A defining moment in the memoir controversy.  Read Heather King on what constitutes value in sharing the pieces of one’s life.

The current consternation over whose responsibility it is to check facts, what constitutes a fact and whether or not a memoir is nonfiction is most entertaining.  That’s because, having been the lead writer of a family memoir, I can tell you that one person’s fact is often another person’s “whaa?”  And my book didn’t even feature any stints in the county jail.

Different people have different recollections.  That’s entirely within the realm of possibility when writing a memoir.  And when it came to our story, I chose to skim the cream from the top — focusing on the best of my generation’s early history, intimately, without sacrificing the things that should remain private.  In other words, it can still be a memoir even if you don’t tell everything.

However.

If a memoir is, as Webster’s indicates, “a narrative composed from personal experience,” then it stands to reason that it falls into the realm of nonfiction.  So the writer should do everything possible to keep it factual, not just true.  If the story itself carries enough power, embellishment is unnecessary; in the right hands, the mundane facts become compelling perspective and serve a larger story arc.  Hyper-dramatic device is unnecessary from the pen of a person with a command of the language and a grasp of the soul.  Memories can fade and unintended mistakes in their telling can easily happen.  But when narrative license is chosen above factual accuracy, just to serve the arc, then it’s reasonable for readers to question what else has been manipulated.

Which begs the question, why manipulate?  Marketing, pure and simple.  Writers often decide that something isn’t salacious or funny enough to hold the reader’s interest, so in this relativistic world, they rationalize that a bit of fantasy is OK as long as a fact is generally true.  It might affect an author’s positioning as a wise soul if the situation isn’t dramatic enough, so the writer asks himself, what’s the harm in making things a bit more dramatic.  Well, this writer should move into fiction.  Or movies or television or theater.  Because that’s where you get to write fantasy.

And about whose job it is to check the facts:  there’s a simple way for publishers and editors to help writers stick to the facts.  Just keep asking them if they are.  Most of the time, if a writer knows the publisher is paying attention, the writer pays attention, too.  Still, if it’s OK with the publisher for a memoir-writer to embellish the facts, just mention it in the foreword.  Marketing requires managing expectations.

Grounded marketers encounter this phenomenon all the time.  Companies feel that they need to glam-up their products or services or, as Sondheim wrote, “You gotta get a a gimmick.”  [That was a song about strippers, by the way.]  So, if you can’t produce copy or imagery that captures something compelling about what you’re trying to sell, you need to probe further.  Because it’s there.  Something is there, and it’s your job to find it and wax eloquent about that.  Same with a book about a real life.

Nineteen years ago, Max DePree, in Leadership is an Art, wrote, “the art of leadership requires us to think about the leader-as-steward in terms of relationships:  of assets and legacy, of momentum and effectiveness, of civility and values.”

Just about a year ago, William Safire reminded us, in THE NEW YORK TIMES, that in the original Greek, the meaning of character is “to mark, to engrave.” 

Yesterday, Iconoculture reported that in 2005, 7 million people hit Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary, and the most sought-after word was “integrity.”

The issues of executive performance and compensation, celebrity CEOs and outrageous-to-obvious advertising and programming content all turn on the question of whether today’s leaders are interested in integrity.  DePree got it right, in that he provided the key to not just to doing the right thing but to what really delivers results.  As long as we are as concerned with legacy — with leaving things better than we found them — as we are with our own success and power, we stand a better chance not just of acting with integrity but of making decisions that make sense … because we’re focused on something bigger than ourselves, perhaps less mortal, and just the act of questioning and testing ourselves can often save us from a self-absorbed act. 

We might slip now and then.  But as long as we have a dictionary around, there is hope.  Here’s to corporate leaders who mark and engrave not our hides but our minds, in ways that lift us not just to buy but to follow.

A happy new year?  Yes, definitely.  But how about a happy year?  Here’s where we can go in the contentment department for the next twelve months.  More about each in the coming weeks.

To character in business.  Self explanatory.

To romantic ideals in corporate positioning.  How we should be positioning, who should in charge of the creative thinking process.  Hint:  not ex-matadors with cigar complexes.

To the Internet in context.  Using technology to serve business and re-define process appropriately — not just for the sake of the technological ego.

To assimilation.  Integrating around a shared, unifying purpose — nations and companies — without sacrificing diversity.

To competitive differentiation.  Telling the corporate story in terms of what is different — and true — in products and services.

To editing.  Knowing what, and what not, to say.

To a sense of urgency.  About products, services, customers, corporate legacy, market value. 

To the certain return of the hero boss.  Taking up where THE ECONOMIST left us last summer.

That great Frank Capra film, Meet John Doe, is memorable for many reasons.  Its timing:  1941.  The actors:  Edward Arnold,  Walter Brennan, Gary Cooper, James Gleason, Gene Lockhart, Barbara Stanwyck.  The themes:  the common man, democracy, individual freedom, avarice, true love, a redemptive Christmas event.

For me, one aspect stands out this year.  It is a phrase from the script:  “lighthouses in a foggy world.”  Whether it’s used to describe the people who gave voice and vigor to our country’s early days — as it does in the film — or to remind us of the figures around whom our religious holidays should revolve, to celebrate every lighthouse in our own foggy worlds might just be the best gift of all, today. 

Merry Christmas.