Executive Rewind: Personality Counts with the Media!

Bud Konheim is a character. In a good way; in an entertaining and engaging way.

He’s the CEO of Nicole Miller, the women’s designer wear company. Konheim has lots of personality, an eclectic taste in clothes, and knows how to tell a good story and leave a strong message.

In a CNBC interview, his message, directed to the investment community, was to define the difference between “trade” and “traffic,” or boutique vs. department store.

Since the ultimate goal going through the media is to make a lasting impression with target audiences, Bud Konheim invokes a naturally friendly, outgoing personality to help make his point.

Taking advantage of this live, extended interview format, Konheim gives his audiences yet more information to understand the difference between trade and traffic, based on what you might call critical mass.

Bud Konheim’s personality manifests itself with excellent body language, strong, easily understood examples, his unique wardrobe, and a very credible, yet grandfatherly way of story telling.

The lesson here: make use of all the positives you have; the ones that come naturally and help your audiences both understand you and, ideally, want to help you reach your business goals. Also, while it’s usually important to get to your point right away, given the chance as Konheim was in this case, use a good story to help make your message memorable.

By the way, if you’re not familiar with Nicole Miller (and I wasn’t), who is herself a fashion designer, here’s some information on the business:

“Miller’s first shop opened in 1986 on Madison Avenue. The brand has grown to 20 boutiques in major cities across the United States and is sold in a number of high-end department stores. Miller designs an extensive collection for J.C. Penney and a home furnishing collection for Bed, Bath and Beyond.”

 Thanks to Wikipedia for the above information.