See a photo of Karen, her bio, Part 1 of this Q&A, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

Q&A with Karen Dietz, Question 7:

Q: What do you feel is organizations’ greatest obstacle in trying to get their message across, and how can story help?

A: Well, I think the greatest obstacle organizations face in getting their message across is the reliance on PowerPoint. According to Presentations Magazine, 30 million are created every day! PowerPoint is basically designed to convey information. Based on my regular exposure to these kinds of presentations, most are terribly dull. Storytelling is about engaging the hearts and minds of people and in business, moving them to action. Imagine trying to tell your organization’s story, or your project’s story, or your team’s story effectively by only using PowerPoint. Imagine trying to squeeze complex concepts and inspiration into a PowerPoint page. Remember the last presentation you heard and they read facts, figures and information off the screen? Ugh! Storytelling is 100 times more powerful and engaging. Electronic presentations are not all bad, and stories can be used in those types of presentations. But it does take some training in how to meld storytelling and PowerPoint together to create a powerful program.

The other obstacle I see that many leaders face is not knowing the right story to tell at the right time. For example, I’ve heard leaders tell again and again and again the story about why the organization needs to change. But people have already gotten that message and are past that. They are ready to be inspired about how the change has already begun and the progress that’s being made.

To sum up my philosophy about storytelling is a quote from author Flannery O’Connor in Mystery and Manners: “There is a certain embarrassment about being a storyteller in these times when stories are considered not quite as satisfying as statements and statements not quite as satisfying as statistics; but in the long run, a people is known, not by its statements or its statistics, but by the stories it tells.”

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

On Tuesday, I noted that SlideShare’s “Tell-a-Story” slide presentation contest had closed, and results were in the hands of the judges.

The SlideShare folks had identified three of their own favorites, only one of which, The Short Story of Drunkenomics, I felt was actually a story.

I’m pleased that the judges recognized the storytelling capacity of Drunkenomics and awarded the presentation the contest’s $5,000 grand prize.

Other prizes went to:

• The comic-book-like Super Cool Dudes for Best Design. Cute story. I wondering in what context this presentation would be used.
• The well-done The Story of H. won for Best Storytelling (embedded below). Compelling, visually excellent, and carrying an important message, this story may not have a beginning, middle, and end — especially an end.
• Let’s Talk Poverty, which starts off well but then devolves into a typical fact-filled PowerPoint, for Most Popular. (What does that mean? Most popular with SlideShare visitors?). Really no story here, though the presentation supports a great cause.
• Preview of a new graphic novel adventure, White Shaka, for best use of multimedia. Really? Good storytelling here, but incomplete, since as stated, this is a preview of a graphic novel. What made this such good use of multimedia — the distracting rap music in the background? The hard-to-read comic-book balloons?

I can’t say I am in love with any of these winners. I do think The Short Story of Drunkenomics was the best choice for the top prize based on what I’ve seen.

I wonder if the 30-slide limit is a problem for storytelling?

I’m thrilled to see this spotlight on storytelling in presentations, but I’m betting slideshows that tell good stories will evolve into even better examples than these contest winners.

Your thoughts?

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

See a photo of Karen, her bio, Part 1 of this Q&A, Part 2, and Part 3.

Q&A with Karen Dietz, Question 6:

Q: If you could share just one piece of advice or wisdom about story/storytelling/narrative with readers, what would it be?

A: When telling stories, ask yourself “What am I giving others?” and “What am I giving myself?” An answer to both questions provides volumes of information about how you hope to connect with the audience, and what meaning the stories have for you personally. Knowing both is essential to mastering storytelling, in my humble opinion.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

As reported on Confessions of a Technophile, researchers from Japan’s prestigious Waseda University and the Shanghai Jiaotong University in China have jointly developed a robot capable of reading out stories from printed books.

Called Ninomiyakun, the aluminum-made robot is 1-meter tall and weighs 25kg. It comes with a built-in camera and a computer that can recognize 2,300 Japanese characters (Hiragana, Katakana and Kanji) commonly known to a Japanese elementary school student. A character recognition software is used to translated text into spoken words, which are produced by a voice synthesizer.

Kamada Seiitirou, the professor who co-developed the robot, told the Yomiuri Shimbun that in future, Ninomiyakun will be enhanced to tell stories with emotions.

I can’t help thinking of Sean Buvala and his definition of story, which includes the requirement for “an audience in front of the teller which can be one person or thousands.” OK, the audience needs to consist of people, but does the storyteller have to be a person (!!??).

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

See a photo of Karen, her bio, Part 1 of this Q&A, and Part 2.

Q&A with Karen Dietz, Question 5:

Q: What future trends or directions do you foresee for story/storytelling/narrative? What’s next for the discipline?

A: I think there are multiple events on the horizon for the discipline: a greater focus on ethics and quality; an improved skill base; and more knowledge sharing among story professionals. I also see organizational story work moving into becoming a core competence for organizations. Today it is seen too often as a mere tool, which is severely limiting and does not recognize storytelling as fundamental to an organization’s success. I would like to think that organizations are starting to realize that mastering stories and storytelling is a core competence to their business growth and operations. Personally, my passion is training leaders to become compelling storytellers as an essential leadership and influence skill. Coaching — workshops — I love it!

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

See a photo of Karen, her bio, and Part 1 of this Q&A.

Q&A with Karen Dietz, Question 3 and 4:

Q: How important is it to you and your work to function within the framework of a particular definition of “story?” (i.e., What is a story?) What definition do you espouse?

