CORPORATE STORYTELLING:
Discovering Fire for the Second Time
Vol. 9, No. 2, 2009

Publisher: Evelyn Clark
evelyn@corpstory.com http://www.corpstory.com

(c) Clark & Company 2009

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"Leadership is about enabling others to achieve purpose in the face of uncertainty."
--Marshall Ganz is a lecturer in public policy at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University

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Please forward this E-Zine to anyone you know who is interested in becoming a more effective communicator, or who may want to learn how to supercharge their business/career.

IN THIS ISSUE

1. The Power of Story to Capture Attention

2. Hold Those Meetings!

3. In Lean Times, Coaching Provides Cheap, Effective Training

4. Corporate Storytelling Live

5. Once Upon a Time....Stories as Branding Tools

1. The Power of Story to Capture Attention

How can leaders harness the power of storytelling to capture employees’ attention—especially in times when high anxiety prevails? Marshall Ganz, a lecturer on public policy at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Management, says stories are the most effective way, and leaders must be prepared to tell three types of stories:

1. The story of self
2. The story of us
3. The story of now

“After developing our stories of self, then we work on building relationships, which forms the story of us. From there we turn to strategizing and action,” Ganz says.

To read the full account of how he used the power of stories as a civil rights leader, go to: http://www.morungexpress.com/faith_leaf/14833.html

2.Hold Those Meetings!

When revenues are plunging, many companies immediately curtail expenses by canceling conferences and corporate meetings. But John Baldoni, author of six books and one of the world’s top leadership experts, says “Don’t cancel that meeting.” Baldoni explains that it’s important for companies to hold corporate meetings and encourage people to talk about how they are coping with hard times, even if the gatherings are scaled back from customary levels.

Share stories from the field, from customers and from veteran managers, he says in an article for Harvard Business Publishing. “Take the long-term perspective and create narratives that share that perspective.”

3. In Lean Times, Coaching Provides Cheap, Effective Training

When budgets are trimmed, training often is curtailed—but staff training is critical, so don’t eliminate it. One effective way to do more with less is to cultivate a learning culture in your business by coaching employees to learn new skills.

“By modeling a thirst for learning and stoking everyone’s curiosity, you can generate excitement among your staff for internal coaching,” reports Morey Stettner in Investment.com, a publication of Investor’s Daily. Instead of letting training fall prey to budget cuts, designate staffers to provide training through staff meetings, lunches and mentoring.

To read more about effective internal coaching, go to: http://beta.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=452017

4. Corporate Storytelling Live

Evelyn recently spoke to 235 managers at the Alberta Motor Association’s annual conference. A sister organization of U.S.-based AAA, AMA is led by a CEO who customarily shares personal experiences to convey his thoughts for the future, so storytelling is recognized as a core leadership skill and many of the managers are skilled practitioners. Held at Kananaskis Lodge in the Rockies not far from Banff, the conference was getting off to a great start just as a steady snowfall began. Beautiful!

5. Once Upon a Time….Stories as Branding Tools

Evelyn is a featured “corporate storytelling guru” in the current issue of Universum Quarterly, a Swedish magazine that bills itself as “The world’s leading Employer Branding journal.” Entitled, “Once upon a time...What a great story can do for your company,” the article is positioned as “A look at corporate storytelling and how it can strengthen the employer brand.” Also featured are two executives from companies highlighted in her book, David Armstrong, CEO of Armstrong International, and Yvonne Pendleton, Director of Corporate Heritage at Mary Kay, Inc.

Armstrong has written several books of story collections about people at his company “caught doing things right.” As he explains, the practice of telling stories consumes most of his time as leader of the company, and it all began when “I was bragging about the heroes at Armstrong International, not about myself, and…people started to think it was cool.” Pendleton says, “The best thing leaders at all levels can do is to set an example by including stories in their everyday work life as a means to encourage everyone else to do the same.”

Writer Katarina Zeidler, a Moscow-based journalist, sums up the main point of the interviewees with this insight: “Storytelling, business or corporate, has one mutual purpose: to improve business success.”

To read the entire article, request a copy by writing to info@corpstory.com

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