CHAPTER 26
Engage With Great Stories
Those who tell the stories rule society.
Storytelling is no longer considered an “art” mastered by only the few; it has become a fundamental leadership skill, like writing, speaking, and vision-casting. As a communicator, you’ll need to select and weave high-impact stories into your presentations, talks, meetings, and conversations to drive home strategic messages and engage others in your cause.
WHY TELL A STORY?
People expect to hear your stories. They’ve been listening to bedtime stories since birth. If they’re Millennials or younger, they’ve been watching movies on smartphones since they could turn one on. And if coworkers or staff members are old enough to remember walking to school (versus riding), then chances are they’ve been entertained by great storytellers since they’ve had access to books, radio, and TV.
Stories involve the listener in the struggle. Listeners (spouse, employees, coworkers, suppliers) begin to identify with the hero in the story, trying to solve the problem and reach the goal. Empathy sets in. As the hero overcomes this and that setback, the listener identifies with similar problems—or at least the frustrations and disappointment such problems cause. Bingo. The storyteller has a link to win hearts regarding a similar situation or viewpoint.
Stories forge a deeper involvement and engage emotions on many levels. The details necessary to set the scene and to structure the story involve multiple senses: The physical scene. The appearance of people, things, or places. Hearing—conversations, disturbances, arguments, laughter. The emotional scene: Fear. Starkness. Withdrawal. Shyness. Mockery. Embarrassment. Grief. Love. Forgiveness. Stories create a deeper emotional link to the storyteller’s viewpoint, situation, or goal.
Stories bring closure on a significant goal. Similar to how viewers feel at the end of a movie, listeners feel a sense of closure and satisfaction after the story “ends.” Whether the movie or story ends “happily ever after” or butts up against a harsh reality, there is still closure—a truth to be processed and internalized.
Stories increase retention. Because stories have structure and the elements of emotion and engagement, they stick in the mind better than straightforward information, concepts, or data. Although good speakers know how to tell an anecdote well, a story stays in the psyche because it has a definite arch that is always the same: beginning, middle, end.
The TED Talks franchise around the world has highlighted the popularity of stories and discussions of “voice.” In these 18-minute talks, note that the most-watched speeches—even those on technical topics involving science and mathematics—include stories. Steve Jobs told stories to launch his Apple products successfully. Warren Buffett tells stories about his investment strategies and philosophies. Creativity expert Ken Robinson, the most popular TED Talks speaker of all time, tells stories about failures in our educational system. World leaders tell stories about what they’ve achieved and where they want to take the country in the future. And the stories usually include aspects of vulnerability and failure.
Publications such as Harvard Business Review, Forbes, The Wall Street Journal, INC, Fast Company, Success, and Entrepreneur routinely ask CEOs for their stories: How did you get started? When have you failed and what did that experience teach you? How has your upbringing prepared you for life and your current career? If you could have a do-over, what would that be and why? What have you learned about leadership and how did you learn that?
So if you’re convinced that stories are fundamental to speaking as a strategic leader, why do some storytellers elicit little more than a blank stare?
1. Mistaking an anecdote for a story
2. Inappropriate story structure
3. Failure to deliver the story with impact
Let’s take these issues one at a time.
ANECDOTES VERSUS STORIES
An anecdote can simply be an incident, a happening, or a “slice of life.” It may be sad, funny, tragic, odd, or merely amusing. Examples: Telling how badly a customer service rep treated you. Explaining the terrible ski accident your spouse had last vacation. Relating your boss’s first experience of being fired and how that motivated her to start her own company.
A story, by contrast, has an official literary definition that you may recall from English class: A hero or heroine struggles to overcome obstacles to reach an important goal. The hero may be the storyteller, another person like your Uncle Frank or your next-door neighbor, or a group. (Other examples: The “hero” might be an organization struggling to stay afloat and avoid bankruptcy. Or the “hero” might even be an inanimate object—like a new product developed on a shoestring budget struggling to become number one in the marketplace. Or the “hero” might be a team struggling to prove its worth and avoid being downsized during a merger.)
