What Stories Can Do That Metrics Can’t

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By posting a discussion question on Worldwide Story Work (of which you probably need to be a member to see the discussion), my friend and story colleague Thaler Pekar called my attention to a New York Times article by Anand Giridharadas, “Are Metrics Blinding Our Perception?”.

Giridharadas contends that we are in the Age of Metrics — or the End of Instinct. The author asserts that contemporary society is obsessed with measuring and quantifying everything. Giridharadas worries about studying things that are not easily counted. Further, the author frets that “what we know instinctively, data can make us forget.”

Similarly, a blogger at Chamberlain Forum (“a group of people who have been inspired by what has been achieved in neighbourhoods like Balsall Heath in Birmingham: where citizens and communities have become involved in turning around years of neglect”) asks: “Why is it that with all the money spent on collecting and displaying data relating to the success of public services, the everyday stories people tell of how public services work receive relatively little attention?”

“Stories don’t just reflect the culture: they ARE the culture,” the Chamberlain blogger notes.

Chamberlain’s response has been to develop “a technique for listening critically to stories; using storytelling in policy evaluation and development.”

The technique, Structured Dialogue Method (SDM) is “based on an approach developed in Canada by Ronald Labonte and Joan Feather, it uses peoples’ stories and a structured dialogue around them to evaluate and understand the experience of policies in practice.”

Key elements of the approach, the blogger continues, involve:

  • A provocative theme — something to generate animated discussion
  • A diverse storytelling circle of around 10-15 people
  • Two storytellers willing to share their experience
  • Active reflection of all participants — not just the storytellers
  • Structured questioning — not general discussion
  • A skilled facilitator to manage the process

The metrics vs. stories/experiences (or quantitative vs. qualitative) argument reminded me of the argument I made in my dissertation about why I chose to conduct my research by collecting stories rather then collecting data. Because I think some of my sources made some excellent points about the value of stories, I’m excerpting a bit of my methodology chapter here. Read specific arguments for narrative inquiry in the extended entry, and contact me if you’d like a full citation for any of my sources.

The qualitative approach, more accurately called the qualitative paradigm (Lincoln, 2005), has strong proponents in the field of organization studies. Luhman (1998), for example, wrote, “Scientific knowledge, in its drive to be comprehensive (to reduce and simplify), ignores the placing of meaning on human experience which fails to gain insight into people’s lives and social reality.” Patton (2002, p. 196) noted that “qualitative inquiry can be used to discover, capture, present, and preserve the stories of organizations, programs, communities, and families.” Contending that tests and measurements do not offer inquiry into such sensemaking, Lincoln (2005, p. 225) argued that “qualitative methods offer the best possibility for understanding how individuals make sense of and enact their social (and organizational) worlds.”

In sum, “qualitative research is no longer the poor stepchild of quantitative inquiries,” Jones (2004, p. 95) asserted, continuing by saying that over the last decade, “qualitative research has come into its own.”

Rationale for Narrative Inquiry

Progressing downward through a hierarchy in which qualitative research embraces narrative as a sub-category, strong support is evident for narrative as a research method. Champions of narrative inquiry pointed out its salient features:

  • “The narrative capability of humans is a unique, fundamental cognitive process, which is crucial to the interpretation and reconstitution of cultural and personal reality” (Sinclair, 2005, p. 56).
  • “Narrative analysis allows for systematic study of personal experience and meaning” (Riessman, 2001, ¶ 45).
  • “Narrative is the bread and butter of qualitative work … qualitative research is always about story reporting and story making … narrative is a democratizing factor in social science research” (Jones, 2004, p. 96).

Quantitative research, Schostak (n.d., ¶ 10) noted, assumes a certain homogeneity among subjects studied, but “it soon becomes apparent to any social researcher that no one organisation, nor single individual is identical to another.” Schostak argued for using narrative to capture the quintessence of human existence, the importance of narrative structure in analytical research, and the consistency of the narrative form in describing the human experience. Clandinin and Connelly (2000, p. 42) noted, “The contribution of narrative inquiry is more often intended to be the creation of a new sense of meaning and significance to the research topic than it is to yield a set of knowledge claims that might incrementally add to knowledge in the field.”

