In a world predicated on the unceasing transmission of hard data, good old-fashioned yarn spinning can add a new level of understanding.
By Kylie Hansen
Tell me a story
Yamini Naidu was driving along recently, listening to a radio item about the US sub-prime crisis and its global impact.
An economist by training, you'd expect that Naidu was fascinated by the report's onslaught of data. Rather, Naidu admits that what stayed with her were the metaphors the reporter used to describe the ripple or wave-like effect that the squeeze was having around the world.
Naidu believes that most people are just like her, you can throw copious amounts of facts and figures at us, but it is the stories and narrative examples that help us understand and retain knowledge.
This theory underpins the current rise in popularity of storytelling. In a world where data and logic form the basis of communication, a story can add a component of understanding and connection that statistics alone cannot achieve.
Naidu and business partner Gabrielle Dolan head one of Australia's leading organisational storytelling consultancies, One Thousand & One, where they teach business leaders not only how to tell a story properly, but when to use one.
You would think that narrative and storytelling would come naturally to most of us, and that it is hardly a skill we need to relearn. However, we are not talking traditional storytelling here. This sub-form is branded as 'organisational storytelling', and is very different from an imaginary narrative.
'There are three reasons why it is different,' Naidu says. 'There has to be a clear purpose as to why you are telling the story. Then the message must support your hard data. You are not throwing the data out, but in addition [to the data supplied] you are able to tell a story that gives people a way of making the data memorable. And finally stories have to be authentic. We advise never to make up stories, as the backlash is not worth it.' Still confused? As Naidu surmises, if data is your Batman, then your story is Robin.
Business education specialist Phill Boas is not convinced this is some massive change in direction. 'Stories are a high-quality way of passing on information, and are a learning tool we have always used,' says Boas, director of design and learning methods at Mount Eliza Executive Education, Melbourne Business School. 'It is just that we are getting a little more structured in terms of the way we use them, and [there is] a recognition of their use in a business world which is obsessed with quantitative explanations.'
This move towards an emphasis on different forms of communication in business is also part of a reappraisal of leadership characteristics. 'Our research shows us that today, emotional connection and personal credibility are number one when it comes to leadership,' Naidu says. 'You can, as a leader, use stories to fast-track trust and credibility.'
Woolworths is one company to have taken this on board. 'Woolworths has incorporated storytelling into leadership courses, as we believe that managers who are able to engage their people into action through authentic stories achieve far greater results then those that just factually tell people what to do,' says Estelle Olstein, Woolworths' HR manager - management and leadership learning.
Olstein says managers benefit from the newfound connection they have to their audiences. 'Managers who have attended [storytelling training] give us feedback that when they have used stories to make a point or illustrate the need for change they can actually see their audience making a far greater connection to their message,' she says.
Organisational storytelling emerged in the US in the 1990s. Several personalities have evolved as storytelling gurus, none more so than pioneer Steve Denning, an author, educator and consultant born and educated in Australia.
Denning began talking about storytelling as a useful tool after trying it himself during the 1990s when he was at the World Bank as program director of knowledge management.
His brief was to communicate the idea of knowledge management to staff and get them to understand and implement the policy. He tried many methods but nothing helped them understand or feel inspired.
In desperation he tried relating a story, and to his surprise, something just clicked among staff. From there, support for knowledge-management policy was widely embraced.
These days Denning runs a storytelling empire of his own, with international speaking engagements, consulting, writing and training forming the bulk of his work.
Along with Denning, two other US-based storytelling gurus have captured the business world's attention. Lori Silverman, author of Wake me up when the data is over: How organisations use stories to drive results, is also a speaker and consultant, and has worked with organisations as diverse as the US Chamber of Commerce, Wells Fargo, Univar Corporation and Rotary.
Annette Simmons has also written extensively on the topic, including Persuasion through the art of storytelling, consulting many companies including the Brookings Institute, PricewaterhouseCoopers, US Postal Service, Time Inc and the World Bank.