A: My definition of a story, adapted from my artist friend Peggy VanPelt along with author David Hutchens, is “an act of communication illustrating interconnections between characters, ideas, events, and even abstract concepts that provide people with packets of sensory material allowing them to quickly and easily internalize the material, comprehend it, and create meaning from it.” Notice there’s no mention of story structure (beginning, middle, end) or story arc (current state, transition, problem, resolution, conclusion). That’s because stories come in all shapes and sizes. Stories, particularly in their oral telling, shift and change to fit the context, audience, intent and a whole host of other factors. So stories and storytelling is malleable. I believe oral storytelling is the most impactful. But it really depends on the context/situation as to which story structure to use, which story elements, how to work the story arc, and which media to employ. By media I mean whether it’s written, on a CD or in video format. While oral storytelling is the gold standard, for me, other media are sometimes necessary, although there are always pluses and minuses to each type of media. The questions to ask someone wanting to effectively use stories/storytelling in an organization, is “What am I trying to do? What outcome am I trying to obtain? What kind of story/stories do we need to tell and in what media in order to reach our objectives?”

Q: Are there any current uses of storytelling that repel you or that you feel are inappropriate?

A: Storytelling has immense power to both heal and harm. It bothers me to no end that as a profession, we aren’t actively discussing examples of great organizational story work, and those that are deficient or abysmal. What passes for organizational stories/storytelling in a lot of cases is just pure junk. It’s terrible. Too many people treat stories and storytelling many times as if it is trivial, instead of immensely powerful. People with no or very little training think they can effectively work with stories and storytelling in an organization, which creates only mediocre results, I’m afraid. And we rarely talk about the dark side of story — those times when stories are deliberately used to harm and destroy others.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

A few weeks ago, I noted that SlideShare was holding a tell-a-story slideshow contest.

Entries are now closed and in the judges’ hands, but the folks at SlideShare noted they had some favorite entrants and gave links to three of them.

I hope the judges have a better sense of story than the SlideShare folks do.

The only one of the three that I felt was really a story is the one embedded below, The Short Story of Drunkenomics. I don’t happen to support its message, but it tells its story without narration and with minimal type on the slides.

I don’t really get the message of the second one, The Small & Big of It. It barely tells a story, in my opinion. It has a soundtrack, but it’s music rather than narration.

The third one, Creative Thinking: Your Edge, while a lovely slideshow, comes nowhere close to being a story.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

I first encountered Karen Dietz while working on my dissertation and have eagerly followed her work ever since. It is a true thrill and privilege to present her Q&A here. This Q&A will appear over the next five days.

Bio (from her Polaris Associates Web site): Karen Dietz, PhD., owner of Polaris Associates Consulting, Inc., works with leaders and executive teams who want to assemble and cultivate their most compelling stories, and tell them in ways that produces results. Her background in the diverse fields of folklore, creativity, strategy, organizational development, high performance teams, and interpersonal communication have allowed her to develop targeted approaches to executive storytelling and organizational narratives. As a coach, facilitator and storyteller, her clients have included Walt Disney Imagineering, Chase Manhattan Bank, City of Santa Monica, and Avery Dennison.

Karen draws on her experience in top-flight organizations to provide practical experience, guidance, and tools that can be put to work immediately.

Karen received her doctorate in Folklore from the University of Pennsylvania and is the former Executive Director of the National Storytelling Network. She is a member of the National Communication Association, Organizational Development Network, the National Storytelling Network, an online organizational narrative community of practice Worldwide Story Work, the past president and former program chair of the Storytelling In Organizations Special Interest Group. Karen is also a certified coach in Vocal Awareness techniques, and is one of the few in the field of stories and organizations bringing together story and vocal skills for greater effectiveness. In addition, her personality type reports for work environments are popular and sold worldwide

In her own words: “With a PhD in Folklore, I’ve always been engaged with stories. When I moved from academics into business training and consulting, I was always listening for, working with, analyzing, and retelling stories as a part of my team building, org change, and leadership engagements.

“In working with senior executives and organizational change, I repeatedly saw how if a leader could tell a compelling story about what change needed to happen, and why, the chance of the initiative succeeding was great. If they could not tell a compelling story about it, I could guarantee the initiative would fail. Why waste all that money doing a year’s worth of research, recommendations, plans and action steps when it could all go so easily down the drain in just a few moments?

“In 2000 I decided to shift my business to working with senior executives, organizations, and their stories so they could stop wasting buckets of money. And be more effective!

“Over the decades, as a professional storyteller, I’ve been trained by some of the best performance storytellers in the nation.

“My goals for leaders are to increase their effectiveness, be compelling, capture the hearts and minds of people, and save money.

“My goals for organizations is to crystallize their identity through compelling stories, be more effective in both internal and external communication, produce bottom-line measurable results, and increase their profits.”

Q&A with Karen Dietz, Questions 1 and 2:

Q: You offer a workshop described this way: “For the past 20 years, a complete cycle of stories has been slowly dying while a new cycle of stories is rapidly growing. Understand where our culture is heading and how these changes in story impact your product/service, marketing and sales strategies.” I’m sure you could write volumes about this story cycle, but if you can summarize briefly, please tell readers the cause of this cycling of stories and a few key characteristics of the new cycle of stories.

