We live in a world bloated with information yet starved of inspiration. We suffer from an inspiration famine. Yet all the research tells us that people crave authenticity and connection. Storytelling gives leaders and businesspeople the ability to connect authentically and to move people to action.

Story power inspires your audience to both action and desire. Storytelling is an ancient yet also a contemporary tool that, if practised authentically and purposefully, can deliver powerful results. All religious belief systems, cultures and societies, past and present, use stories as a mode of influence. As humans, we are hardwired to tell stories and to listen to them.

Business storytelling

I believe so much in storytelling as an influence tool that in 2005 I co-founded Australia's first company to specialise in business storytelling. Business storytelling is storytelling with a purpose and for results. Here's an example from one of my clients, James Lindsay of Accenture:

A few years ago when I was living with my family in Canada, we had friends over one evening for a Thanksgiving dinner. It was a lovely evening, we had the fire going in the fireplace, lots of good food, red wine and conversations. After our friends left we cleaned up and went wearily to bed.

At about 2 am I was woken by the smoke alarm going off. I sprang out off bed and went around the house carefully checking the fireplace, the basement, the whole house, but could find no evidence of any fire. The alarm eventually turned itself off and I went back to bed. But about 15 minutes later, the alarm went off again. I couldn't believe it, and went through the whole process again, carefully checking the house from top to bottom, and there was no fire to be seen anywhere. I thought the alarm might be faulty and did not want to be disturbed again, so I turned it off completely.

Later that night I was woken by a thick cloud of smoke and barely made it out of the house, with my wife and son. I even had to rush back in to get my dog. We were standing outside our house, which was engulfed in smoke, waiting for the fire engine when a huge flame erupted, exactly from in front of the fireplace.

The fire engines arrived and put out the fire, and we found out that builders had been installing faulty fireplaces in new homes in our area to save money. I also found out later that my family and I had escaped the Grim Reaper by only a few minutes. In life we often get early warning signs that serve a purpose. If we took notice of these signs and did something, imagine the difference we could make.

You could use this story to influence and inspire a client to take action by quickly responding to early warning signs. Sometimes information alone isn't enough to promote action, but a story combined with data will often persuade and inspire.

Whether you want to influence your team or change the world, how do you find the right story to share? Try these three simple steps.

1. Think of a bumper sticker

Start by looking at the purpose of your story. What's the single message behind your story? To achieve clarity, think of the message or idea as a bumper sticker. Bumper stickers force you to tackle just one message with your story. They make you prioritise and focus and distil what you're trying to convey to its core.

Is your message Step up or Fortune favours the brave? Writing your bumper sticker down helps you eliminate jargon. Jargon is the death knell of storytelling. We defy you to frame a personal story around ‘operational excellence' or ‘optimising synergies' or ‘leveraged synchronicity'. But it is possible to find stories around ‘giving the best you've got' or ‘beating loneliness by working together'. To get your bumper sticker right, think of one thing that you want people to do differently. Is it to ‘ask questions' or ‘share information'?. Your bumper stickers don't have to be super sexy — we are not going to be selling them — nor do they have to be original! What they do have to do is give you crystal clarity on your purpose.

2. Scan your own life experiences

Once you have bumper sticker clarity on your message, look through your experiences, both personal and professional, to see what fits this purpose. If your purpose is ‘Step up', ask yourself, ‘When did I or someone I know step up and make something work?' You'll be surprised how many experiences come flooding back.

When your purpose is crystal clear, you'll start to tune into events and issues happening around you that will work with your purpose.

Once clients have their purpose in mind, I share a scene from Michael Jackson's 2009 film, This is it. While Jackson's team were working furiously on the music and lyrics, he approached them and said simply, ‘Let it simmer'.

Don't expect to find the perfect story for your purpose straight away. While your purpose and story idea simmer, go to step 3.

3. What does your audience want?

Consider your audience and what will work for them. Once you have your bumper sticker purpose and have isolated the right experience, ask yourself, ‘Who is my audience and what do they like? What motivates them?'

Darren Rowse, the founder of one of the world's most successful blogging sites, problogger.net, has a razor-sharp understanding of his audience. He'll paint a picture something like this: a thirty-something who lives in Melbourne, in the inner-city fringe suburb of Northcote, loves coffee and rides a fix-wheeled bicycle. He then writes with that person alone in mind.

