BTU #315 - How To Be A Better Storyteller (Paul Smith)
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Why Listen:
Well, normally on the show I interview military veterans about their civilian career, what they do, how they got there, and advice for other veterans seeking to do the same. Today, however, is a skills episode, where I meet with a world-class expert on a topic relevant to our listeners, regardless of your career path. And the topic may surprise you, because today is all about storytelling. We talk about why storytelling may make or break your success as a leader, interviewer, and even parent. We talk about how storytelling is one of the most efficient and lasting ways to influence people and organizations.
About Paul:
Paul Smith is one of the world’s leading experts in business storytelling, one of Inc. Magazine’s Top 100 Leadership Speakers of 2018, a storytelling coach, and bestselling author of the books The 10 Stories Great Leaders Tell, Lead with a Story, Sell with a Story, Parenting with a Story, and Four Days with Kenny Tedford.
His work has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, Time Magazine, Forbes, Fast Company, The Washington Post, PR News, CIO Magazine, Investors Business Daily, Marketing Research Magazine, the American Banking Journal, and London’s Edge Magazine, among others.
In his 20 years with Procter & Gamble, Paul held leadership positions in both research and finance functions, and most recently served as director of consumer and communications research. Prior to P&G, Paul was a consultant for Arthur Andersen & Company.
His keynote speaking and training clients include international giants like Google, Hewlett Packard, Bayer Medical, Walmart, Kaiser Permanente, Ford Motor Company, Luxottica, and Procter & Gamble among dozens of others.
Paul holds a bachelors degree in economics, and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. He lives with his wife and two sons in the Cincinnati suburb of Mason, Ohio.
Our Sponsor:
StoryBox- People trust each other more than advertising. StoryBox provides the tools and supports businesses need to take the best things customers say about them, and use them to drive more sales and referrals. StoryBox offers a 10% discount to companies employing veterans of the US Armed Forces.
Audible is offering one FREE audio book to Beyond the Uniform listeners. You can claim this offer here, and see a list of books recommended by my guests at BeyondTheUniform.io/books
Selected Resources:
Paul’s Books
Lead with a Story (Amazon #1 Bestseller in Business Communication)
Sell with a Story (Amazon #1 Bestseller in Sales and Selling)
Four Days with Kenny Tedford - coming Nov 2019
Information about Paul
Transcript & Time Stamps:
4:00
Joining me today from Cincinnati, Ohio is Paul Smith. Why is serving the veteran community important to you?
My father served in the Korean War and this community is one I have a great deal of respect for. I think improving storytelling abilities will greatly assist veterans as they make the transition into the civilian workforce.
6:05
Why is storytelling important in our lives today?
In the past 20-30 years, there’s been an increased interest in the power of storytelling. Storytelling helps people make decisions. As it turns out, human beings make subconscious emotional decisions and then we justify those decisions in the more rational thinking parts of our brain. We think we make very rational decisions but often it’s the more emotional parts of our brian that are really making the decisions.
Stories are an exceptional vehicle to reach to more emotional parts of the brain. So it’s very important that leaders are good storytellers.
8:00
Can you talk more about storytelling as it relates to leadership?
The job of leaders is to influence what people think, feel, and do. The old school way to do this way just to boss people around. That works in the military but it really doesn’t work in the civilian workforce. As a leader you need to influence people in order to lead them toward your goals and objectives for the organization. One way to do this is through storytelling.
9:40
What is the structure of a good story?
What I’ve realized in working with executives is that they’re not familiar with the questions their story needs to answer. Those questions are:
Why should I bother listening to the story?
Where and when did the story take place?
Who is the main character?
What is a problem or opportunity to character ran into?
What happened in the end?
What did you learn from the story?
What should I do now?
The entire story should be no longer than 2-3 minutes. They’re intended to be short, digestible leadership stories.
13:50
How should people practice storytelling?
A lot of people just wing it and that’s a mistake. Storytelling is like any other art form - there are people who are naturally good at it and there are many others who are not. If it doesn’t come naturally to you, you can take lessons, read books, and use other resources to improve your storytelling abilities.
The questions I shared before are a guideline but not necessarily a hard and fast rule. You can stray slightly from those questions and still tell a good story.
18:00
How important is a surprise ending?
A surprise ending is important to any good story. It makes the story more interesting and also more memorable. The reason it does that is based on how memories are formed in the human brain. There’s a period called a memory consolidation period where a memory is being processed and then stored. During the memory consolidation period, a memory can be lost or enhanced. A memory is enhanced when adrenaline is released in the body. A surprise ending will cause a release of adrenaline that will then cause the memory to be stored in a more distinct way.
20:35
How do you distinguish between bad and good stories?
Usually bad stories aren’t even a story. The person thinks they’re telling a story but they’re really not.
You can’t go through a military experience without having great stories. So learn how to share those stories with the people around you that will allow them to benefit from your experiences.
26:55
How do you categorize storytelling?
The main thing I teach is how to craft a good story. These are techniques to bring in emotional connections and ways to tell surprise endings. But depending on who you are and who your audience is, you will reshape your story to fit the group you’re speaking to. For example stories parents tell their children will often be centered around character building.
None of us have enough stories on our own to teach our children or the people we work with everything they need to know. That’s why it’s important that we also encourage other people to share their stories. So that everyone has a collection of stories to draw from.
33:10
How important is it that leaders have a bank of stories ready to share at all times?
It’s important. I refer to it as your repertoire of stories. You need to have lots of them ready at a moment's notice. I write stories out in Word files so that I can go back and refer to them on a regular basis.
In my books, I cover about 70 different types of stories. The ten stories that I find most important in business are:
Where we came from
Why we can’t stay where we are
Where we’re going
How we’ll get where we want to go
What we believe
Who we serve
What we do for our customers
How we’re different from competitors
Why I lead the way I do
Why you should want to work here
Think of these stories ahead of time. You need to have them ready to go. If you’re trying to think of a story in the moment, it’s already too late.
38:37
Are there any resources you would recommend?
My best thinking about storytelling can be found in my books. I also do a weekly podcast called Lead With a Story.
I also recommend listening to other people’s stories. This will give you ideas about how you can better your own storytelling.
41:00
Is there anything else you’d like to share?
Treat your storytelling skills like you would any other skillset you would need as a leader. Don’t wing it or think you can’t get better at it. Being able to tell a good story is really important in leadership.