A: I’ve changed my thoughts on this statement, somewhat. I am now focusing on the mono-myth of the hero and how inadequate it is today to meet our needs as a human race. Of course, the hero story will always be present. But today almost all of what we do has been reduced to the hero’s story or journey. Not everything we do is heroic, and there are plenty of other journeys than the hero’s. In fact, when I work with leaders, I talk about how the hero story that they’ve grown up with in an organization needs to be replaced by the magician’s story and journey. The hero’s journey is a story of an individual. The magician’s journey is the story of a community. It’s based in building community, telling and sharing stories of community in order to reach a goal. At some point, every manager has to put away the hero’s story of an individual making it happen. Instead, they need to become a leader who, as a magician, facilitates organizational change. I could write volumes on this topic, and it’s only in the last few years that I’ve started to share some of my thinking about this.

On the story cycle: Why are we so steeped in the hero’s journey? I wish I knew. Organizational story professional Richard Stone talked many years ago about the “de-storification” of our culture. You can see it all the time in the formulaic movies Hollywood produces. And you can see it when the news media scrambles to identify a lone hero when in fact the story is about several heroes or a community of heroes. Where are the trickster tales? Where are the stories of community? Where are the king or queen stories? Where are the crone stories? I could go on. So as a storyteller, I am always asking myself, “What are the stories that are not being told that people might need to hear?” and “What different kinds of stories do I need to listen for?” I find those to be much more provocative questions that helps shape my work as coach, consultant, trainer, and storyteller.

Q: How did you initially become involved with story/storytelling/narrative? What attracted you to this field? What do you love about it?

A: I initially became involved in storytelling through graduate school where I was receiving my doctorate in Folklore & Folklife from the University of Pennsylvania. I was exposed to storytelling as an academic subject, but it really made an impact on me when I got to know storyteller Ron Evans from Canada. As the keeper of the sacred stories for his tribe (Chippewa/Cree), he taught me the power of oral storytelling, and I learned the most about stories and storytelling from him. His lessons about the care and feeding of stories I still carry with me today, and I do my best to pass along what he taught me.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

What struck me the most about President Obama’s recent televised town-hall meeting on healthcare was that when he asked the gathering of some 160 people of all political persuasions if any of them felt the healthcare system is fine the way it is, not a single one raised a hand.

Over the past few weeks, the administration has collected hundreds of thousands of stories about just how messed up the healthcare system is.

I have read many of these stories and find them a mix of poignant, heartbreaking, and enraging. There are also stories of people who have lived in countries where healthcare is accessible and affordable.

Disagreement about how to solve the healthcare problem is rampant, but when you read these stories, you know that America must fix healthcare.

I am convinced that we will get it done this time.

The fact that the administration is using stories to make the case gives me even more hope.

The healthcare story site is still collecting stories. Tell yours today.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Don’t know how I managed to miss this post from Shawn Callahan of Anecdote from January of this year since storytelling in the job search is my “thing.”

Shawn suggests several excellent ways to find stories you can use in your job search, especially in interviews:

• Draw a timeline of your career with significant events and your feelings about them.
• Recount remembered events out loud to yourself, or someone else. (I would advise framing the events as accomplishments.) If you write down the events, avoid recounting them the way you’ve written it because they will sound unnatural, Shawn says.
• Look at random images to see if they jog your memory about other professional experiences.
• Listen to the stories of others. “Make notes about any anecdote that springs to mind about your own experiences at work focusing on the ones that set you apart,” Shawn advises.
• Always carry a story notebook to jot them down because memories may creep up on you by surprise, and, Shawn says, “I will guarantee you will forget it instantly if you don’t either write it down of have the opportunity to tell the story a couple of times.”

Now, for ways to polish your ability to tell these stories in interviews, Shawn advises:

• Practicing stories, which will most likely at first sound “rambling and, quite frankly, boring.” If you tell the stories to others, you’ll learn what to edit out based on their responses — “facial expressions, comments.”
• Be specific and avoid generalizations. … The story has to about a specific individual (you!) “trying to achieve something, ideally with some obstacle that [you] eventually overcame.”
• Help people visualize what’s happening. “The best stories are ones that the listener can picture vividly in their mind’s eye,” Shawn says.

Shawn says to aim for about a dozen stories you can tell in interviews. Although I have found that a stockpile of as few as five stories can be adapted in response to most interview questions, I advise shooting for a goal of about 20.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Thought it would be nice to have a daily lit quote as an entry:

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

I’m excited to announce a new project, a downloadable PDF e-book, Storied Careers: 40+ Story Practitioners Talk About Applied Storytelling, which will compile all the Q&As with story gurus that have appeared in A Storied Career since the series began last September.

Rather than simply repeat all the Q&As as they appeared here, I will arrange them by topic; for example, all the responses to my question about defining story will appear together. Bios, photos, and contact information for all Q&A participants will appear in the back of the book.

This free e-book will feature Molly Catron, Jessica Lipnack, Terrence Gargiulo, Jon Hansen, Svend-Erik Engh (pending permission), Loren Niemi, Gabrielle Dolan, John Caddell, Shawn Callahan, Stephanie West Allen, Madelyn Blair, David Vanadia, Tom Clifford, Sharon Lippincott, Ardath Albee, Sharon Benjamin,Carol Mon, Ron Donaldson, Cynthia Kurtz, Annette Simmons, Karen Gilliam, Michael Margolis, Corey Blake, Susan Luke, Mike Wittenstein, Cathie Dodd, Sarah White, Chris Benevich, Karen Johnson, Jon Buscall, Thaler Pekar, Lori Silverman, Casey Hibbard, Katie Snapp, Rob Sullivan, Andree Iffrig, Whitney Quesenbery, Sean Buvala, Stephane Dangel, Karen Dietz, and probably a few others who have promised Q&As that I don’t have in hand yet.

