Narrating Stories in Organizations
Creating Hospitable Workplace Environments through Storytelling
Mar 12, 2009
Once upon a time people held conversations and told stories in organizations. The murmur of voices signified one employee’s helping or consulting another; the water cooler was a place for building relationships as well as for gossip.
In the contemporary workplace, a lot of conversation has been reduced to brief exchanges via email, text messaging and social networking sites. Digital networking is convenient, but a workplace where the only sound is the tapping of keyboards is an impoverished social environment. It is hard to solve misunderstandings through email.
Storytelling in the workplace serves productive purposes and can be used to educate and explain, to share knowledge, to lighten a difficult situation, or by way of creating connections between manager and employee or among peers.
To tell a story all a narrator needs are some lessons in life, good intentions and self-awareness. Everyone has a story, and most people are starved for genuine, heart-felt stories: narratives about how other employees solve workplace challenges and muddle through tough times in their professional and personal lives.
Why Tell Stories at Work
Employees don’t appreciate lectures from managers and they resent cursive emails from authority figures. Communicating information through a story makes the content more memorable than an arid, unwelcome list of instructions. Storytelling encourages compliance rather than demanding it.
Telling stories presumes a two-way conversation, with the listener having the opportunity to comment or ask questions. Effective workplace communications are premised on this type of two-way exchange. Misunderstandings can be worked out and differences of opinion addressed.
Storytelling is a vehicle for employees to find their voice at work and create more hospitable workplace environments. Through story, people build relationships and bonds of trust. Regardless of senior management’s position, employees can choose to listen to and support each other; storytelling is a powerful way for people to connect.
When to Tell Stories
No meeting is too important or too insignificant for a story, especially if that story helps people understand each other. Performance reviews, team meetings and one-on-one encounters are all candidates for storytelling.
The key to narrating stories in these circumstances is to be genuine: grandstanding is taboo. The first rule of communications is to make communications about the listener first, narrator second. Hyperbole is the stock in trade of storytellers, but a narrator who is preoccupied with trying to look good will only alienate listeners and undermine their trust.
What Stories to Narrate: Choosing Story Content
Would-be storytellers often start their storytelling careers by reciting other people’s published stories. The Heart of Change by John Kotter and Dan Cohen is an excellent source of workplace narratives. Malcolm Gladwell’s books, Blink, The Tipping Point and Outliers, are another.
Episodes from the narrator’s own experience are just as likely to engage an audience of friends and colleagues. People’s lives are rich with stories about mistakes made, unexpected good deeds and team mates pitching in to deal with an irascible client.
A game of storytelling dice can generate multiple ideas. Make a list of any number of items, from coffee cups to computers to taxi rides, and assign each item a number. Throw the dice and then tell a story to match the item.
Storytelling can be as simple as narrating a wisdom story: telling listeners what a situation was like, what happened to change it, and what it is like now. Sincerity is more important than style. The audience is fellow employees, and sharing stories is a way to create a brighter outlook in the workplace.
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