Back in Australia, Naidu says that when she set up shop in 2005, the concept was still very new and she realised she would have to spend the first six to 12 months simply educating the market. However, since then demand has grown. The focus of most of her work to date has been working with leadership groups. But the idea of storytelling has taken off to such an extent that sales teams and call centres are beginning to see its benefits. Naidu's clients have included AXA, ANZ, Woolworths, Shell New Zealand and the City of Melbourne.
The benefits of conveying a message this way sound well and good, but as some have discovered, not everyone is a natural storyteller. Naidu says this is where expert trainers like herself and Denning come into the equation. Her first message during training is that this approach goes well beyond pulling out a story for traditional presentations.
'It [storytelling] is something you use every day in your leadership challenges, not just in your presentations, but around the water cooler as well,' she says. 'With organisational storytelling we are creating a metaphor that people can connect with when we are trying to shift behaviour. We understand logic, but logic is not enough to get people to shift.'
In reality, the educative process begins with consultancy work to identify a company's issues. 'Then we do workshops, which is a very structured process, and we work on finding and constructing narratives and then ways to implement them,' Naidu says.
It is at the workshop stage where negative perceptions are challenged. Naidu deals with many clients who at first might have some concerns, such as whether it is unprofessional to take the unconventional approach, or are worried about the time it takes to recount a story.
After the workshops, a follow-up program works to help embed storytelling into an organisation's culture. There are also strategies put in place to help people keep their peers accountable and make sure that storytelling tools are being used.
Part of Denning's approach is to help people understand when storytelling can be used. He believes it can be a useful tool to help with training and education, M&A, strategic planning, individual growth, building trust and developing international relationships.
Aspects of storytelling have been adapted for use in programs at Melbourne Business School. The institutional banking and investment banking arm of National Australia Bank, nabCapital, has recently begun sending leaders to storytelling workshops with One Thousand & One.
Jim Stiliadis, nabCapital's head of corporate affairs, says that like any business, nabCapital wants staff at all levels to have a clear understanding of what's happening in the organisation. 'The move to take up storytelling workshops was about giving our people another way of articulating a message around an issue,' Stiliadis says. 'We are targeting it at our senior people, and we see communication as an important part of what it is to be a leader. We are not saying to our leaders that you need to use this form of communication on every occasion. It is about giving them something else to have in their back pocket to use where appropriate,' he says of the 100 or so senior leaders, from all nab's offices, who are involved. 'We've found really strong interest.'
Storytelling example one: Sales targets and brussels sprouts A sales manager was struggling to get his team to meet their sales targets. They had financial incentives if they met them, but even that was not working. The team members told the manager they knew their targets and what they were, but it was the part of the job they most hated.
The manager attended a seminar run by One Thousand & One and started telling a story about how as a young boy he disliked eating brussels sprouts, and would always push them to the side of the plate even though he knew his mother would insist that he eat them. He would inevitably end up eating cold brussels sprouts at the end of his meal. One night he decided to eat them first and get them out the way. He was then able to go on and enjoy the rest of his meal. Encouraged to recount his story to staff, he did so, travelling around his branches explaining how sales targets were their own 'brussels sprouts', and unpleasant as they were, it was best to deal with them early and fast. He had a great response, and now his sales team even talk about their sales leads as 'brussels sprouts'.
Storytelling example two: The war for talent One woman enjoyed going to the football each week. However, she wasn't very tall, and found she often couldn't see the action. So one week she decided to take a milk crate along to stand on. It worked brilliantly and for a couple of weeks she had a fabulous view. That was until everyone else thought it was a good idea as well, and brought along their own. The woman recounted the story during a workshop with the One Thousand & One team, and with milk crate in hand, she said the story illustrates how we constantly have to look for the next 'milk crate'. She uses the idea in business to explain why companies have to always be on the lookout for the next big thing in order to win the war for talent.
