A good story can inspire, motivate and drive forward your employees and clients, anyone who will hear your real intentions supported by emotional story will follow you, as the authenticity brings people together.
Every audience would prefer to listen complex messages as the story form rather than try to understand conventional informative style of communication. I would like to underline the importance of this essential business skill, which could help each of us succeed. Still in some workplaces the idea is not that clear and sometimes devalued, compared with lecture-style way of communicating, presenting numbers and facts.
Storytelling is not just simple as one could thought. There are different kinds of stories, fiction and non-fiction. Dr Murray Nossel, founder and director of Narativ, teacher of the Program of Narrative Medicine at Colombia University, says that his favorite type of storytelling is personal one. It’s a fact based story telling, that happened in one’s life. By telling your story well you should be able to bring your listener into another dimension and awake his emotions which will help him understand the turn of events.
This strategy of communication can facilitate the understanding and increase empathy in corporate world. Dr Nossel, comments that personally for him storytelling comes down to one principal issue: connection. We need to focus on the quality of connection with our audience, taking into consideration what kind of emotions our story awakes. Storytelling creates deeper connection, which last longer and its not easy to forget. It doesn’t matter if
it’s marketing, finance or online business – connections are everywhere and it is up to you how you take advantage of opportunities coming your way.
As an example, I would like you to get to know the story of TOMS, a footwear company launched by Blake Mycoskie, young entrepreneur who after travelling in Argentina and seeing the real problem of shoeless kids decided to start a new business which main motto is: One for one. That means one pair of shoes purchased from TOMS Shoes, provides one pair of shoes to the child in need. It began simply, but later on became a powerful story to tell and a great marketing strategy for the brand.
The storytelling that TOMS applies, has a social approach that certainly thrills. Mycoskie claims:“We’ve given over 60 million pairs of shoes to children in need, teaching us 60 million lessons. Since 2006, people like you [the buyer] have helped us achieve this amazing number – and it’s leading to bigger and better things, like giving different types of shoes based on terrain and season, or creating local jobs by producing shoes in countries where we give. TOMS ® Shoes are always given to children through humanitarian organizations who incorporate shoes into their community development programs.”*
Also the name of the company indicates a lot. TOMS Shoes means “Shoes For a Better Tomorrow” which came out to be Tomorrow’s Shoes, abbrev TOMS.
Overall, storytelling can be an opportunity and a great way to become point of attention for your audience.
Watch the following video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BIArTdAHwBc
References
http://www.toms.com/about-toms
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kathycaprino/2018/03/23/how-storytelling- can-improve-
business-communication- and-transform- workplaces/2/#308fde8a7912
http://neurads.com/blog/storytelling-10- claves-y- ejemplos/
http://www.toms.com/about-toms
http://wheretoget.it/look/548772
https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/220350
