Corporate Storytelling: Sounds Good, But...

There's been a lot of talk about storytelling these last years. So I asked 30 senior managers of large, international companies about their storytelling practices. Folks who get paid to manage others and get stuff done in the hurly-burly of international business. What I learned surprised me: strategic stories are scarcely used in large international companies... Nestle, Dell, Pepsico, Dow Chemical, Cisco and UBS. Large international companies are contexts of logical argumentation.Management credibility comes from functional expertise and logical persuasion. Storytelling as easy to do badly, and very hard to get right. It requires time and effort, and the returns are seen as marginal. Stories are easily misunderstood by many of the various cultures in their audiences. The German VP worries that his Indian, Japanese, American and Costa Rican IT techies won't be engaged by his story, but rather put off. There is often organizational resistance to storytelling. Anti- or counter-stories flare up. Nevertheless, storytelling can be valuable, if done well. In some situations (change, new CEO, rallying the troops) more effectivel than the usual email, Power Point or other kinds of argumentation. A good way to engage the audience emotionally. Stories can boost influence. Stories build metaphors, spark visualization, engage the imagination on many levels, make abstract information more concrete. Stories generate action, make pedagogical points, enable indirect messaging, boost persuasive power and entertain. All managers can learn to tell passable strategic stories, so long as the teller accepts some rules: Strategic storytelling is a performance. A strategic story needs a clear, well-articulated purpose. The teller needs to be invested personally in the story, should believe it and be passionate about it. The teller has to be prepared, but not overly prepared. Practice is vital. Stories should be drawn from the world of large international companies, culled from personal experience. Stories do not need a traditional plot. They need a loose structure that orders events and has at least one character (which may be the company) experiencing events and acting on them. Stories must be short, relevant and offer a lesson. What's your experience?


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