Estimated release: By end of summer, but I hope sooner.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Here are some interesting sites I’ve come across recently that offer story collections. Some solicit stories from the public.

• Fear.less collects stories about people who have overcome heir fears. From the site: “fear.less is a movement borne from our right to live without fear. It’s where human potential meets the courage to act. Every story you read is an example of conquering fear, whether an immediate physical danger, the looming threat of failure, the pressure to compete in a changing world, the incessant quest for identity, or the overwhelming uncertainty of death.”
• The Maine Women’s Fund offers inspiring stories of women making change happen. From the site: “Each month, the Maine Women’s Fund recognizes and celebrates women and girls who are making positive change happen in their lives, their communities and in Maine. Through Making Change Happen: Women Creating a Better Maine profiles, we share the stories of bold women who are building businesses, nurturing families, teaching young people, leading industries and strengthening communities.” The stories download as attractively designed PDF files and serve as an excellent model for any organization seeking to spotlight people’s stories.
• Place + Memory is “recreating places that no longer exist. Places that were important to us. we are creating a series of stories for radio and an online map where you’ll be able to add your own memories through text, photos, sound, whatever.” Categories of places for which stories are sought include Where We Shop & Dine, That’s Entertainment, In The Neighborhood, Where Things Grow, The Natural World, Institutional Life, Byways, Gathering Places, Landmarks, Where We Work, and No Place Like Home. If I were submitting a story, it might be about the Peter Pan Bakery in my hometown, Moorestown, NJ. This best-bakery-ever, which closed last year, made out-of-this-world cream donuts. I learned just yesterday that my sister’s best friend has two of these donuts in her freezer. I would kill for one of those! Of course, given that the series is for radio, it would be hard to capture the most distinctive sensory aspect of Peter Pan — the amazing smell!
• Here’s a great idea for nonprofits: The Michigan Nonprofit Association has a Nonprofit Storybank, a collection of articles “that prove the impact of our sector on the lives of individuals. By submitting your story through the following form, you can easily outreach to a broad audience who is interested in the diverse human interest stories of our members, and help to advance your organization’s mission.”
• Tea Cart Stories require audiences to experience them at a certain place and time, in this case, the Lower East Side in New York City. Reports the blog The Food Section: Tea Cart Stories is “an interactive public art exhibition exploring tea as a locus of tradition, memory, and culture. Artist Michele Brody will set up a tea cart … and invite guests inside to share family stories and experiences dealing with tea. Brody will record and transcribe the stories on paper tea bags steeped in tea leaves which will then be displayed on a structure made of copper pipes installed on an early 20th century pushcart.” Story-gathering takes lace at certain times during the month. Here’s a different incarnation from 2007. (Thanks to Thaler Pekar for telling me about this one.)
• I’ve written here before both about science stories and The Moth. A convergence of the two in which The Moth sponsored an evening of science stories told in Moth style with Moth rules mostly exists as a moment in time, although at least one story exists on video (see below). The site The Scientist had this to say: “Science is a story — a story about ideas, but also a story about the remarkable people who devote their lives to unraveling the wonders of nature. Scientists themselves, however, rarely have a vessel to impart their personal wisdoms since the main outlet for scientific research — peer-reviewed literature — is typically devoid of narrative. … at the World Science Festival in New York City[,] two Nobel Laureates, two neurobiologists, and two writers poured their hearts out to a packed room of showgoers at an event called Matter: Stories of Atoms and Eves, which was sponsored by The Moth, a nonprofit group that hosts storytelling slams. In keeping with The Moth’s traditions, each story of the event had to be true, short, and told without notes.” The stories sound fascinating. The most significant aspect of this event, to me anyway, was the “rapt audience,” as The Scientist described it. Compare this way of reporting about science to the dry papers presented at conferences.

Two final sites deal with fiction. Although I don’t focus on fiction much in A Storied Career, I spotlight these sites because of their interesting approaches.

• Her Side is a “multimedia fiction project conceived by author Mur Lafferty and photographer J.R. Blackwell. Mur Lafferty’s narrative leads the reader through a story of violence, love and self discovery as J.R. Blackwell’s photography illuminates the unspoken elements of the story. Together, they combine two different storytelling methods to tell one story.”
• Sniplits MP3 audio short stories run from under a minute to about an hour. “They are professionally narrated and produced as MP3 files, so you can download them just like you download music,” the site says.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Sometimes when I see art or photography described as great storytelling, I wonder if I’m supposed to see a really obvious story that everyone else sees.

More fruitful, I think, is to imagine one’s own story to go with each image.

There’s plenty of fodder in two sets of photos on the theme “Trouble in Paradise” by Christoph Martin Schmid. One set is labeled “Day,” the other, “Night.”

In fact, one of my favorite storytelling activities is to use an image or set of images as a story prompt. Without considering artistic intent, I like to conjure my own story for each image.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

How about $5,160 in New Zealand dollars, which is $3,296.55 in US dollars?

Much is written about storytelling in marketing and selling. It has been a while since I’ve seen such a profound example of how this kind of storytelling works.

“mikew4” in Auckland was selling a washing machine on a New Zealand eBay-like auction site. The bid reserve amount was a mere $1. He wrote an absolutely hilarious ad for the washer. His listing provoked 89 pages of comments when printed out (and I know because I inadvertently printed all 89 pages).

