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arts | Ming Ge, a former McKinsey strategy consultant and Accenture management consultant, is a veteran who likes to use mind maps to structure PPT. Welcome to pay attention and become a professional elite together. Preface: I conducted a nearly 9-hour seminar with a client over the weekend, and my understanding of the pyramid principle deepened. In this seminar, some people even came into contact with the pyramid principle for the first time, heard about the MECE law for the first time, and heard about the SCQA model for the first time. But what is impressive is that they are all Ph.D.s. After an hour of theoretical introduction, their understanding of MECE and SCQA was already clear. For example, after telling the conclusion first, someone shared the following story:: On the bus, a middle-aged man said to a fashionable young man: “I took the bus from Yuxi at 8 o'clock this morning. There were too many people, and I still get motion sickness. I am going to a relative's house as a guest. His family gave birth to a big fat boy. Today is exactly 100 days old. Please celebrate with us fellow villagers. My fellow villagers are rich. There are three houses in Kunming. The place he asked us to go to today is the first house he bought in Kunming. He said that there is a bus stop on this bus that is closer to their home. Young man, I want to ask, I want to go to Hongshan Community, which stop is better to get off at? ”, before he finished speaking, the bus arrived at the stop, and the young man smiled apologetically, "Uncle, I've arrived at the stop, you can ask someone else." The middle-aged uncle talked for about 2 minutes, and finally the young man understood his needs. Unfortunately, the bus was not waiting for anyone, and the young man got off the bus before he could help him. So, what would the middle-aged uncle do if he understood the conclusion of the pyramid principle first? “Hello, young man, I want to go to Hongshan Community. Which stop is better to get off at? ” He is polite and states his needs within 10 seconds. He can get the answer within 10 seconds. What is the pyramid principle? The Pyramid Principle is a methodology proposed by a consultant named Barbara Minto of McKinsey & Company. She is also the first female consultant in the history of McKinsey & Company. The Pyramid Principle is one of the most effective tools for training people's logical thinking and logical expression. The Pyramid Principle has four core ideas.: Conclusion First, MECE rules 4 logical structures. Let’s first look at a typical pyramid structure diagram.: Figure 1. Typical pyramid structure. Why should conclusion come first? The greatest value of conclusion first is that: (1) Let the other party hear your conclusion immediately, even if the other party is interrupted by something or leaves midway. (2) After the other party hears your conclusion, his brain will automatically associate the following information with this conclusion. This is a kind of attraction. (3) Conclusion first to ensure that you truly grasp your goals and describe them accurately to avoid saying a lot at once, but ultimately without a clear theme. For example, Xiao Zhang's probation period is up, and the HR department needs to report to the boss whether Xiao Zhang is genuine. traditional saying: Xiao Zhang has a good sense of responsibility and is very serious about his work. Boss, do you think Xiao Zhang should become a regular employee? Conclusion first: Xiao Zhang meets the conditions for being a probationary employee, so it is recommended that he be turned into a regular employee on time. Figure 2. Conclusion first case. It is obvious that the traditional method is to let the boss do multiple choice questions. The boss may interpret it as you are afraid of taking responsibility and are afraid that Xiao Zhang will be punished by the boss if he does not do well. If you switch to the conclusion-first approach, and you directly give suggestions, the boss will think that you are responsible. Moreover, in your suggestions, Xiao Zhang's performance has been concreted. For example, he is responsible and has provided evidence such as "opinions on meeting methods and corrected data". It is said that he works seriously and has given "organized files and written reports." Such an HR manager will probably be continuously promoted by the boss. MECE Law Among the pyramid principles, the most important and difficult one is the MECE law. The MECE law literally means "mutually independent and completely exhaustive", which means the three principles of "no duplication, no conflict, and no omission". The MECE law reflects the idea of grouping. All arguments are grouped directly first, and then it is checked whether the content of each group or sub-argument is mutually inclusive or self-contradictory. The idea of grouping mainly solves the problem of "mutual independence". Figure 3. Use 5W2H to ensure that the content is completely exhausted during logical analysis. The "complete exhaustion" in the MECE rule depends on "5W2H". Through the 5W analysis method of "who", "at what time", "what", "why" and "where", only in this way can we ensure comprehensiveness and reduce or avoid omissions. Tips: How to judge whether the MECE rule is met, there are no duplications or omissions horizontally, and there is a causal relationship vertically. Figure 4: Vertical and horizontal MECE rules 4 logical structures 4 common logical structures in the pyramid principle: Temporal order, spatial order, order of importance, deductive reasoning. chronological order: The relationship between cause and effect, the sequence of actions, the spatial sequence: Divide the whole into parts, such as the order of importance of people, money, and things: Group similar things into groups, such as most important, second most important, etc. Deductive reasoning: Advance step by step and draw conclusions. Figure 5. 