Patton (2002) recognized narrative as an emergent, specific approach for studying organizations. Of four of Czarniawska’s forms that Patton delineated (p. 118) as ways of using narrative to study organizations, the one that most closely aligns with this study’s methodology is “organizational research that collects organizational stories (tales of the field).”

Cohen and Mallon (2001, p. 48) observed the increasing recognition of stories as “a powerful research tool.” Narrative inquiry is especially appropriate to the current study and its exploration of the role of organizational change in constructing individual career stories.

Several scholars, for example, have made a case for narrative inquiry in careers research. Despite a predominance in careers research of a positivistic approach, Cohen and Mallon (2001, p. 48-49) wrote, “Stories … can be a valuable instrument in illuminating the ways in which individuals make sense of their careers as they unfold through time and space.” “To describe a person’s career is to tell a story,” wrote Cochran, (1990, ¶ 1), who also noted Tiedeman’s and Miller-Tiedeman’s 1985 argument that “career theory and research have been distorted and restricted by an unexamined adoption of a positivistic stance on research, a myopic focus on current practice, and the materialistic and mechanistic worldview of scientism” (¶ 37).

“In the context of societal, organizational, and personal change,” Cohen and Mallon wrote (2001, p. 53), “a focus on individual stories offers a creative technique for studying the process of career creation, re-creation, and improvisation” and provides “potential for elucidating this subjective level and the relationship between individual action and wider social and cultural contexts” (p. 48-49), while Mensinga (n.d.) cited “the challenges and delights of using a narrative approach to explore students’ career choices” (p. 2).
The use of narrative also enables previously unheard voices to speak. Noting the postmodern aspect of collecting stories, Rhodes (1996) made this assertion:
Using storytelling as a research technique aims at giving voice to stories which are not heard in traditional (modern) narrative of organisational theory… The value of the approach is that it creates the opportunity for reflective discussion and comparison of the diversity of story meanings and themes. (¶ 15)

Thus, storytelling opens “discursive spaces for research subjects” (Riessman, 2001, ¶ 46). Walker (2003, p. 46) described narrative inquiry as a responsive and participatory method of data gathering and interpretation,” providing “direct open-ended engagement with people.”

Finally, narrative inquiry aligns with this study’s theoretical framework that reality is socially constructed. In situating the individual as the originator of reality and identity construction during organization change, both Taylor and Ford provided a jumping-off point for considering social construction of the self and career and “the now well-accepted idea that our identities are continually being made and remade through the stories which we tell to ourselves and others, about various aspects of our lives” (Cohen, 2006, ¶ 2). Taylor (1999) and Ford (1999) also supported the theoretical underpinning that “meaning is constructed through the telling of the story” (Walker, 2003, p. 16). Similarly, Lambert (2003) called stories “the large and small instruments of meaning, of explanation, that we store in our memories. We cannot live without them” (p. 1). Further, Polkinghorne (1988) described narrative:

A form of “meaning making” … Narrative recognizes the meaningfulness of individual experiences by noting how they function as parts of the whole. Its particular subject is human actions and events that affect human beings, which it configures into wholes according to the roles these actions and events play in bringing about a conclusion. (p. 36)

