What can I do with a Story-Strategy?

Move your audience, your team, your people

Through the ages from ancient myths to modern fantasy, Bible stories to Grimm fairy tales, story tellers from the earliest times until now has harnessed the power of story to impact the lives of others and to teach them truths that otherwise seem abstract and complex.

They knew how to meet their audience where they were and draw them into a story world that opened to them a new perspective and took them on a journey of discovery so that, by the end of the story, something had shifted for them. In identification with the people in the story, the listeners could change how they see things, what they believe about their world and how they act within it.

Story-Strategy is the underlying blue print of how stories do this. What are the mechanisms that draw people in?

How do you shape the story so that people change their beliefs, opinions and actions?

But Story-Strategy does not end with its use in shaping stories that are written or told. This very same strategy can help you shift the story of your life, the lies of your audience, the story of your organisation.  You can apply the same strategies that story tellers use to tell great stories, to live a great life story, or to design a story for an organisation, or a team, or a social grouping of any other kind.

Story-Strategy is the internal structure of stories that allow them to move people. These same structures can be used to design

  • talks,
  • workshops,
  • Organisational Development Programmes,
  • Interventions,
  • conferences,
  • learning material or
  • personal development projects.

But it is not just these internal design features of story that can move people, but also the delivery methods: the way you present the story through training, coaching, facilitation, talking and selling. There is also an entire printed media side to this, but I like to focus only on the oral delivery of the story.

Story-Strategy is the big picture sequential design and the poignant delivery of messages and events that take people from where they are to where they could be.

Every good story-strategy, like every good story, has a well designed beginning, middle and end. Each of these three can be divided into three more sections so that your beginning leaves no-one behind, your middle keeps everyone rivitted and your end leaves them changed forever.

To design conferences, workshops, talks or programmes that move people, use a Story-Strategy.

 

Story Secrets for Speakers #3: Demonstrate your magic

Why should your audience trust you?

Once you have painted a picture of the possibility (Story Secret #1) and you have overcome the first block to your message, personal resistance, by calling on the hero’s character (Story Secret #2), it is time to let the audience know why they should trust you. Who are you that I should take you seriously? What makes you the expert? Because if you can overcome their resistance then you can get them to act on what you say. Why does Cinderella do what the Fairy God Mother told her to do? Why does Frodo leave the beloved Shire and go on a journey to Mordor, and possibly death? The only reason why Frodo set out on a journey to the land of Mordor was because Gandalf told him to do so. And because the Fairy Godmother told Cinderella to go to the ball she did.

But how did Gandalf get Frodo to trust him? And the Fairy Godmother Cinderella?

By demonstrating their magic. Yes, it helps to rattle off an impressive CV and it helps to list your credentials, but this is not half as powerful as turning pumpkins into carriages. What they think is, mice are really white horses and what they think is an ugly old dress need to become a beautiful evening gown. What if an old ring your uncle played with, suddenly becomes the most powerful object in the world. Before their eyes ordinary things turn into something out of this world. Not by itself. Through you, demonstrating your magic. Demonstrating your magic means that YOU let your audience see ordinary things in a whole new light. And with all magic it is simpler than you think. Here are three of the most used ways in which speakers help the audience trust them by revealing their magic…

  1. By demonstrating their expertise – reason
  2. By sharing personal experience – action
  3. By relating to the audience’s experience – heart

Whichever one of these techniques you choose, the aim is always the same: to help your audience overcome doubts and reservations so they will believe again. Let’s take these techniques one by one to show what I mean: 1.         Reason through demonstrating expertise How many times have you heard a speaker say something like: The Harvard School of business has proved that 93% of a certain group of people do something a certain way, but in fact it is the 7% that is left that are successful?  Then the speaker reveal the logic behind this; giving facts, statistics and logical argument until, like that 7% the audience also sees the light. If they buy the reasoning, they buy your magic. 2.         Share your personal experience – Action The typical story here says: “In nineteen-hundred-and-something, I faced this or that challenge. But today I stand here having overcome… these are the simple things I did… the actions I took…  to make it work. In your story you were the Yahoo and by trial and error you saw the light and now you can share your insights–your magic–with the audience. Your audience believes you, because you are living proof. 3.         Relating to the audience – Heart This technique goes like this: “You know how you sometimes do xyz only to discover abc?” or “Have you ever found when you do d then e happens right after?” By citing typical behaviour and experience common to all human beings, you show how the audience themselves intuitively know that these are the steps to take in spite of the doubts and questions they may have. You can do this with great humour as you typify universal experiences and poke fun at people’s common reactions. Again you show yourself to be the one to trust because you know them and you can even clarify their own muddled experience and make sense of it. I find this latter technique the most powerful of all three, especially in a participative training and facilitation space where you can ask the question directly to your audience and create a safe environment for them to air doubts and reservations. If you can allow your audience to have doubts and accept that their doubts are okay. If you can understand and allow for their questions, you reveal your heart and the strength of your own conviction.

Ironically, talking about doubt often builds the most trust.

In C. S. Lewis’s ‘The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe’ the lion and mentor Aslan tells Peter that he will be a king. Peter says that Aslan must be mistaken, that he could not possibly be a king. That Aslan does not know how much of a coward he is. That Aslan does not really understand him at all. While they are talking an enemy wolf attacks Peter’s sisters, Lucy and Susan. Peter rushes to defend them and then come face to face with a wolf he has lost against before, acting like a coward. His friends want to help him, but Aslan holds them back saying “This is Peter’s fight”. Peter fight the wolf and kill him, overcoming his own doubt in Aslan’s words. Aslan allowed him to have his doubts and express them freely. And then, through action, Peter proved that Aslan did in fact know him truly – magically – and knew he was no coward at all. Of course, Aslan does not send Peter into the battle without a sword. It is the nature and power of the weapon you provide for your audience that is the focus of Story Secret #4.

Dr. Petro Janse van Vuuren

Researcher, Speaker and Coach

Story Secrets for Speakers #2: Call on the Hero’s Character

Once the audience catches on to a new idea, a new way of viewing a problem reframed as a possibility (Story Secret #1), they must be enrolled as the heroes who can make that possibility happen.

As soon as your audience starts dreaming about new possibilities their status quo is threatened. This automatically leads to at least four kinds of resistance. The first kind is personal resistance.

The most effective strategy to overcome this kind of resistance, is to make an appeal on the prospective hero’s character as revealed in their core values. Why does Horton in Dr. