Storytelling As Weapon

Years ago Fredericton used to hold a Storytelling Festival. I remember at age eleven or twelve biking to Wilmont United Church to hear speechwriter of Louis J Robichaud, Jackie Webster, spin tales about the adventures she was involved in during those heady political days.

Storytelling has been something of a lost art but it’s recently gone mainstream. Anthropologists and business thinkers are helping develop an understanding of how a good story motivates action. It’s now considered to be one of the weapons leaders need in their arsenal.

But to actually construct and be able to tell a good story that motivates action is a hard task.

On Tuesday I gave a presentation on 21inc and our work to board members of the Atlantic Provinces Economic Council and other members of the Nova Scotia business community. This opportunity couldn't go to waste. I wanted attendees to leave lunch knowing how important our work is. I wanted to affect them on an emotional level, the core of motivation.

I was aware of all the work being done on the power of storytelling (we hosted a panel discussion at the last Ideas Festival on the topic with storyteller extraordinaire Antonine Maillet) and knew that the best way of reaching this audience would be to tell a good story.

To prepare I connected with a friend of mine who teaches storytelling at the Rotman School of Management in Toronto. He uses the work of Marshall Ganz, a professor at the Harvard Kennedy School who also helped design Obama’s Presidential campaign. He sent me a short article by Ganz that breaks down what’s included in a good story.

Ganz’s break down is easy to follow and effective. At a macro level, every story includes A Story of Self, A Story of Us, and A Story of Now. To get people engaged they need to engage with a protagonist (Story of Self), understand how that story affects and includes them (Story of Us), and why it’s urgent that action be taken (Story of Now).

The protagonist faces a Challenge, Choice and Outcome. Think of all the great stories out there and they include a challenge, choice and outcome. Martin Luther King Jr. faced the challenge of a racist United States and chose to fight for freedom and liberty, eventually getting the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act passed.

Most of our stories are not of that magnitude but there is still a story that can be told to get people engaged and moved to act. I wrote the story of 21inc with these directions. You can read it here.

I spent almost the whole two days prior to the talk writing and practicing it. According to the feedback and especially the follow-up discussion, the lunch went really well. The business leaders saw how our work fits both their direct organizational self-interest and also that of the larger community on which they depend.

Here’s a video where Ganz talks about leadership more generally but he gives a great reflection on storytelling.