Ruona’s observation (2005, p. 234) that “qualitative data deal with meanings,” which are “mediated primarily through language and action,” stands in contrast to Cohen’s and Mallon’s (2001, p. 51) assertion regarding the “inadequacy of positivistic approaches (the stock-in-trade of much career theory) and the need for theoretical approaches which more adequately capture the dynamic ways in which individuals enact their careers.” Noting the tendency for research using the positivist approach to “fall into the trap of thinking in binaries” (Mensinga, n.d., p. 6) such as individual vs. organization, Cohen and Mallon (2001, p. 52) stated that “the conceptual power of the notion of career is precisely that it recursively links the individual to the organization and the wider, changing social world.” Similarly, of the positivist approach to research, Riessman, 2001, wrote this comment:
Verification of the “facts” of lives is less salient than understanding the changing meaning of events for the individuals involved – and how these, in turn, are located in history and culture. Personal narratives are, at core, meaning-making units of discourse. They are of interest precisely because narrators interpret the past in stories, rather than reproduce the past as it was. (¶ 36)

The theoretical framework of the narrative-inquiry portion of this study mirrors that of Bryant and Cox (2004, ¶ 10, citing Guba & Lincoln, 1998): “A constructivist approach to gain an understanding of how individual employees interpret and talk about their experiences of organizational change.” The study finds its roots in constructivism not only because it examines meaning in participants’ change stories but also because it looks at ways that creating meaning through stories can help individuals advance their careers. The research may benefit both scholars and study participants, a reflection of Luhman’s assertion, “Organization studies should strive to enable people to realize an understanding of themselves and the process of social construction of reality.” As in Cohen’s and Mallon’s (2001) description of individuals “gaz[ing] backwards and invest[ing] past events with meaning that resonates with the present” (p. 56), the researcher explored how study participants may have imbued their past experience of organizational change with meaning that they can then apply to their future careers, especially by textualizing meaning in career-marketing communications (resumes, cover letters, interview responses, career portfolios, and personal branding). As Walker (2003, p. 68) described the transcripts and other raw materials she generated through her narrative interviews as “temporary containers for meanings as they emerged,” so, too, were the raw materials in the current study. The researcher then envisioned participants’ meaning in further temporary containers – communications that they might use to propel their careers. Participants may have benefited from the method of inquiry based on the notion set forth by Andrews, Sclater, Squire, and Tamboukou (2003, p. 22) that “in performing narratives we can create new possibilities for identities and actions.” For readers, too, stories offer the opportunity to ponder “vicariously” (Walker, 2003, p. 22) the experience of others and consider how it might relate to their own.

To that end, and in support of “fuller, richer narratives” about and in support of careers and organizational life, it is appropriate to underscore this study’s theoretical framework with Cochran’s lament about the persistent tendency in career research and theory to conceptualize individuals as comprising traits and attributes rather than meaning-filled stories (1990):

What is lost is the meaning of a career as lived, the interior significance that is peculiarly human and that would allow us to form a story rather than a chronicle. In pursuing a career, we live meanings, and lived meanings make a career narratable, intelligible, and coherent. All that would captivate us in a good autobiography, for instance, would be neglected. Meaning (self-concept, values, etc.) enters as an attribute of an organism, not as the living of a story that endows life with significance or insignificance. Dividing people, for instance, into those with high and low meaningfulness is at best merely preparatory. Careers as texts to be interpreted must still be read to understand the reality that supports and authenticates external attributions. Phrased another way, if we are beings who live in story, represent in story, explain through story, understand through story, and have our meaning in story, then chronicle leaves out the most essential part. We must seek ways to go beyond chronicle to fuller, richer narratives. (¶ 24)

Things We Think But Do Not Say: Could Personal Branding Be a Bunch of Hooey?

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I have evangelized about personal branding for a number of years, including here on A Storied Career.

Deep in my core, I believe in the concept of personal branding.

But I admit to some doubt and cynicism.

Finally someone else has expressed similar cynicism. Carlos Miceli wrote recently on the Brazen Careerist blog that he no longer cares about personal branding for these reasons:

  1. It makes you afraid. …
  2. It has made us so calculated, that I wonder how many people are able to live up to their online personas. …

I understand these concerns. Every time I post a status update, I have to think about all my various social-media contacts and whether any would be offended or whether my words are consistent with my “brand” or whether my various audiences will think I’m a moron.