So you've decided on your bumper sticker purpose. You've captured the best story by sifting through your experiences and have selected the best fit for your audience. Now make sure it shines. Try these three tips:

1. Write it down.Most people ramble if they try to tell a story off the cuff. By writing it down, you can craft it, refine it and increase your clarity. Make sure you write as you speak so your story flows well and comes across as conversational, rather than as a prepared script.
2. Keep it short. In business, your stories should take between 30 seconds and two minutes maximum. Anything longer and you risk boring or losing your audience.
3. When you think you've practised enough, practise some more. Champion South African golfer Gary Player once said of his success, ‘The harder you work, the luckier you get'. The more you practise, the better your stories will be. It may feel awkward, but nothing beats practising aloud, whether it's in the shower or in front of your family. It also helps to record your stories into your phone so you can play them back.

Personal stories are powerful

Here's an example of a story that pulls all these tips together. Bill Arconasti, formerly of major software developer Atlassian, shares it to demonstrate the power of the right story:

A few years ago a friend and I went backpacking in the pristine wilderness of Denali National Park in Alaska. We bought every piece of equipment known to man to fight off grizzly bears, like pepper spray, bells, etc. Before we set off, the rangers made us watch a video in which we were instructed to simply wave our arms in the air in the unlikely event we encountered a bear. My friend and I laughed so hard at the actors in the video and made fun of the idea that something so ridiculous would scare away a bear.

The very next day we set off and had barely turned the corner when there right in front of us was a giant grizzly bear. My knees started knocking and my friend shouted, “Hand me the pepper spray!” And for some reason I replied, “No, just wave your arms in the air,” and we both did. To our shock the bear ambled off. When we returned we told the ranger about our encounter and he replied, “I'm so glad you didn't use the pepper spray as that just makes the bears mad. Either that or you accidentally spray yourself!”

I am sharing this with you because it reminds me of our daily choices with technology. Of course we can choose the “bells and whistles” version for our customers but sometimes, just like waving your arms can scare off a grown grizzly, all that is needed is the simple and effective version.

This story ticks all the right boxes: it's engaging, funny and purposeful, and it marries story and message beautifully. It also shows how, even in business storytelling, personal stories are often the most powerful.

But this is just the beginning. (Warning: the following is a blatant plug!) I co-authored an entire bestselling book on the power of storytelling, entitled Hooked: How leaders connect, engage and inspire using storytelling. Of course it's the best book on the planet to show you how to do just that!

Power up your storytelling

Once we have figured out our purpose (via a bumper sticker), panned through our experiences to find a story that will appeal to our audience, written it down, kept it short and then practiced it, where do we go next? All the steps and tips previously described are very much the price of entry for storytelling. These strategies will help you take your storytelling up a level.

Start strong

With business storytelling we often see leaders do a preamble that, before launching into the story, gives away the ending or the purpose. This ‘faux beginning', is the very antithesis of powerful storytelling.

Steve Denning, the father of organisational storytelling, states that starting with time and place informs your audience that you are telling a story without you having to begin with, ‘Let me tell you a story …'. For example, ‘Three years ago when I was working in London …' or ‘Yesterday on the way to work …'.

Once you have played with this, you can subvert the rules and do a provocative beginning or even ask a rhetorical question. You could start by saying ‘What does it feel like to hit rock bottom? I remember when I was 18 …'

Beginnings are critical as this is where your audience will decide if they will lean in and listen. I recommend spending a suitable amount of time thinking, crafting and re-crafting your first sentence to ensure you start strong.

Seeking a segue

Sometimes things can get in the way of us starting strong. Maybe we feel awkward or it feels too abrupt and we need some sort of launch pad. This is why leaders often clutch at faux beginnings such as ‘Before I begin let me tell you a story …' or ‘I am going to tell you a story … '. Why do I baulk at these segues? Because these faux story beginnings manage to both patronise and alienate your audience. It's two for the price of one! Would you begin a factual statement by saying ‘Let me tell you a statement of fact?' Highly unlikely.

In a lot of contexts, what we need is a segue sentence that lets us smoothly launch into a story. A segue sentence acts as a launch pad for our stories and can be inserted into any conversation, avoiding the need for any clumsy, clunky or clichéd attempts to begin a story.