Since the washer sold, and the listing may be removed (and thus above link will be no good), I’ve pasted the text of the ad below. Although only one little piece could be considered a beginning-middle-end story, “mikew4” certainly knew how to make his product so legendary that the machine sold for far more than it would have been worth even new and without all its flaws.

The ad:

Old mid 80’s Fisher and Paykel top loader.

Goes like a rocket!

By ‘goes like a rocket’ I actually mean that literally.

It actually shakes the house.

It’s the loudest most violent sounding washing machine I have ever encountered.

It makes guests scared and children cry. I’ve lived with it like that for almost a year and it still scares me.

Once while washing a load of towells it got a bit out of balance and it got so out of control for a minute that I swear I actually saw a porthole to another dimension open above it just for a second, there were dinosaurs on the otherside and they looked scared too, it almost sucked me in but I held onto for my life to the deepfreeze. It sucked my shoes and pants off though and it got the iron as well which pissed me off because it was quite a good one. Luckily it sucked it’s own power cord out of the wall and stopped before the whole house went in.

I drew a picture of the dinosaurs i saw incase people didn’t believe me, they are partly red because my green felt ran out half way through.

I think it would be good to paint it matt black and put steel spikes all over it and draw demons on the front, however I have added an image of another possible customization option for people who like horses.

On heavy duty spin cycle it sort of sounds a bit like the tortured howls of 1000 undead writhing in the sulphury pits of hell mixed with a train with carriages full of scrap iron sliding down the road with no wheels, on fire, into a bell factory.

Thankfully it’s bite is not as bad as it’s bark. It washes fine, completes cycles, does everything it’s supposed to.

It leaks a bit when it’s running, always has.

Its a bit grubby, could do with a wipe down, I refuse to touch it because I’m still getting over the whole dinosaur scare thing.

If your in a fix and need a cheap washing machine and are either completely deaf or hate your neighbours this baby is for you.

$1 reserve, pick up only, Waterview Auckland.

Selling to pay for my counseling.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

One of the special delights of this Q&A series is its international flavor. We’ve had Q&As from the UK, Canada, Denmark, Australia, Sweden (by way of UK) — have I missed any? — and now France. Stephane Dangel almost single-handedly upholds organizational storytelling in France and builds bridges from there to the worldwide storytelling community. Here is my Q&A with him.

Bio: Stephane Dangel has a background in political science, journalism, and communications. His interest in storytelling has derived from these activities, and he defines now himself as a “storytelling activist,” since organizational storytelling is still an emergent discipline in his country, France.

He has created the blog Storytelling which includes posts both in French and in English. Stephane teaches storytelling in business schools, is involved in projects dealing with the co-creation of stories within various environments, and is a keynote speaker in storytelling.

He’s also a writer; his forthcoming (fall 2009) book (in French) is Rires Post-mortem. It’s about stories — a collection of real-life events throughout the world and related to burials, coffins also. The pattern is that they are all funny stories.

Q: The storytelling movement seems to be growing explosively. Why now? What is it about this moment in human history and culture that makes storytelling so resonant with so many people right now?

A: We hear a lot about “narrative turn.” I don’t see storytelling as a turn, but as a story “to be continued.” Organizational storytelling is a modern form of the very ancient art of storytelling, adapted to contemporary needs. Storytelling is not a revolution, it has accompanied evolutions. As Robert McKee says, “stories are the currency of human relationships,” basically.

Marketing, management, and other disciplines integrate some structured narrative dimension because the focus is now on these disciplines as the focus was in bartering (with a strong narrative dimension) yesterday when bartering was the way things were going on in the world. So it’s somewhat natural.

Another dimension is related to “the quest for sense.” We hear a lot about the lack of sense. I think it’s more a lack of sense quest, because sense quest is complex and time spending. As storytelling is already deeply anchored into each of us, it’s a relatively low-cost solution to engage on sense quest. So it’s a solution for lazy people, but lazy, that’s what we are all, and it’s not negative. A problem occurs when corporations are extremely lazy, so they only grab and arrange stories in a database, instead of pursuing the quest till the patterns-finding stage.

Q: Are there any current uses of storytelling that repel you or that you feel are inappropriate?

A: Not everything is storytelling, but storytelling is able to be integrated in almost everything.

What I see, especially in France , is that some users in the political area have written the screenplay of a soap, and they even have already shot season 1, 2, 3, and more in advance. How could such a practice operate within an ever-changing world? It doesn’t fit the very basics of storytelling requirements. It’s like displaying, say today, an episode of a soap featuring Saddam Hussein, head of Iraq, as if he was still there. Irrelevant and ridiculous.

A: Here is the full (and long) story:

In the winter of 1954 in Paris, there was a man named Abbot Peter (Abbé Pierre) [pictured]. He was willing to launch some initiatives to help poor people, but nobody cared about that unknown guy. At this time, you got very low, minus temperatures in Paris. Abbot Peter managed to convince the biggest radio network to let him address a message to the population. So 20 millions French (half of the population) heard the message while being around the table for dinner.

Here are some excerpts from the message:

A woman has just died tonight, frozen, on the sidewalk of Boulevard Sebastopol in Paris. She was keeping in hand the paper by which she was expelled from her home two days ago. Each night, there are 2,000 persons who have no home, no bread to eat, some almost naked.