But I have other concerns. Personal branding often seems like a Flavor of the Month kind of concept — a fad or trend that careerists are urged to devote time and energy to. I often have the sense that in a few years, no one will be talking about personal branding; they’ll be talking about the next thing we’re supposed to put time and energy into.

I’m also flummoxed by the fact that there’s no one consistent rubric for developing and communicating one’s brand. Everyone who touts personal branding has his or her own formula, approach, or process for determining one’s brand.

Your personal brand is supposed to be about your authenticity, but like Miceli, I often think that worrying about staying “on-brand” and saying the wrong thing makes us inauthentic. Miceli writes: “Once I started not worrying about the repercussion of every word I said online, I truly connected at an emotional level with others. Once I embraced my personality, I strengthened the connections that mattered and cut ties with those that didn’t.”

And what does all this have to do with storytelling? Personal brands are synonymous with — or at least spring from — our stories. In my book, Tell Me About Yourself, I write about developing a personal-branding statement backed by a story.

I have a feeling that personal storytelling that expresses our authentic selves may pass the test of time more than “personal branding” will.

Video Has Vastly Expanded the Story Universe: Is It a Whole Different Game?

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In my world of curating information in the realm of applied storytelling, the term “digital storytelling” has truly exploded in the last year. It has been big for a few years now and is only getting bigger. I’d estimate that at least a third of storytelling tweets I follow relate to digital storytelling.

Last year, Douglas Galbi claimed that “online video isn’t succeeding in telling stories,” to which “Dr. Strangelove” retorted that Galbi’s claim may depend on how “story” is defined. Certainly, viewers are watching YouTube videos in huge numbers.

Not only has video vastly expanded the story universe through the sheer numbers of (arguably storied) videos out there, but, says Carolyn Handler Miller::

While traditional stories are told via a single medium — the spoken word, the printed page, or the cinema screen, for example — digital storytelling encourages the use of a number of different media, all tied together to serve the core story. In these new stories, the plot is advanced by everything from content on websites and DVDs to highway billboards to magazine ads to cell phone messages. They may incorporate mainstream media as well — including feature films and TV series. This method of tying many media together to tell a single story gives the writer a potentially enormous and versatile canvas to work on.

From the standpoint of the creator, though, “video storytelling is a whole different game.” So writes Steve Krizman in his Tropes blog. He lists three ways that video storytelling is different from other forms. The first two can be judged through the eyes (and ears) of the beholder, while the third is from the maker’s perspective:

  1. Video is not as forgiving as written storytelling. If you don’t get the beginning, middle and end captured in video, your story will stink. You either have to stage a reenactment, or you resort to a silly text card.
  2. Sound is the most important part of video. I’ve had decent visual, but lousy sound. Nothing you can do with that. Conversely, with good sound you can get by in editing.
  3. On the scene, you have to work harder on a video story than on a written story. You snooze, you lose the one piece of action that would make the whole story.

Here is a diverse group of video stories that I’ve seen cited by bloggers and others somewhat recently. How do they stack up according to Krizman’s criteria? Do they have beginnings, middles, and ends? How’s the sound? Do they work as storytelling?

    • Renee Hall’s “A Day to Remember,” about President Obama’s inauguration.
    • More of a slideshow than video, “Homeless Connection” tells of a couple that buys hygiene supplies, bottled water, and backpacks in order to put together Roadside Care Packages for the homeless of Austin, TX.
    • A technological marvel, “The Creative Bushido” uses the metaphor of Japan’s Age of Warring States and presents it “as entertainment in the style of a traditional picture scroll. Seemingly at the mercy of the powerful current and waves of these times, we the creators of YOMIKO Advertising freely exchange our views and enter into the fray of the battle for new business with enthusiasm in this epic tale. And no matter what the next age may bring, we are prepared to meet the new era of advertising, armed with the peerless weapon of ideas polished to brilliant perfection.”
    • “The Heart Knows,” asks the question: “How does a shy M.D. win the heart of a gorgeous pharmaceutical rep?” The video stars Anuja and Nirav in “an original Bollywood-inspired short … produced for their 6.6.09 wedding. The couples’ surprise big-screen debut premiered on two massive screens just before their grand entrance to hundreds of unsuspecting family and friends.” Pacific Pictures made the film.

