This is the ‘win with stories’ newsletter. Every week I send an email with a message wrapped in a short story. I also share one actionable tip and a recommendation for you to enhance your storytelling skills.
As leaders, managers and entrepreneurs, we are often faced with the responsibility of inspiring our team members. Without knowledge of communication techniques, we mostly end up speaking in assertions. For example, “We must become more innovative. Let’s start today.”
The result of these hollow assertions is that no one remembers them the moment they step out of the meeting. I was in one such meeting a few years ago, but our CEO took a different approach.
Be like Vivek.
The agency I worked with while I was in PR, was a good one. In fact, it was considered one of the best in India. In the early 2010s, business was growing at a fast clip.
But there was a problem.
The more we grew, the more we lost people at junior levels. We could have accepted that as an undesirable result of hyper growth, but our CEO didn’t.
Valerie Pinto called all team heads for a meeting around that time. The message was that we should invest in and mentor our junior team members.
She did not parrot the message. She narrated a story instead. It was of one of our senior and dear colleagues, Vivek Padiyar. Back then, Vivek was like the Rahul Dravid of the agency. Always calm and collected. His team members were the heroes and never him.
Though many others commanded the spotlight, Vivek had actually built a lighthouse.
“Be like Vivek.”, said Valerie.
We walked out of that room rather inspired. Without giving us hollow gyaan, Valerie had given us a clear standard to adhere to.
I can make an honest confession that her talk motivated me to become a better team leader.
Values when narrated through stories work much better than assertions.
Did any of your seniors use stories to good effect? Do share with me, I am keen to hear them.
Now for today’s communication tip:
Let’s say you are in a situation like Valerie. How do you communicate like her? Are there any steps you could follow?
Yes, there are some steps that I can suggest.
- Prepare your messages and stories for the meeting. You don’t need hours, even a 15-20 minute prep will help you get better results with your team.
- ‘Show, don’t tell.’ Whatever message you want to deliver(better performance, creativity, change or goal setting), make a note of examples that will make team members understand your message better.
For instance, rather than just saying, “We need to aim for higher value clients.”, you can follow it up with names and revenue of these type of clients. I am sure you get the drift.
Human stories are always the best. But having examples(whether of fellow humans or not) makes more sense than not having any.
- Avoid talking about yourself. When you say stuff like, “When I was at your level, I would…..”, you sound like a parent and you don’t want that. Talking about yourself can come across as vain, so avoid that in such settings. Shine the spotlight on someone else, like Valerie did on Vivek.
One thing you could listen to today:
David Pullan is a wonderful story coach from the UK. He brings his experience from theatre into the world of business storytelling. Francisco Mahfuz is another interesting proponent of the profession. He breaks down the art of business storytelling in his podcasts and courses.
These two gents had a chat about stories recently(no points for guessing). Whether you are new to the idea of business storytelling or already know a fair bit, this podcast will be useful.
You can either watch it on Spotify here or read my rough notes from the podcast here.
Happy listening!
Hope you enjoyed this edition of ‘win with stories’ newsletter.
One last request – forward this to friends and colleagues who’d find this story and the tips useful. If you received this email from someone and liked it, you can subscribe here.
Are you the next Harari? :WWS#11
This is the ‘win with stories’ newsletter. Every week I send an email with a message wrapped in a short story. I also share one actionable tip and a recommendation for you to enhance your storytelling skills.
Are you the next Harari?
It’s been three years since I started reading ‘Sapiens’.
I remember being mesmerized. It was more interesting than most fiction I had read. The book managed to narrate the story of humankind in a manner that it felt like a movie.
Since then I have been following Prof. Harari’s work. Recently I watched a video by David Perell about Prof. Harari. He shared that a lot of academics and historians are critical of Prof. Harari.
Why so?
Because he has not contributed anything new to the world of anthropology or history. Still, he has millions of followers and yields immense influence.
And that is the genius of the Israeli historian.
He took a topic that everyone was interested in, but no one really understood. Then, he built a simple and compelling narrative around it. The result? Millions now understand the history of humankind and narrate it to others too.
And that’s our opportunity too. We could take important subjects that interest us and make it easy for others to understand. Many of these opportunities lie in deep tech, AI, crypto and blockchain. Amnd this is by no means an exhaustive list.
So a good question to ask yourself is, “What complicated subject am I trying to simplify for others?”
One communication tip for today:
After ‘Sapiens’, Prof. Harari has written two books. While I haven’t read ‘Homo Deus’, I am a big fan of ‘21 Rules for the 21st Century’. And that’s my communication tip for today.
Most startup founders are selling the promise of future to investors(and many times to customers, employees and partners as well). Just saying that you will build a big company is not enough, people need to see the future.
For example, Prof. Harari says that AI will automate most mechanical jobs we know. Driverless cars will become the norm in the near future as they will be safer and more efficient than manually driven cars. This is expected to happen across the board creating a massive class of unemployable people. So unless workers learn how to adapt to changes and learn new skills at a fast pace, they are staring at a very difficult life ahead of them.
In the same way, I believe that as the world gets increasingly connected, entrepreneurs can access business opportunities from across the world. In such a case, what skill do you think can make or break your career or business? My answer is your communication or storytelling skills.
If you have the ability to articulate your thoughts in a simple, clear and compelling manner then you can convince someone in Germany about your idea sitting in Coimbatore. But the point is you need more than just good language, you need to able to capture your audience’short attention span and get them to follow your call to action.
So ask yourself over and over again – what’s my future story?
One thing you could watch today:
As you would have figured out by now, I am a big Yuval Harari fanboy. I believe a lot of what I understand about this world is derived from the knowledge he shares. I keep listening to his talks every now and then, and have created a playlist of them on Youtube.
You can listen to them here.
Over time you will realise how he takes complex topics and arguments and converts them into simple narratives using storytelling techniques. I have benefitted a lot, both from his knowledge and communication skills. Maybe you will too.
Hope you enjoyed this edition of ‘win with stories’ newsletter.
One last request – forward this to friends and colleagues who’d find this story and the tips useful. If you received this email from someone and liked it, you can subscribe here.