They need your help. In each Parisian borough, in each French town, boards have to be put under a light in the night, in front of houses where you can read. You, who suffer, whoever you are, come and sleep, eat, regain hope, here we love you. Weather channels announce terrible freezes for the next weeks. Thank you.

The most interesting fact is not that barely he had finished to address the message people began to act and help those poor people with great success, but the wave of collective innovation that followed after that emergency need for help.

While some weeks before, the government refused to take money to build homes for poor, this single story was sufficient to trigger what will be called “the revolution of Good,” whose actors were an anonymous team constituted by people from the whole country, who didn’t know each other but were united by the same spirit. The days following the radio message, money could be collected, people joined Abbot Peter, acting as a team. As a result, several organizations were created — an association called Emmaüs, a sub-division dedicated to the building of low-wages houses, the first non-profit organization dedicated to the defense of tenants, the creation of communities for homeless people where they could find a roof and a job (collecting old objects and reselling them)…

The Emmaüs organization still exists (Abbot Peter is now dead) and has an international scope, spreading in a lot of countries wolrdwide.

A: The “storytelling community in France” is for the moment… a fiction. We are only two bloggers running a blog dedicated to storytelling! There is only one and major book dedicated to storytelling in French, and it has been written by a man who hates storytelling (Christian Salmon: Storytelling)! His message is very raw: “storytelling = fiction = manipulation.”

So, building the storytelling community is a big task, trying to educate people who don’t have the patience to read all the wonderful available resources in English, and reinsuring those who are tempted by storytelling but express doubts since they are hearing such “negative mess.”

I also see French focusing on marketing uses, knowing few about the analytical potentiality. This is also a real issue.

But we cannot let a guy like Christian Salmon establish himself as The Voice about storytelling in France, seeing the ideas he tries to infuse.

A: What I wanted to do is to prove that even an under-developed country (in the storytelling field), could contribute to the worldwide storytelling community. I’ve also launched the first Digg-like [site] dedicated to storytelling. I need to take care of it because after some good start, it has somewhat faded; I didn’t give enough time to it.

I’m working on a method to elicit stories within conflictual situations and contexts which I’ve called “The I forgive…” method. I’ve already released a paper about it. I’m currently refining it, getting some advice especially from Cynthia Kurtz. I will release a completely new, expanded version as a chapter of a collective book to be released by mid-2010.

What I expect from these initiatives is a reverse, boomerang-like effect in France, in addition to the somewhat “frontal attack” I’m implementing.

In addition, I’m working on some projects to organize training sessions in France, with trainers coming from the “expert countries,” hat is to say the anglo-saxon ones — sessions conducted by renowned storytelling consultants are good tools to expand storytelling in the country.

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Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Down at the bottom of my sidebar, I have a large widget under the heading “Storytelling Books.” A few notes about these books… They fall basically into these three categories:

1. Books about storytelling, primarily applied forms of storytelling, such as storytelling for healing, organizational storytelling/business narrative, and storytelling in career and job search.
2. Storytelling how-tos, such as how to journal, how to craft your life story, how to do digital storytelling, how to use stories in presentations, and how to use stories in training and communication
3. Books that are told primarily in stories, including entire books that are a story or fable, such as Peter Weddle’s Recognizing Richard Rabbit and the business novel Edge by Corey Blake et al, as well as collections of true stories on similar themes: how people got their jobs, interesting careers people have, how people escaped from corporate America, stories of marriages, workplace stories, stories of the Great Depression, stories of science, and stories about values.

The other thing I need to say about these books is that most of them are not exactly recommendations because … I confess that I haven’t read most of them. Yes, I’ve read some and can heartily recommend them. The books are on the sidebar because I have come across them while researching entries for A Storied Career. I own many of them.

But I am a slow reader to the point where my deficiency in reading speed is almost a learning disability. I once took a speed-reading class in which I discovered that I didn’t really want to read faster. I will confess, however, that my slow reading has been problematic — in graduate school for example. I have also developed a pattern of reading myself to sleep, so anytime I read, my body starts to think it’s sleepytime.

This summer, I’ve made a commitment to read a good chunk of the books on my sidebar. I just finished the book I was writing (I think I write books faster than I read them), so I have a bit more time.

My first selection was The Spirituality of Imperfection: Storytelling and the Search for Meaning, which I had come across multiple times in research for this blog. I had seen it mentioned in both storytelling circles and addiction-recovery circles. Both are directly relevant to me because I am a 26-years-sober recovering alcoholic.

The Spirituality of Imperfection by Ernest Kurtz and Katherine Ketcham essentially embodies the spirituality of 12-step groups, particularly Alcoholics Anonymous. I did not use AA in my recovery; I quit drinking cold-turkey. But this book made me realize how important storytelling is for recovery and made me long for a 12-step group even after being sober for more than twice as long as the 10-year period during which I was drinking.

It’s a beautiful, gentle, inspiring book. At first I was puzzled about where the storytelling element was even though the book is full of illustrative stories.

At this point, it occurs to me that this entry is getting kind of long. I want to share with you some of the storytelling wisdom of The Spirituality of Imperfection and thus, the sharing continues in the next entry.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Continuing my post about the wonderful book, The Spirituality of Imperfection …

It was on page 63 that I finally began to understand the book’s subtitle: Storytelling and the Search for Meaning. I want to share with you some of what the book says about storytelling and how important stories are for sharing our common humanity and imperfections. Here are some passages from The Spirituality of Imperfection:

Listen! Listen to stories. For what stories do, above all else, is hold up a mirror so that we can see ourselves. Stories are mirrors of human be-ing, reflecting back our very essence. In a story, we come to know precisely the both/and, mixed-up-ed-ness of our very being. In the mirror of another’s story, we can discover our tragedy and our comedy — and therefore our very human-ness.