 

  • The most affecting story in the group, in my opinion is “Choosing Thomas,” about a couple that chooses to see through the wife’s pregnancy and birth even knowing that their baby will die shortly after birth because of a genetic disorder.

Want to see more storytelling videos? Eric Johnson at the Case Foundation lists storytelling videos in which nonprofits present their missions — what they do, how effective it is — and how supporters can help.

 

Thomas Clifford Names Tell Me About Yourself Among His Top 2009 Book Picks

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My friend, corporate-communications media producer, author, and speaker Thomas Clifford, has included my book, Tell Me About Yourself: Storytelling to Get Jobs and Propel Your Career, on his Top 10 Books of 2009.

Here’s what he said about the book:

Want to learn how to use stories in your career, in your job search and anywhere else, for that matter? Storytelling proponent Kathy Hansen has written a super user-friendly guide to navigate you through the storytelling waters.

I’m also excited to check out the other books on Thomas’s list. His book picks focus on leadership, social media. engagement, communication, creativity, private writing, and more. I’m especially intrigued with Accidental Genius: Revolutionize Your Thinking Through Private Writing by Mark Levy and the author’s “Fascination Method,” as well as The Power of Appreciative Inquiry: A Practical Guide to Positive Change.

A Tale of Job-search Story Success: Judy Rosemarin Followup

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Storytelling in the job search is a recurring theme in A Storied Career, and I’ve presented support for the notion, along with how-to’s, but not a lot of evidence of how well storytelling works in the job hunt. Today’s entry is the story of marketing professional free agent Bryan Lee, who took a “Humaway” workshop with recent Q&A subject Judy Rosemarin

Frying Pan to Fire: Bryan’s Story

The day before taking my “Humaway” Workshop with Judy, the phone rang and it was a firm with whom I was angling for a new position. Could I come in tomorrow to interview? I had that excited/nervous thing going on the whole night. I played the two stories I had drafted for Judy and the workshop in my head as I tried to drift to sleep, but also now played out the interview in my mind.

During the workshop, Judy led us through the elements of a great story — learning to feature characters, drama and dialogue. As my fellow students and I worked our way through our first attempt at telling our stories, you could feel the collective unease and tension rise. This was supposed to be a story to highlight a strength of ours — could it really sound like this? I couldn’t help but think of how challenging it might be a few hours later in the interview. I had moved to churning the butter.

Then something remarkable happened. Following some collective feedback and some pointed but helpful coaching from Judy, we rewrote and then retold our stories. What a difference for each of us! The stories were personal, interesting and most importantly, memorable. From the bank compliance officer to the CFO to the accountant and on, a new “humaway” had been birthed for each of us.

I was exhilarated leaving Judy and the group, and started to feel my story coming together as I dined on a slice and soda.

An hour later, I was seated in my interview with Harriet, the vice president for HR and Louise, one of her staff. Finishing some opening banter, the first question came: “Can you walk us through your resume?” Inside, I took a deep breath and took the plunge. Instead of a dry recitation of my previous jobs and experiences, I said, “I’d like to tell you a story that I think will feature a couple of my key strengths that will help you understand what I can do for your firm and your clients.” Anxiously scanning faces for reaction, I saw a bit of surprise, and a spark between them — they looked at each other, then back at me. Harriet nodded and said, “Sure. Love to hear it.”