Some suggested segues are ‘That reminds me of …' or ‘To explain, let me share an example … '. Former Chief Commissioner of Victoria Police Christine Nixon was a master at this. She would present complex strategy points in a Powerpoint presentation and then say, ‘To explain, let me share an example … ', and launch into a story. Practice a few segues that fit with your natural style and find some that work for you.

Have fun

There is unfortunately an earnestness that has seized the whole business storytelling world. The gravitas common in company announcements, meetings and presentations is now seeping into storytelling. With the exception of some stories that will merit a level of seriousness, the most important thing we can do is to have fun with storytelling. But as this instruction sounds like one of those pseudo positive psychology banalities such as ‘reach for the stars' or ‘follow your passion', let's unpack how we can have fun with our storytelling.

• Share stories that you enjoy telling and that are meaningful to you. We once heard a CEO squirm his way through a story about his childhood. It was very uncomfortable for the audience and it later turned out that he had been persuaded to share the story by a well-meaning advisor.
• Harness conversational energy. Always pretend you are sharing the story with a friend over coffee, and use that energy both when you are crafting your stories and when you are in storytelling mode.
• Share stories your audience will enjoy, stories that are relevant to their world. While this might sound populistic, when your audience enjoys your stories, so will you. In storytelling it's hard to have fun alone! When your audience laughs and relaxes into your story, you will too.

The power of everyday stories

Storytelling is a skill you can learn. Stories have to be crafted and honed, tested and practised. I don't suggest for a moment that sharing one story will gain you instant influence over all of your audience. No one story can do that, and no one deserves that level of influence. But as I have worked with clients, over and over again I have seen how a purposeful story, well crafted and shared with authenticity, creates a ripple effect of influence.

What are the barriers that obstruct our storytelling?

The first is ‘my story is not enough' syndrome.

When you ask for a story, many think it has to be spectacular — a hero's journey, saving the world and slaying dragons along the way. Often our first exposure to inspiring storytelling is seeing a motivational speaker on stage. They usually recount an epic that involves scaling Mount Everest, sailing solo around the world, winning an Olympic gold medal, or some similar feat of courage and endurance.

But in everyday leadership, everyday stories work better than Hollywood epics. Stories about shopping in your local supermarket, or a restaurant experience with friends, or an issue with your child at school. These common stories work because your audience relates to them. They can see themselves in the story.

An epic story has your audience in passive, spectator mode. They enjoy the spectacle of your story, but they're not involved in it. An everyday story, on the other hand, engages your audience more directly. They invest in your story emotionally and relive their own experiences through yours.

This leads to the next barrier in storytelling, the requirement that you, as the storyteller, acknowledge and display vulnerability.

Vulnerability means self-disclosure and dealing with messy, unpredictable emotions. Storytelling also demands that you put something of yourself out there. Commendable as this is, it's also difficult. For storytelling to work it has to be based on authenticity, otherwise it can degenerate into spin.

Neil Gaiman is the author of the classic series of terror comic books from the 1990s, The Sandman. In Volume 9: The Kindly Ones, he writes: ‘Have you ever been in love? Horrible isn't it? It makes you so vulnerable. It opens your chest and it opens up your heart and it means that someone can get inside you and mess you up'.

The same can be said of storytelling, which requires a degree of self-disclosure and vulnerability that can be confronting both for you as a storyteller and for your audience.

Why would you do it if the personal cost is so high?

American sociologist, researcher and storyteller Brené Brown ponders whether stories are ‘data with a soul'. Her 2010 TED talk on vulnerability is itself a tour de force of storytelling, combining humour, honesty and occasionally breathtaking self-disclosure. It's also the fourth most commented on TED talk in history.

Brown is the author of a number of books, including the must-read Daring Greatly: How the courage to be vulnerable transforms the way we live, love, parent and lead.

Some leaders find storytelling hard to do. Others design stories by committee, making them sound more like vision statements or corporate spin than authentic human connection.

Storytelling done well can connect, engage and inspire your audience. But successful storytelling requires skill, authenticity and time to craft, road test and practise.

In business, you can tell stories in writing or through social media, but they are most compelling when delivered face to face.

In the next chapter we show you how you can magnify your influence by understanding the nuances of your context. By crowning it king you can make any context work in your favour.