The stories that sustain a spirituality of imperfection are wisdom stories. They follow a temporal format, describing “what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now.” Such stories, however, can do more: The sequential format makes it possible for other people’s stories to become part of “my” story. Sometimes, for example, hearing another person;’s story can occasion profound change. Telling the story of that change then follows the format of telling a story within my story: “Once upon a time, I did not understand this very well, but then I heard this story, and now I understand it very differently.”

When a [person] comes to you and tell you your own story, you know that your sins are forgiven. And when you are forgiven, you are healed.

Stories help us attend. And “attending” in a setting of storytelling and storylistening, helps us to remember… “Memory” is communal.” Thus, although a spirituality of imperfection insists, “Pay attention to yourself,” such attending is not self-centered self-seeking but an awareness of oneself as related to others, as a member of a community.

Spirituality’s long-standing connection to story and storytelling ensures that we will never be alone in the spiritual way of life. For whenever and wherever there is a storyteller, there will also be a storyhearer. In the communal act of telling and listening, listening and telling, the sense of belonging begins.

If we would listen, we must also tell; and if we would tell our stories, we need places where we can tell and listen.

It is … a human truth that we are able to listen only when we know that in time. we will be able to tell our own story. Perhaps the main benefit of thr storytelling format … is that it invites, enables, and teaches listening. When we are able to tell our storied, when we are urged to stand up and tell them, we learn respect for other people’s stories and for the need to tell them. The practice of telling stories gives birth to good listeners.

… Community is where we can learn and practice storytelling and its virtues.

That [sober alcoholic] way of life, [early AA members] discovered, could be learned and taught only through the process of telling stories — stories that disclose in a general way what we used to be like, what happened, and what we are like now.

Discovering a new “map” through storytelling:

When newcomers to Alcoholics Anonymous become immersed in storytelling and storylistening, they begin to see the form and outline of a new map, which details where they are, and how they got there, and — most importantly — the way to get where they want to go. … Through the practice of hearing and telling stories, we discover and slowly learn to use a new “map,” a map that is more “right” because it is more useful for our purpose. … what happens in the remapping of storylistening and storytelling is that in telling our own story, we come to own the story that we tell.

At times … adulthood seems to consist of fending off others who try to impose on us their ideas of what our roles should be, their versions of our stories. Our spiritual problems stem, at least in part, from the fact that we continue to allow someone else to tell us our story.

Recovering our own story, our own spirituality:

The spiritual leaders recognized as “great” … invited their followers to question the handed-down maps by making their own maps — their own stories. Rather than trying to tell their listeners’ stories, rather than imposing interpretation, the sages and saints told the kind of stories that invited identification. For they understood what the ancients had discovered: The best way to help me find my story is to tell me your story.

More in the extended entry.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

A couple of Sundays ago, Will Coley created a Twitter hashtag, #StorySunday, and proposed storytelling Sunday. So far his proposal is the only item under that hashtag.

I think it’s a coo idea, though.

What if the storytelling community made Sunday a particular day for sharing stories and material about storytelling, tweeting these items under the #StorySunday tag?

How ‘bout it, folks?

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

This week, well-known career blogger Penelope Trunk bravely told the story of her two abortions on her blog Brazen Careerist.

Even more interestingly, she connected abortion to career. The entry’s title is “What’s the connection between abortion and careers?”

In today’s emotionally charged climate, it takes a lot of guts to tell a story like Trunk’s. Not surprisingly, she’s gleaned 335 comments as of this writing.

Trunk says she had her abortions to preserve her career. But she also admits she is not sure her life would have turned out differently had she not had them.

I have known near and dear ones whose abortions were at least in part prompted by that same desire to preserve their careers. I also know one young woman with a thriving career who made the courageous choice to give up her baby in an open adoption.

This week I also watched Jon Stewart and Mike Huckabee debate the abortion issue. Stewart admitted that of all the “liberal” positions, his pro-choice stance is the one his feelings are the murkiest on (for the record, I don’t think he used the phrase “liberal positions”).

Stewart pointed out early on that it just doesn’t make a lot of sense for men to debate and make policy on the issue. They are not the ones directly affected.

That’s why it is so important for women on both sides of the issue to speak out — to tell their stories.

I applaud Penelope Trunk for having the courage to tell hers.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

See a photo of Sean, his bio, Part 1 of this Q&A, Part 2, Part 3, and Part 4.

Q&A with Sean Buvala, Question 8:

Q: You coach storytellers, including corporate storytellers, and on your site devoted to that effort, you note that “Corporate storytelling is hard work.” What’s the hardest part about it?

A: The hardest thing is doing the work to master the skills. Corporate folks must take this storytelling skill seriously. To really be an effective corporate storyteller, you need to be devoted to being the best storyteller you can be.

However, many people think of storytelling as an adjunct or soft skill in their repertoire of communication skills. We certainly saw the potentially career-ending and dangerous misuse of storytelling in the televised speech by [Louisiana] Governor Bobby Jindal [after President Obama’s State of the Union address]. I imagined that he probably searched the Internet and found this interesting idea about storytelling and figured that anybody can do it. Well, he found out quickly that storytelling is a powerful tool that requires training in order to be used well at such a high-level. I think that if I had to use a jackhammer for something, that I would want to be taught how to use it rather than relying on my previous experience of watching one be used as a punch line in an episode of “Sesame Street.”

