Here are some seven free goodies for you and your ministry from the work of Sean Buvala. (Who is Sean? See below, after the free goodies.)

“Sean (Buvala) promised me that when he was finished with the day, our people would have practical skills to begin their own story telling. Sean was right. Not only did he give folks practical strategies for forming stories he captivated and inspired us all with stories of his own.”
-Christopher Ashby, Youth Ministry Office, Diocese of Baltimore

1. Free 30 session storytelling course via Email. Use the form (with the red arrows) directly below!
Yep. Free. Lessons arrive once a week to your Email box. Your information is private with us. We don’t spam and we don’t help others spam. AND>>> Be sure that once you register that you CONFIRM your registration or you won’t get anything. Check your Email box and click the link to confirm.

2. Free Video: “Gestures for Public Speaking: Three Steps”

3. Free Article: “How to Get Teenage Guys to Talk.” Written for youth workers: daddyteller.com/guytalk

4. Free Article: “Listening Sideways.” About how some teens listen to storytelling. An experience from one of the “bazillion” church camps where I have been the main speaker.

5. Free Article: “Five Basic Storytelling Techniques for Youth Ministry.”

6. Free Article: “Three Tips for the Nervous Public Speaker.” Written for a secular audience, but applies to all situation.

7. Sacred Story: Beggars Can’t Be Choosers. When youth ministry crosses into real-world learning.

8. Free Coaching. Oh, good. You read this far down the page. How about a free 20-minute phone coaching from Sean Buvala? We can talk about any aspect of your public speaking, sacred storytelling or youth ministry concern. Pick the brain of a youth worker, ministry and trainer with more than two decades of experience? How? If you are interested in working with Sean, please drop an Email to sean@storyteller.net and include the subject line of: “youth ministry coaching” to reserve your spot. Most free coaching takes place on Monday or Friday. You will need to call a “623″ (Arizona) area code for this offer- at your expense, if any. Does anyone pay long-distance anymore? Limited to the first 20 responders.

About Sean Buvala.
Sean Buvala is a full-time, professional storyteller, the author of “DaddyTeller“, and a veteran of youth ministry who presents workshops and training throughout the United States. .

“Sean (Buvala) promised me that when he was finished with the day, our people would have practical skills to begin their own story telling. Sean was right. Not only did he give folks practical strategies for forming stories he captivated and inspired us all with stories of his own.”
-Christopher Ashby, Youth Ministry Office, Diocese of Baltimore

As a leader of a nonprofit organization, it might be easy for individual staff and volunteers to be focused just on those who receive the services of the organization. However, does your group remember to talk to each other about your own work? Nonprofit storytelling is not just for the outside customers, it is for our very own staff members.

Stories can inspire your staff, improve staff retention and grow job satisfaction. You will see greater nonprofit fundraising. In turn, a happy organization generates deeper satisfaction among clients and benefactors.

Learn to use the power of nonprofit storytelling techniques in your business communications with these five tips:

1. Leaders should know and speak the stories of everyday successes.

Do your nonprofit’s leaders only speak to everyone when there is a problem? Stories are everywhere in an organization and they can be easy to find. I teach several methods for story gathering, but whatever method you choose to use, do something to solicit and find the stories of your company. When using storytelling for nonprofit organizations, the leaders must be the first to demonstrate this communication technique and they should seek to do so for every level of staff.

2. At least once a calendar quarter, have a single department share in-depth stories about their role in the organization.

Are your staff meetings limited to cursory sharing of agendas?

My wife is a gardener. Among other things, I have learned from her is that plants not only need the surface watering on a regular basis, but that they benefit from a “deep” watering occasionally. Much like these plants, your company needs to be “deep” in sharing their stories.

I have been on staff for many nonprofits. In our busyness, our staff meetings were reduced to around-the-table updating, doing not much more than checking in. To grow your staff cohesion, make a monthly gathering where one department shares both the success and challenge stories. As the deep watering that my gardener wife does for her trees, let these monthly or quarterly gatherings feed the roots of the entire organization.

3. Be sure volunteer training includes stories from other volunteers.

Do you assume your volunteers (or those seeking nonprofit jobs) are present because they really understand your group? As a nonprofit leader, I have seen how quickly some volunteers can burn out, especially in jobs requiring a great deal of face-to-face interaction. It is easy to assume that volunteers completely understand your mission statement. Of course, that is false. When your volunteers know the joys, challenges and reasonable expectations of your group, they will be more inspired to stay longer with your group. Mixing in a generous portion of stories (fun and serious) to your training will have long-term benefits.

4. Invite, rather than require, staff to create stories of the organization.

Mandatory story sharing results in low quality stories. Gathering stories is a natural process but sometimes your staff needs to be reminded how to do so. Rather than mandate to a group, teach them skills. Your stories will be much more genuine as they grow out of desire to share and not a requirement to meet a quota.

