Most of us in the evening MBA program are knowledge workers. We don’t work with our hands, we don’t physically produce goods, we either create, analyze or transfer knowledge. Transferring knowledge from one person to another is the most challenging, because no two people think in the exact same way, but also the most important, because it is what drives change. Whether its giving a presentation, writing an important email, or having a tough conversation, my instinct is to fall back on my engineering background and rely on data and facts – and more often then not, doing this doesn’t inspire action.
The Harvard Business Review conducted an interview with screenwriting coach Robert McKee called “Storytelling That Moves People.” In the interview, McKee talks about how storytelling is a crucial skill for business leaders to be able to motivate their coworkers, customers and partners to navigate through business challenges. McKee describes two types of storytelling that business leaders use. The first uses conventional rhetoric and statistics, which, if successful, persuades people only on an intellectual level, which doesn’t inspire people to act. The second method of storytelling is to unite an idea with an emotion to persuade people on an emotional level and get them to act.
In the conversation, McKee describes the most difficult part of effective emotional persuasion through story-telling: discussing the struggle. We all have a tendency, especially at work, to paint a rosy picture. We want to be viewed as always succeeding, always in control, and always right. McKee argues that story without a struggle doesn’t inspire because it doesn’t connect people on an emotional level about the challenges we all face. To be a good storyteller, according to McKee, “you want to display the struggle between expectation and reality in all its nastiness.” McKee goes further to say that “the energy to live comes from the dark side…as we struggle against these negative powers, we’re forced to live more deeply, more fully.”
As an engineer working for a marketing company, the most difficult part of my job is persuading others to act while not falling back on data and statistics, and not painting a rosy picture. Even though its challenging, telling stories that include a struggle has a tendency to unite people as they think about adversity in their own jobs, which usually causes them to rally around your goals.
As McKee says in the article, being a great storyteller alone won’t make you a great leader, but it is a skill that will help make you a better leader and help you to inspire action in others. You can access the article through the Goizueta Business Library website, through the “Business Source Complete” database (search “Storytelling That Moves People”).
Source:
Fryer B. Storytelling That Moves People. Harvard Business Review [serial online]. June 2003;81(6):51-55. Available from: Business Source Complete, Ipswich, MA. Accessed July 12, 2014.