By All Means

Michael Fanuele is a brand strategist who has worked at JWT, Havas, Fallon, and most recently served as chief creative officer at General Mills. There, he tried to inspire a big food company to be a good food company, and in the process, helped Cheerios and Nature Valley grow for the first time in a decade. Currently, he’s the founder and CEO of Talk Like Music, a consultancy that helps people, places, and brands become more inspiring. His new book is called Stop Making Sense: The Art of Inspiring Anybody. Fanuele became interested in the topic of inspiration when he found himself caught up in the theatrics of U2, a band he despised. He wondered what it was about Bono that had the power to move even the most reluctant fan. And he started thinking about how that same feeling could apply to other aspects of life and work. “The inspiration equation is pretty simple: passion minus reason is inspiration,” Fanuele says. "You’ve got to find a way to make things odd enough, strange enough—music-like enough that sp