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

Q&A with Evelyn Clark, Question 3:

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

A: There are so many, it’s difficult to choose. Here are two of my favorites, insights that executives shared with me:

In a management retreat for 200 top executives and managers of a medical center, the president came up to me at the first break and said, “I’ve already learned a valuable lesson: I can tell stories! It’s second nature for our CEO to use stories when he speaks — and he’s so good at it, I had decided to leave that to him. But I’ve realized, as you’ve said, that we all naturally use stories in our conversations, and I’m looking forward to learning more about how to do it deliberately when I deliver more formal presentations.”

At the end of a two-day executive retreat that was part of an 18-month program to develop leadership skills, a highly-respected community leader said, “I wondered how we could possibly spend two days on storytelling, which seemed like a lightweight topic. But as we peeled back the layers over these past two days, I realized how profound the applied skill of storytelling is.”