4 common logical suggestions in the pyramid.: Use summary and induction to present, and use deductive reasoning to conceive. The process of deductive reasoning is complicated and suitable for sorting out the supporting conditions and content logic of the conclusion. Therefore, it is recommended to use "use summary and induction to present, and use deductive reasoning to conceive." Figure 6. Structural structure of summary and induction In the pyramid principle, the structuring tool is the logic tree. Specifically, it includes the issue tree, hypothesis tree and whether tree. The structured expression is a divergent tree structure (can be easily realized with a mind map tool). When building a tree structure, follow the following 4 principles: ； The content of each node must be a summary (or induction) of the content of the next level. All the content of the next level must exhaust the various possibilities of the previous node. The content of each level must belong to the same category. The content of each level must not overlap or conflict. Figure 7. Examples of three forms of structuring of logic trees.: Customers are dissatisfied with sales reports and inventory reports, including the following 8 aspects: 1. The period for submitting reports is inappropriate ； 2. Inventory data is unreliable ； 3. Obtaining inventory data too late ； 4. Inventory data does not match sales data ； 5. The client hopes to improve the format of the report ； 6. Customers want to remove meaningless data ； 7. Customers wish to highlight special circumstances ； 8. Customers want to reduce manual calculations. The first step is to group the 8 questions into 3 groups.: Report contains unreliable data ； Report format is confusing ； The report is generated too late to take effective measures. The second step is tree display Figure 8. Logic tree application example. At this point, the core of the pyramid principle is finished. At the end, we share a set of story models based on the pyramid principle for program reports, project summary reports, year-end summary reports, etc.: SCQA. SCQA Model What is SCQA Story Model? As shown in the figure below, the SCQA story model includes Situation S (Situation): Time and place of occurrence, and introduce background information that everyone can understand. Conflict C (Complication): What happened in the middle, and what conflicts or problems it caused? Q (Question): What kind of doubts will arouse people? Doubts can only generate interest. Answer A (Answer): Our solution is... Figure 9, SCQA story model explained in one sentence. The SCQA model is to tell a background that everyone knows, start from the conclusion you output, create a conflict, and let the audience automatically generate a question. Only with this question will the audience be interested in listening to your story. Almost all copywriting masters are story masters, such as: (S) got onychomycosis: State the background (C) One infection affects two: A conflict occurred in this context (Q) Ask me what to do: Put yourself in the opponent's perspective and raise doubts (A) Use bright armor immediately: Give a solution and another example: (S) I realize that as long as I face my mobile phone for too long in a day (C) I will suffer from low efficiency and blurred vision (Q) The mobile phone is a black hole and a waste of time. How should I change it? (A) Use the Pomodoro Technique to concentrate on work, and only focus on mobile phone problems during odd breaks. Back to the question, what are the three points I have realized? The Pyramid Principle is not only applicable to the business environment, but should also be used in daily life at any time. For example, in the example of the middle-aged uncle asking for directions at the beginning, the Pyramid Principle is relatively simple to learn (as mentioned at the beginning, many people have never heard of it, but after listening to the theory for an hour, the principles will be understood). However, to learn it well requires more training in daily life, such as consciously training the conclusion first, and consciously training the MECE law. Optics * It is not enough. You need to practice it. It is best to teach it to others. The process of teaching it to others is equivalent to learning it again. * , summarized 2 times. best study * I have always believed that the best way to learn is through transfer. * The method is to transfer and always provide valuable output. This is my original intention of making this headline. Common progress is the unremitting pursuit. Discover and beautify, and continue to share, the road of life will be more exciting. Transfer teaching is peer-to-peer learning * Further sorting out and refining the results ； Before transferring, you need to train your language and logical organization skills so that others can understand ； It is easier to build your own knowledge system by sub-teaching. Further reading Even big names like IBM don’t forget to learn from each other * , recharge at any time, why don’t we learn * , If you are not making progress, let’s take a look at how IBM views the pyramid principle. If you have any suggestions, please feel free to discuss them in the comment area. Content source: That thing about marketing