5. Never be afraid of negative stories.

I have found that negative stories (complaints) are a more effective gauge of staff satisfaction or job issues than any comment box will ever be.

In any organization there will be moments of success and sometimes challenge. Learn to listen carefully to all stories you hear. What are the trends and patterns? Before a staff issue becomes a major problem, it first appears as a few whispers. Are you listening to these stories? In thinking about your own work history, what problems might have been avoided if management had been carefully listening rather than defending or suppressing issues?

Strive to implement these “internal customer” tips for the health of your nonprofit group. Thinking of starting a nonprofit organization? Make these steps an integral part of your initial plans.

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K. Sean Buvala is a national leader in the communication skill of storytelling for business. An award-winning veteran of nearly two decades in storytelling, he uses his experience in the non-profit industry to help you grow your bottom line and increase staff satisfaction. His website for nonprofit organizations is at http://www.getmorefunding.com . For daily tips, follow him at Twitter @storyteller .

As good accounting can be a barometer about your company so does storytelling give you a picture of your organization’s health. Like the ledger, business storytelling reveals truth about your organization. No matter if your company has just a single entrepreneur or a payroll of thousands, pay attention to these revelations.

1. Storytelling reveals what your customers really think. Gathering customer stories tells you what is truly happening. No matter what organizational myth you might have, the real truth comes from your customers. There is a reason the “Emperor’s New Clothes” is such a popular story for so many generations. Are you going to be caught naked someday because you did not truly listen to your client’s real stories?

2. Storytelling reveals who is really paying attention. Your company should make it a point to conduct regular sessions of story gathering from employees and management. Processes like my “Intentionality”(tm) activity help anyone in any company create stories about everyday experiences. Like a Board that cannot tell you about the company ledger, be very afraid of any upper management that never has new stories of the company. Stories of how the powerful are deposed are very common in world folktales. Is your CEO paying attention- even if the CEO and the janitor are the same person in your small business?

3. Storytelling reveals your organization’s ability to adapt to change. For survival, your ledger needs to show some reserve funds for your metaphorical “rainy day.” So, too, stories of change show how your company has the readiness and acceptance of the inevitable shifts in the market. Are you prepared for everything to change tomorrow? Are you stuck in the same old ways? Can you make a list, right now, of the stories that show how your nonprofit or business has adapted to change? You do not have past stories of change management and adaptability in your company? You are in for a rough future.

Corporate stories and skills in business storytelling, yes even storytelling for financial advisors, are as valuable to your group as good accounting. Are you giving storytelling the attention it deserves?

Sometimes there are surprise moments when some rather public storytelling skills are demonstrated very well.

It is common to see public figures fail at storytelling. However, at the Michael Jackson Memorial service, entrepreneur and former professional basketball player Earvin “Magic” Johnson demonstrated a command of and elegance to his story. Although many speakers spoke at “MJ’s” funeral, Magic’s few moments stand out.

Here are 4 things that anyone who wants to use storytelling can learn from Magic’s story.

1. His story was brief. I am sure that Mr. Johnson may have had more to say, but he cut through the extraneous details and went directly to his point, taking the audience with him as he experienced the wonder he felt as Michael Jackson ate KFC (Kentucky Fried Chicken) with him one night many years ago. Ironic as it may sound, the purpose of being a storyteller is not to talk words but rather to communicate ideas.

2. It was a story told in the “voice of the people.” I have watched and commented on many public speakers, especially politicians, who try to speak “to the people.” In the Jackson memorial, Magic Johnson used an important storytelling technique: talk so people understand. His words were simple. His illustrations were accessible to all as he talked about family gatherings, dinners, playing games with family, celebrity-meeting nerves and eventually, something as simple as a fast-food icon: a bucket of chicken.

As a pro-basketball star, Magic could have easily made sports references. However, no sports reference would speak to such a wide range of listeners as his family references did. Choosing to speak to your audience so they understand rather than using self-serving references is a sign of a mature and effective speaker.

3. In his story, he laughed at himself. Magic’s story was not to tell people how wonderful he was but rather to share how wonderful he thought Michael Jackson was. A good storyteller can reflect the focus on the story and the subject of the story.

4. His story was actually a story. It contained a beginning, a middle and an end. Magic did not tell an anecdote: “I once sat on Michael Jackson’s carpet and ate KFC with him. Wasn’t that cool?” Rather, he placed his story in the context of a developing relationship with the family and the invitation to dinner. Without being sappy or manipulative, he shared his own feelings about the invite and his surprise to discover his idol ate “real food” like everyone else.

His story supported this expression of hope for the future. At the end of his comments, when he referred to Michael’s children having family support, you knew his point of reference to make such a statement.