My energy rose, and I unfolded the story I had told to Judy, and my workshop pals, only two hours earlier. No notes, no hesitation — just fun. I was engaged, and more importantly, they were engaged. My two-minute story prompted some great follow-on discussion. At the end of an hour, we ended — I had graduated from a “recitation” interview to a pace where I thought my story was in play — and regardless of the outcome to come, I was memorable. Humaway indeed!

You can reach Judy Rosemarin through her Web site, Sense-able Strategies or via e-mail.

Many Coaches are Turning to Storytelling Methodologies

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You can tell that a particular way of doing things is catching on when a practitioner carves a niche out of teaching others how to do it.

Lisa Bloom has recently begun to teach coaches how to use storytelling in coaching. In her newsletter, Kachanga, in an article that also ran in International Association of Coaching’s IAC Voice, Lisa explains why storytelling is a natural fit with coaching:

Storytelling is the perfect complement to the coaching process, helping us answer the questions we bring into coaching. On one level, storytelling gives the coach an additional tool to get to a level of understanding or awareness which may be inaccessible to the client. This level may be blocked for many reasons; through listening to a story, the client can hear and s ubsequently deal with more difficult issues.

On another level, we are all storytellers and our narrative is the story of how we talk of our lives. As we experience life, we “tell” it. We pass along almost every event that happens to us-as an anecdote, complaint or amusing tableside story-sometimes lightly and sometimes purposefully and with interpretation. And in the “telling,” in the narrative we choose, we define the experience. When we look closely at the narrative and examine the stories we choose to tell, we begin to understand how committed we can become to these stories. We also understand the fascinating potential to create new and better stories-stories that empower us and allow us create a more fulfilling reality.

Of course, Lisa is not the first coach to teach storytelling in coaching. That distinction may belong to David Drake, PhD, who not only teaches storytelling methodology in coaching but also operates the Center for Narrative Coaching. Or perhaps Dr. David Krueger at Mentorpath was the first. His program is Live a New Life Story, in which he offers a coaching certification.


Others use storytelling in coaching, too, including several folks who’ve been part of my Q&A series:

  • Jim Ballard of LifeCrafters “uses the myth of the Hero’s Journey to teach groups and individuals how to develop their intuitive connection with their souls; to use not just the intellect but all of themselves in bringing meaning and passion to their experience.”
  • Annie Hart has developed several bodies of original work including a Heart-Centered Communication model, DreamBuilders a group coaching model, Stories From the Heart of the Cosmos, a story performance workshop and her current work Skills of Excellence, a compilation of skills of the masters.
  • Melissa Wells Q&A “explores remote areas to find unexpected stories about cool creatures” to “help individuals determine what they want out of their career and how to get it.
  • Katie Snapp‘s focus is leadership training, and she asks leaders what their leadership story is.
  • After Rob Sullivan spent “countless hours helping job hunters from a variety of industries,” he “realized that the inability to share our stories is widespread — mostly because our society isn’t clear on the distinction between bragging and factual self-promotion.” Thus he coaches job-seekers to tell their stories effectively in the job search.
  • Karen Gilliam explains here why she uses story-based techniques in coaching.

And finally, someone with whom I have not yet done a Q&A (but would love to) is Yvette Hyater-Adams, who has an assessment instrument, Transformative Narrative Portrait, which Yvette says “takes a collection of stories along a lifeline to look at the pattern of experience and make decisions on ways to ‘re-story’ unhelpful habits into new and thriving stories that move toward a desired vision.” Yvette calls the Transformative Narrative Portrait “a collection of past, present, and future stories along with action stories that help facilitate personal change.” She plans to offer a certification for people who want to use this method for coaching.

My Big Giant Yard-Sale Story: 5 Lessons Learned

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Another of my occasional forays into stories of my own life …

As regular readers know, my husband and I plan to move from DeLand, FL, to Kettle Falls, WA, in April. We are downsizing to the smaller house we are building in Kettle Falls, so we knew we wanted to purge a lot of our stuff. Our neighborhood was planning a big yard sale this weekend, so we decided to join in. Now, I have the world’s worst yard-sale karma; I have never been successful at staging them. But I figured if Randall took the lead, I couldn’t jinx it too much (I also thought that I would jinx the Florida Gators if I watched their SEC championship game against Alabama — so I didn’t — but apparently I got that backwards).

