Organizational Storytelling

Key Thoughts:

Advocates for organizational storytelling (OS), a very compelling one at that. OS can increased level of understanding to a specific organization goal.

Summary:

3 reasons why it is different from normal storytelling. 1) Clear purpose why you are telling the story 2) the story is to support hard data 3) stories must be authentic.

OS helps today's leader bring emotion connection and personal credibility to the table. Research shows that the audience makes a far greater connection to the speaker's point when using stories.

Two books worth mentioned as reference text for OS. Lori Silverman, Wake Me up When the Data is Over: How Organisations Use Stories to Drive Results (hint: this book is in the Finance Library), and Annette Simmons, Persuasion Through the Art of Storytelling (still looking for this book in the bookshop!).

Not everyone is a natural storyteller. For this, there's training. One Thousand & One is cited as a consultancy firm that does this professionally.

Storytelling example one:

Sales manager struggles to get team to meet sales target. But the team members most hated this part of their job. Sales manager tell a story about a boy to hates brussels sprouts, and would push them to the side even though he knew his mother would make him eat it eventually. So he always ended up having cold brussels sprouts. One night he decided to eat them first and get them out of the way. He had a great response...

Storytelling example two:

A woman enjoy going to football each week. But she was too short to see. So one week she took a milk crate with her. Now she can see. She has a clear view until the rest decided to follow her. Now with 'milk crate' in hand, she uses the story to illustrate how we constantly have to look for the next 'milk crate', the next big thing to win the war for talent.

A short and effective article on organizational storytelling.

Reference: Tell Me a Story by Kylie Hansen, Intheblack, CPA Australia, June 2008, pages 42-45.