There’s a picture this week (Detroit Free Press, 9/26/10, Section D) that truly displays two corporate voices visually–something that I don’t think I’ve ever seen so accurately. Denard Robinson, starting Michigan QB, but knocked out of the game earlier with a minor knee injury, is smiling and hugging  2nd string QB Tate Forcier, who just connected with his fullback John McColgan for a third-quarter touchdown.

Now doing high-fives, helmet bumps, hugs are nothing knew for athletes from all sports when they’re excited about an offensive or defensive major play for their team.  But this hug was something more: it was displaying a solid positive corporate voice from both players for all the world to see, that months before was only a hopeful wish for an entire team.   As Detroit Free Press reporter, Michael Rosenberg, wrote “he(Forcier) will not have the Michigan quarterback job and might never hold it again.  But this month, he did one of the hardest things a college football player can do:  Buried on the depth chart, chastised by a teammate and written off by the public, he came back”.  Forcier completed all 12 of his passes and helped lead the Wolverines to victory.  That was the picture last Saturday.

The picture three weeks ago during the Michigan Wolverines’ first game was much different: a lone Tate Forcier sitting on the end of a bench by himself with a towel over his head.  Not a team player.  Not even part of the team.  A  negative corporate voice for viewers to see over and over again on replays later that night–especially after a star was born with the lightning fast and affable Denard Robinson(whose corporate voice so far has been exceptionally positive) leading the way to a fantastic first win for the Wolverines.

Forcier is a young student-athlete and learned early that’s it’s hard to lose your position to someone else with not as much experience (something we all learn in the corporate work world at some time or another) and his corporate voice showed it:  he didn’t talk much, he didn’t work hard during the off-season, he moped.   But he turned it around and he deserves credit for that.  It turned around his corporate voice, too.  In an interview after the game he said, ….”I love Michigan.  I love everything about it.  I’m not going to leave.  Not a chance I love Coach Rod. I love these fans, I love Michigan football.”  Now, whether all this is true or not, we don’t know.  What we do know is what we saw in the picture: a non-verbal highlight of a new, positive corporate voice from Forcier…..and that plus positive mediatude does wonders for public perception.