We literally worked on this yard sale just about every waking hour for nine days straight. The second my mother left Thanksgiving dinner, we started dismantling the lovely and tasteful home (if I do say so myself) we’ve been remodeling for 17 years. Here are five lessons I learned from the experience:

  1. Possessions can create a kind of prison: When I wondered on Twitter why we had saved all the stuff we had, a friend made the tongue-in-cheek observation that a new season of the A&E show “Hoarders” is starting. Well, we don’t quite reach hoarder status, but Randall and I are both packrats. We have accumulated an enormous amount of STUFF in 25 years of marriage, plus our single lives before that. One of the biggest reasons I felt we would be bicoastal and maintain homes in both Florida and Washington was that I felt it would be just way too overwhelming to deal with all our crap. Once we realized that Kettle Falls was our future, it seemed insane to be beholden to our possessions. And the more we started to purge, the more free I began to feel. It feels so fantastic to simplify. There’s also a sense of wanting a fresh start. Decorative items and furniture that we still love aren’t hard to part with because we want things to be fresh and new in our new life in the great West. I also began to acutely realize the utter mindlessness with which I acquired possessions. So many things I bought simply because I could. I failed to question whether I really needed something, whether it would give me pleasure, whether it had lasting value. This mindlessness was especially true of gifts. While I pride myself on clever, creative, and thoughtful gift-giving, another dimension for me has been wretched excess — giving gifts just for the sake of giving them without really thinking about what the gift would contribute to the recipient’s life.
  2. Circumstances can change your relationship with things. Twice in my 20s, my residence was burglarized, and prized possessions were stolen. From those experiences, I learned not to place as much importance on possessions as I once had. Apparently that lesson didn’t stick. But I had my next epiphany while spending the summer in Kettle Falls living in our RV while we build our house. As I wrote here, I found I really didn’t miss any of my myriad possessions back in Florida. I had all I needed. A year ago, purging the many (many, many, many) possessions we put up for sale in the yard sale would have been unthinkable. We filled 40 cartons of books to sell, probably 80 percent of the books we own. I’m an inveterate book collector, but I had read only a small percentage of them. My fantasy was that I would read every book in retirement (or I would go to prison where I’d have little to do but read). It doesn’t seem worthwhile, however, to schlep 40 cartons of books to the West Coast for a scenario that may never happen (especially the prison scenario). I had a large two-drawer lateral file cabinet filled with my notes from college — and would you believe high school. Realizing that I had never once referred to these notes since filing them, I purged them so I could sell the filing cabinet. I collect teapots and had amassed quite a few. I held onto some favorites but was able to part with others. And then there were my “soap-opera boxes.” Have you ever noticed that on soap operas — and many other TV shows — when a gift is given, the recipient doesn’t tear into the wrapping paper but simply lifts a wrapped box top off a wrapped box bottom? About a decade ago, I had the idea to create my own collection of soap-opera boxes. They would be eco-friendly because they could be reused, and they would make gift-wrapping easier (for years, I had had conducted all-night wrapping marathons a couple of days before Christmas). I had a whole closet filled with these boxes, and I stuffed nine large garbage bags of boxes to sell at the yard sale.
  3. Yard sales are very much susceptible to Murphy’s Law. Since we got back to Florida on Nov. 1, we’ve had rain maybe once. But a few days before the sale, we learned that rain was predicted for the exact days of the sale. Weather forecasting is, of course, an inexact science anywhere, but especially in changeable Florida; naturally however, this forecast was dead on. The rain started about an hour into the first day of the sale and just got more and more torrential, bringing cold (for Florida) temperatures and lasting well into the second day of the sale. We rain-proofed as well as well could; sales areas were either covered or inside the house. Surprisingly, we still had a good first day of the sale and made the bulk of our sales then. The second day, however, brought just a trickle of nickel-and-dime customers. We also learned at the end of the second day that the rest of the neighborhood had bailed on their part of the yard sale and taken down their signs. Despite many forces working against us for this sale, we did pretty well.
  4. Yard sales are stressful and a test of relationships. I didn’t agree with Randall’s pricing strategy. I was resentful that I was the one stationed outside on the first wet, cold day of the sale. Randall resented the fact that he had been the only collecting boxes during the prep (especially since the produce guy seemed to be coming on to him). I was also unnerved by the chaos of the preparations. Our adult children could have been more helpful with the preparations. So, we all had some issues to work out by the end of the sale — but fences seem to be mended.
  5. Leftovers are pretty easy to deal with. Even if we hadn’t had miserable rain, I knew we’d still have a lot of stuff leftover — simply because we put so much stuff on sale — three full rooms of sales space plus several outdoor venues. I estimate it was about two-thirds of our possessions. So, I planned a strategy for dealing with the leftovers. Greyhound Pets of America, a greyhound rescue organization, is a favorite charity dating back to the two wonderful greyhounds we had in the 1990s. They hold a couple of fundraising yard sales every year, so we offered our stuff to the group. They picked up the bulk of it right after the sale and are picking up more today. In many cities (including both DeLand and Kettle Falls), Habitat for Humanity runs a thrift store; the DeLand store will get our furniture leftovers. For the few types of items that neither organization wanted — like the famed soap-opera boxes — The Freecycle Network, a nonprofit organization and a movement of people interested in keeping good stuff out of landfills, provides a way to offer the stuff for free to folks who will come pick it up. I think the only item, that, alas, may end up in a landfill is a bunch of old VHS tapes.