Although in the past Magic has been critiqued for his speaking style, his presentation at the MJ funeral was a good example for any speaker striving to improve their storytelling skills for business or personal use.

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Sean Buvala is a public speaking coach who specializes in helping you tell your core story in all situations. For free Email lessons, please see www.storytelling101.com .

When a customer experiences your company, they leave with an impression. If they were offended, hurt or feel they did not get good value, they will passionately talk about (create the story of) their perceptions of your business. Likewise, if you exceeded their expectations, they will also talk about that story. When a person hears one of these customer stories about your business, do you have your own equally passionate company stories to counter or confirm? Can your customers find these passionate stories on your website via video or audio links?

Here are five storytelling for business tips to help you express your passion:

1. Do not be afraid to be full of passion about your product or service. For example, I am always amazed at the way small brick-and-mortar business owners can be so alive and excited about their offerings but yet have zero expressions of that anywhere on their websites, other advertising or in casual conversations. Real passion ignites real passion. Don’t tell me that you’re “passionate about the perfect cup of coffee” at your coffee shop. Rather, through business storytelling, show me your passion by telling me the story of how you spent a year travelling the country to find the best and most unique roasting machine. I want to see that look in your eyes as you tell me about the best/worst coffee you ever had that led you to start your own business. Let me laugh with you about your obsessive interviewing and auditioning in order to find the perfect baristas. Help me to feel your focus as you tell me about going through a dozen suppliers (and their unique personalities) looking for the perfect coffee beans.

2. Your employees are your best source of truth about your company. Train your employees in ways to gather and collect their own company stories. Then, on a regular basis, gather employees together to share these stories. The sharing of these stories must not be mandatory. Requiring employees to have a story results in faked stories. By the way, my coaching clients will sometimes hesitate to use this story-gathering process with employees because the session will generate “nothing but complaints” from the participants. All stories have value to your company and if you are getting lots of complaints, let those stories be the catalyst for internal change. Take the cue to understand: if your staff is producing uncomfortable stories, then you can be assured that your customers are unhappy, too.

3. If your company is very large with multiple locations or large departments, start your storytelling process in just one section of the company. Nothing squashes passion more than yet another management project that “we are all going to do.” Choose one department and let them be the first group to experience the power of business storytelling. Once they have learned and applied storytelling techniques successfully, then other departments or locations will want to join in.

4. The elevator speech is dead. For any size company, learn to tell each of your stories in a variety of time formats such as two minutes, six minutes or fifteen minutes. Always be ready to tell potential customers about your work. Your preparedness will help convey your passion.

5. Remember that storytelling is a person-to-person experience. Take every opportunity to be in front of customers or employees to tell your stories. Digital storytelling, print advertisements and social media are all fine tools, but they can never replace the benefits of experiencing your story passionately told live and in person.

Storytelling is one of your business communication essentials. Add passion to your public speaking!

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Sean Buvala is a storyteller and corporate coach focusing on communication skills through the art of storytelling for business. He can be reached at www.seantells.net . You may also follow him on Twitter at @storyteller.

Yesterday, on my way into the grocery store, a woman sitting at “animal rescue” table asked me if I would like to donate to their rescue shelter. As I made my way into the store, I had both the time and the inclination to listen to her ask for a donation as my family has been connected to the work of rescue shelters for more than six years. (You can see the website at 3lostdogs.com.) As well, we have three “rescued” shelter dogs in our life. So, I am open to the idea that these volunteers were promoting. I also know that these impromptu tables are an important non profit funding source.

I asked her, “What does your shelter do?” The volunteer was not ready to answer my question. She did not know the story of the shelter she was representing. Her only answer was, “We do the adoptions at the (name of pet store).” Outside of that, she did not know what to say.

So, unlike most people passing her table, I stopped long enough to actually talk to her. I was a prime-candidate to donate money to her cause. However, she had not been trained in how to talk to potential donors. Either she did not know the story of her group or she had not been trained to speak about her organization.

This, of course, is not her fault. Her lack of preparedness was the fault of the director of her non-profit organization. It is possible that she had been trained on where to find the table that she needed, what to do with the money she collected and where to turn in the forms at the end of her shift. She was not trained in talking about the mission of her organization.

How about your volunteers and employees? Have they been trained to tell both their story of why they volunteer as well as the story of your organization? I am not talking about elevator speeches here. These elevator speeches, also know as unique selling points, are static anecdotes used to snare others. Rather, knowing the multiple stories of your organizations and how to adapt them to both casual and formal situations is a key skill for your staff, both volunteer and paid.

Here are three steps you need to follow to prepare your staff to use the power of story in your non-profit organization.

