Knowing storytelling techniques is not a “fluffy” or soft skill for your business. Just as your accountant needs to have strong skills in numbers and laws, so must all your staff and volunteers learn storytelling, both creating and listening.
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?
Posted 7 months, 4 weeks ago at 12:14 pm. Add a comment
How to Tell a Story.
One of the most searched-for communication skills on the Internet is “how to tell a story.” I would like to give you a quick step-by-step guide to this process of story telling, drawn from my 23 years of being a professional storyteller. This is the fast and quick method to learn a new story.
1. Decide on a story. Sounds elementary, but at some point, you need to find a story that you love. If you are having problems, search the Internet for some simple Aesop fables or find some good stories at a site like Storyteller.net .
2. Break the story down into an outline of events so that you can remember the episodes of each story.
You have two choices for step three. Do one or both if you would like.
3A. Write out or draw out the parts of the story. Using longhand, that means pencil and paper, write out the episodes of the story in your own words. Do not copy the story. Rewrite it in your own words. Doing this process by hand allows your brain to overcome any resistance you might have to the story. Knowing you can do this process with your story is also a way for your brain to overcome some fear of public speaking that might hinder you from telling this story.
3B. The other way to break down a story is via “storyboarding,” a technique that many storytellers use. Take a letter-sized piece of paper. Fold it in half along the length. You now have an eleven inch piece of pager that looks like a taco. Then, fold the right side up against the left and then fold the same way again. When you unfold the paper you will have a piece of paper divided into 8 segments.
Starting at the top segment, draw out each step of the story. This is only for you to learn so stick figures and bad drawings are just fine. This visual method may help you grasp the story better than writing alone.
4. Begin to tell yourself the story, aloud, using your own words while looking at one of the #3 tools above. Repeat this process several times.
5. Think about the story you are telling. Are there parts of the story that do not really need to be there? Do they drag down the story? Cross them off the list or the storyboard and tell yourself the story one more time with those parts of the story removed. Again, at each of these times, you are speaking your story aloud. Let your face get a feel for the story.
6. Put your notes down and tell yourself the story a few more times. This is a great exercise to do while you are driving your car or cleaning your house. Just keep talking to yourself.
7. Call up a friend or find an associate and tell them your story. Use no notes or storyboard. When you finish telling the story to your associate, ask them if it makes sense to them. Did they think you left out any parts? This is not the time to see if they “get it” or understand the deep meanings. You just want to know if the essential delivery of the story makes sense.
8. As your confidence in the story grows, you will want to start thinking about the emotions represented by different words in the story. You may find that you wish to emphasize one part or character over another. These things come with time. If you feel better about saying “once upon a time” at the beginning or “the end” as one of your story endings, then do so. As you grow to understand storytelling even more, you will learn so many other ways to start or end a story.
9. When it is time for your story’s debut, be confident. Look at your audience. Speak clearly. Slow down and enjoy the story experience. As a professional storyteller, I can tell you that it takes a dozen or more tellings of a story to find the your true rhythm and delivery for each story.
There you have it, how to tell a great story! This is a quick, get-it-now guide to storytelling. There is so much more you can learn about how to tell a story. Remember- get started today telling stories. Like a painter who must paint often to get better at painting, you, too, must speak stories often and to many groups in order to improve.
Some resources:
To get my free ECourse on storytelling, see the front page of my website at www.seantells.net.
For hundreds of articles and stories, please visit www.storyteller.net.
To order the EWorkbook on storytelling that includes live coaching and audio files, please visit www.storytelling101.com
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Based in Arizona, Sean Buvala is a full-time professional storyteller and storytelling consultant who works throughout North America teaching storytelling for business. Along with storytelling techniques for corporate communication, Sean is also sought after for teaching storytelling for teachers of middle school and high-school students. For more information about Sean’s work as a storytelling coach, please see his site at www.seantells.net.
Posted 11 months, 3 weeks ago at 12:39 pm. Add a comment
The next episode of our “Storytelling and Narrative for Business Podcast” is ready for you!
Episode Four: “Storytelling is Not a ‘Soft Skill’: Sure Looked Easy”
Sean brings you some tough-love this week to help you understand that storytelling is a “hard skill” for your business. Fail that understanding and things can go bad. Get real coaching and training to sharpen your skills.
Listen in: Episode Four
Find all the podcasts on this page here.
Posted 1 year ago at 5:29 pm. Add a comment