So, bottom line, I’m glad we did the yard sale even though it was flawed. I’m grateful to be one step closer to purging the bulk of our possessions and moving. I also hope to be a much more mindful consumer in the future and really think about each future purchase to consider whether I truly need it.

Q&A with a Story Guru: Judy Rosemarin: A Job-Search Storytelling Methodology Based on Intentionality, Audience-centricity, and Authenticity

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

Q&A with Judy Rosemarin, Questions 5 and 6:

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

A: Gossip or false advertising.

Q: Your Web site states: “In today’s tough and turbulent times, Judy has a methodology that helps executives move quickly into the memories of interviewers, to distinguish themselves from the competition.” Without giving away too many trade secrets, can you provide a taste of this methodology for readers?

A: My years as a journalist, executive coach and now, for the past five years in community theater as an actor and director, my methodology is based on intentionality, audience-centricity and authenticity. People can be more of themselves when they share a true story, (albeit well considered and crafted) than when they have to put together some artificial elevator pitch and sound like everyone else. There are no two perfectly similar CFOs, and if there were 20 in a room, each would have his or her own brand and stories. My methodology is to play to a person’s strengths while using proven approaches to unearth and rebirth their stories.

Q&A with a Story Guru: Judy Rosemarin: Story Triumphs Over Elevator Pitch

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

Q&A with Judy Rosemarin, Question 4:

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

A: While teaching one of my classes, some people were working on their interviewing stories, based on a value to the potential employer. One woman, on the opposite side of the room, was getting increasingly more red in the face. Others were talking about how the storytelling was new to them and yet a bit easier than they thought it would be.

I kept my eye on her, as I anticipated some emotionality. I noticed that her eyes were filling up but the tears did not flow over her bottom eyelids.

“Judy, you have changed my life from here on.”

“What do you mean?”

“I have always felt like an imposter with that darned elevator pitch.” Her skin got redder. “And now, I realize that all I have to do is tell my story and I feel released. Thank you, thank you,” she replied and as she said those words, her skin returned to its normal coloring, and I thanked her back for sharing.