issue should first publicly apologize and take ownership for the problem at hand.
Then, they must take action, sometimes taking the offensive against the issue. Sheehan used examples from an interview with Wal-Mart’s vice president and a public statement from a baseball coach in order to demonstrate his point.
The speech by Sheehan was part of a values-based leadership speaker series organized by the Daniels College of Business.
“The idea is to bring experience of the real world to the college campus,” said Voices of Experience director and DU professor Sam Cassidy. “These speakers bring real credibility. The students benefit because the business people coming are really top drawer.” Numerous sponsors help to fund the series, bringing influential people to the DU campus to lecture.
Future speakers for the series include Arun Gandhi and Erik Weihenmeyer, who became famous after summiting Mt. Everest blind.
“This is for everyone, not just business students. It’s about the art of leadership,” said Cassidy. “Whether in the public or private sector, leadership is the difference between success and failure.”
According to Cassidy, the series is advertised within the DCB to business students via posters, TVs and in-class publicity.
Presented by the Department of Business Ethics and Legal Studies at the Daniels College of Business, the speech by Sheehan was followed by a question-and-answer session and light refreshments.
This is the third year DU has hosted the Voices of Experience speaker series. The series has speeches scheduled through May 2007.
The next planned presentation, on Feb. 16, is titled “The Travels of a tee-shirt in a Global Economy: An Economist Examines the Markets, Power and Politics of World Trade.” It will be presented by Georgetown University professor and author Pietra Rivoli. To attend the event or to learn more about upcoming events, visit daniels.du.edu/VOE.