Storytelling is a “hard skill” and must be mastered in business. You cannot “sort of” use storytelling any more than your accountant can “sort of” know about money and taxes. I have been teaching for years that storytelling is an Intentional process by using my “Interpret, Express, Integrate” method. There has to be a balance of theory and technique for corporate storytelling. Unfortunately, we have many of the business storytelling gurus wandering the countryside able to teach theory very well but not so good on technique. There is a danger in corporate America in that we take ourselves too seriously, hoping our statistics, buzzwords, and projected pie charts are a replacement for actual skills. You cannot fake authenticity and still be a good storyteller. In my experience, the most receptive audience these days to learning corporate storytelling are the entrepreneurs and small business owners. These leaders understand that they must master their Story; most often the only thing that separates them from their competition. They know that their image and theory will not help them pay the rent. Our story and knowing how to tell it is about the only thing that really sets us apart from one another. When a company loses touch with its story and how it is presented, we get the disasters we have seen recently in the auto and finance industries.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

Last week, Michael VanDervort blogged on RecruitingBlogs.com that resumes must die. He asked the question: Are resumes obsolete?

To illustrate the flaws of resumes, he took up a large chunk of his entry with his own fairly lame resume from 2007, which he had built using a Careerbuilder template.

He then condemns “Careerbuilder for creating a template that takes 23 years of professional work experience and turns it into a jumbled, difficult to read mess.” He also says the resume doesn’t represent who he is in 2009.

I don’t disagree that VanDervort’s 2007 resume is a mess, but just to play devil’s advocate:

• Don’t use marginally effective job boards like Careerbuilder.
• Update your resume if you want it to represent your current professional self.

VanDervort goes on to say, “I would much rather have my current body of social media work representing me in the market place than even a cleaned and pretty copy of this resume.” He says an ideal resume would contain things like his LinkedIn profile, his tweets on Twitter, and results about him from search engines.

OK, good argument for a Social Media resume like mine. Personal-branding guru Dan Schawbel’s quintessential article on how to create a social-media resume is here.

VanDervort also cites the argument “your blog is your resume.” This line, which I’ve discussed on this blog and here, is starting to feel a bit shopworn and really applies to a very small subset of job-seekers (techies and social-media strategists, perhaps). Not that I’m the world’s most brilliant blogger, for example, but I’ve never had a flicker of interest from an employer based on this blog or any of my other extensive social-media efforts.

Louise Fletcher, who runs the excellent Career Hub blog, reacted to VanDervort’s post over on CollegeRecruiter.com, (especially his contention that his resume “does nothing to communicate anything at all about me that I would want to put out if I were job searching”) writing:

People say to me all the time “I can’t capture who I am in a resume” and I always ask them the same question: Why not? Is it because words are just not adequate to describe the wonder that is you? Unlikely!

More likely it’s because you are being limited by what you imagine a resume should be. If you step outside the box (sorry for the cliche!) a little, you might see lots of ways to convey who you are and what you have to offer a company.

Yes. What the world needs is an outside-the-box incarnation of the resume.

Fletcher and virtually any professional resume writer can do a far better job than VanDervort in crafting a compelling resume.

But the drum I’ve been beating for a long time is that a new form needs to emerge. The key is in these words, “a resume that captures who I really am.”

In other words, tells your story.

To support his “death to resumes” argument, VanDervort cites a blog entry from marketing author Seth Godin in which he asks the question, “Why bother having a resume?”

I would cite Seth Godin, too, for my argument for the Storytelling Resume. In fact, I have cited him in my book, Tell Me About Yourself, but in a different way:

Godin … does not believe marketing without story is possible: “Either you’re going to tell stories that move people, or you will become irrelevant,” he writes.

If marketing products and services without storytelling is not possible, then neither is it possible to market oneself without storytelling.

The Storytelling Resume must and will emerge.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.

See a photo of Sean, his bio, Part 1 of this Q&A, Part 2, and Part 3.

Q&A with Sean Buvala, Questions 6 and 7:

Q: What’s your favorite story about a transformation that came about through a story or storytelling act?

A: I am not so sure that transformation comes from story. I think stories of transformation are powerful, but not sure story alone causes transformation. I have many stories about how the use of “community service” has transformed teens, for example. If in some way the sharing of these stories creates an open door to other opportunities for service, then that is a good use of the story.

In most cases, I think story is there to “frame” the facts, ideals and purposes of groups, actions or information. I know recently a woman, who was in one of my youth programs two decades ago, found me to tell me about her life now. She shared with me how one of my stories in particular led her to her public service. Did the story cause that transformation? I do not know. More likely, it gave and gives her a framework from which she moved forward into community service. Stories carry the message but I am not sure they are the message.

I also have experiences of storytelling in corporate training that caused people to both recommit to their jobs and also caused at least one person to quit. Story, in those cases, was an amplifier of values and decisions already in existence in the listener, the catalyst to have them take transforming actions.

Q: If you could share just one piece of advice or wisdom about story/storytelling/narrative with readers, what would it be?

A: You must tell stories to get better at stories. You can no more be a storyteller by thinking about stories than an artist can create beautiful water-color paintings by thinking about paint. One must pick up the brush or open one’s mouth as the case may be.

Entry by Kathy Hansen. Learn more.