Obstacles that get in the way of reaching the important goal might be a disapproving boss, a tight budget, lack of experience, stupidity, a forced relocation, a death in the family, a senseless internal company policy, or bad weather. You get the picture.
An important goal might be physical safety, a successful product launch, good health, a proper sense of self, profitability, integrity, saving your company, “doing the right thing,” stronger self-confidence, mastery of a new skill, or any number of things the “hero” hopes to achieve by the end of the struggle.
Structure a good storyline, and listeners will root for the hero all the way to the end!
APPROPRIATE STORY STRUCTURE
No one watching a TV documentary would mistake it for an action thriller or a romance movie. Sure, they all involve video footage of people. But that’s where the similarities end. Documentaries have a typical structure. Action movies have a typical structure. Romance movies have a typical structure. Documentaries make a point—but they don’t “tell a story” in the same sense that a mystery or romance does.
The typical story follows a basic structure.
If you’ve lived, you have superb stories. Becoming a skillful storyteller involves paying attention—recognizing those situations, events, and occurrences that make first-rate stories and then shaping those stories to share valuable insights.
Hero (all is well)
↓
Problem Develops or Disruption Happens
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Goal Forms (hero now has an important goal to reach—one the audience cares about)
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Obstacle (complicates the hero’s attempt to reach the goal)
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Another Obstacle (further problem/delay complicating the hero’s journey to reach the goal)
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Another Obstacle (further problem/delay complicating the hero’s journey to reach the goal)
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Hero Finally Achieves Goal (all is well again)
Note: You can toss in as many obstacles as appropriate—or as authentic or as time permits—to build the story.
Polish your storytelling with a solid story skeleton.
Unless you’re a walking memory bank (most of us aren’t), you’ll need to record these stories as they occur to you. That doesn’t mean you’ll instantly recognize how you can best use the story to make a significant point in an upcoming speech, presentation, meeting, party, or conversation. But when something odd, humorous, or meaningful happens, note it—either write it down or record it on your smartphone and email it to yourself. Then title the file in a way you’ll remember the incident. Save your stories in a “Stories” folder or journal. (Ministers, rabbis, priests, professors, consultants, and professional speakers do this routinely.)
Then when the next occasion presents itself to speak, browse through your file and select your supporting stories to make your key points.
DELIVER THE STORY WITH IMPACT
The final reason stories land with a thud: weak delivery. No matter how great the story, you can kill it in the telling with little or no thought on how to set it up, shape it, phrase it, and land it. See the checklist for help.
The next time you need to inspire your team, launch a new initiative, or motivate people to accomplish a mission, perfect this storytelling art: Select a real story, shape it into the proper structure, and deliver it well. In strategic situations, a great story can make the difference between inspiration and a blank stare.
CHECKLIST FOR A DYNAMIC DELIVERY
• Set up your story in an intriguing way. Use an opening line that makes people say, “Tell me more” or “What do you mean by that?” (Example: “Whoever said absence makes the heart grow fonder hasn’t lived next door to Bubbles McGuire.”)
• Introduce the hero in a colorful manner. (Is there something odd about this person to help listeners immediately visualize and understand him or her?)
• Include details. Help the audience visualize the scene.
• Eliminate superfluous details that slow the action and add nothing but length.
• Add dialogue. Don’t tell us what the characters said. Bring in the characters and let us hear them talk, argue, pout, ignore, misunderstand, or shout.
• Use colorful phrasing. Replace vague words with specifics. Not “car” but “2012 Chevy pickup.” Not “reading a magazine” but “reading a Delta Sky Magazine with only the shopping pages left.”
• End with the punch line, putting the punch word at the end. (Even serious stories have a punch line—a poignant ending.)
• Let the story stand on its own. Don’t explain it. If people don’t get the point, either you need to rework the story or you need a better story.
• Transition to your key point for the story. What insights did you gain from this event or situation? What’s the takeaway for your listeners? What insights did you or the hero gain through the struggle, failure, success, journey, or outcome?
Great stories die for lack of a dynamic delivery.