How to Deploy Instructive Analogy

I analogize everything in every thing. That is how I make sure to connect to another person, including and especially when they don’t know what they don’t know. We all have the tendency to have more confidence in what we know than is healthy, which is why the premise of analogies are instrumental to all of us.

I speak to connect, not simply to speak. When communicating, my aim is to bring clarity and illuminate the darkness of our minds’ thought processes that are attracted to the negativity and chaos of our feelings. Analogies build on the human tendency toward comparison. By employing a familiar analogous framework, I (or anyone) can significantly speed the pace of understanding and, therefore, effective communication.

It is due to the efficacy of analogies that I uniquely made them a centerpiece of a music education method that I refined over the years.

I implemented the method in one of two guitar stores that I founded, developed, and operated. I created the method and stores from zero relying on no previous framework for either the educational process or business operations. The stores are where music education using this unique method was used to teach both adults and children equally as a result.

The method benchmarked by analogous teaching is one of the key components that differentiated us as a guitar store in particular and as a small business in general. This process and way of thinking that I trained each instructor to implement gave us the competitive advantage. It resulted in participation and retention that far surpassed the industry average in all metrics, including but not limited to impact on the community.

In addition to the music education method itself, I utilized the same framework to develop a program to train each instructor. This allowed our teachers to understand not just how to teach but how to think in order to communicate to all ages equally. While the fundamental concept of analogies in communication is age-old, my employment of them in a focused, scalable, and strategic way pertaining to the guitar and education is one of a kind. This unique and exclusively focused process was essential to our accretion and absolute success as a team.

What is the most effective analogy that you’ve come up with or have heard that has significantly impacted your life?