1. Collect the stories of your group.
There are a variety of techniques available to aid any organization in the collection of their stories. However, the best method is the oldest method: listen. Train your staff to think about stories. Ask them to think: what is happening/has happened that others need to know about? Find a way to share these stories at regular gatherings. Never make story sharing mandatory in any setting. Although many trainers advocate this, the pressure of “I must have a story” results in poor stories shared when your staff is under pressure to come up with anything. Stories should always be gathered in an organic or grass-roots process.

2. Train staff in the essential skills (the how-to) of storytelling.
The best investment you can make in your organization’s future is to enlist the help of an experienced storytelling coach to teach your staff and volunteers to tell stories. You want your team to be able to know and tell your core or essential stories in a variety of time formats. For example, the volunteer I encountered outside the grocery store might have known the 20-minute story of their organization but had not been trained to tell it to me in a two-minute setting. She would need to know both the long and short versions. You also want your team to be able to use stories as frames for presentations that require quantities of data and shared information. Teach storytelling techniques first and save the high-level theories of storytelling for advanced classes once your staff has had success with storytelling.

3. All non-profit leadership must use stories at every gathering.
In every public speaking setting, from formal board meetings to casual walk-arounds, the leadership of the organization must fully immerse themselves in the use of story. Despite the glut of storytelling-for-business consultants available, the idea of storytelling for adults in a business setting remains challenging for many. Your leadership team, from the top on down, must clearly demonstrate the importance of story in all settings.

In even good economic times, a non-profit organization must have a strong command of their past, present and future stories. Your potential donors are interested in what their money can do in your organization, assuming your mission aligns with their values. Are your volunteers ready to speak your mission statement, not in overused mission “statement-eese,” but rather in the geniune stories of your group’s daily experiences?

Expressing your organization’s story should be a skill for all of your staff. It is a requirement for business communication today. Consider everyone in your organization to be public speakers. Your experiences, expressed in story, are the unique features of your group. Be sure your donors can understand them.

I did explain to the volunteer outside the grocery store about my family’s history and thanked her for the good work she was promoting in defense of abandoned animals. Her work was important and I hope she had some success in collecting funds for their rescue project. However, I knew that she was unprepared for real conversations about the work and mission of her group. I hope that the leadership of her group soon gets a chance to teach their staff to tell the real stories of the challenges and successes of their charity.

Good stories, willing listeners and a staff trained in public speaking skills are tangible assets for every non-profit group must have.

Having done executive coaching and corporate storytelling training over the last 23 years, I have seen many common mistakes from folks wishing to use storytelling for business presentations. Here are three of my quick fixes for public speaking issues.

Fix Number One: Take your story seriously.
World stories, myths and legends have endured for many centuries because of their ability to carry powerful messages in the small space of well-selected words. Use this power carefully. When I work with clients, they will often have spent many hours on their appearance, their eye contact and the slides they will project. However, they only spend minutes on story selection and presentation. This is a big mistake. There is no such thing as a simple story. Stories are powerful tools and, used incorrectly, they will explode back at you. Stories selected with care, crafted with good storytelling techniques and told with an intentional purpose will create a long-lasting impact on your audience. Your listeners will remember your stories long after the memory of your nice tie, fancy dress or overhead slides quickly fades away.

Fix Number Two: Plan the gestures you will use.
Your hands do not always need to be in motion nor held clasped in front of you as if you were carrying a bouquet of flowers. Avoid making choppy hand movements with eve-ry syl-la-ble you speak. Plan your gestures to match your story and move effortlessly and smoothly from one gesture to another. Let you hands rest naturally at your sides in between gestures. Try to avoid the finger pyramids or hand clasping between gestures.

Fix Number Three: Speak in your natural voice.
One of the best time investments you can make as a public speaker is to watch a professional storyteller speak to your target demographic of adults. You will see and hear the differences between how one tells stories to adults and how one practices storytelling for children. You must avoid the “sing song” voice of the unpracticed storyteller, who, like revered hosts of children’s television programming, makes a lilting vocal pattern that sends adult audiences screaming out of the room.

Also, be aware that when you speak personal or “real” stories about your company you do not imitate or mimic the voices of others. Speak in your own voice. In most cases, do not change your voice to reflect your perceptions of the gender, race, regional origin or social status of those of which you are speaking. Mimicking another can quickly backfire on you, causing you to lose goodwill and trust with your audience.

Applying these quick fixes for public speaking will help your audience to be fully immersed in your presentation. Your storytelling, well prepared and well coached, can lower your public speaking anxiety and make you one of the best business speakers your audience has ever heard.

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Sean Buvala ( Twitter him @storyteller) is an award-winning storyteller, experienced business speaker and executive speaking coach who helps businesses grow their bottom line and create employee satisfaction through the power of storytelling. His website is http://www.seantells.net. He offers private training and coaching. Learn about his small group, multi-day workshop at http://www.executivespeakingtraining.com .