Storytelling can be used to persuade, motivate, and inspire in ways that cold facts, bullet points and directives can’t.
Annette Simmons, author of The Story Factor
When we started our business in 2005, the term ‘business storytelling’, or ‘organisational storytelling’, was nowhere to be seen. It was not bandied about on business websites, on blogs or in the media. It wasn’t even on Wikipedia. So we came up with our own definition:
Business storytelling is sharing a story about an experience, but linking it to a business message that will influence and inspire your audience into action.
Like traditional storytelling, business storytelling tells a story, but unlike traditional stories, business stories carry a message to connect, inspire and engage an audience.
In this chapter we will explore the difference between traditional storytelling and business storytelling. We will also look at how metaphors and analogies differ from stories.
A story about storytelling
The definition we gave earlier is one that we came up with and to demonstrate what we mean, we are going to tell you a story. After all, this wouldn’t be a book on storytelling if we didn’t! We will set up the context of the story before actually sharing the story.
The context
Michael Brandt was Regional Executive at National Australia Bank. Michael was responsible for 16 branches and in every team in every branch he had the same problem: his team members did not meet their ...
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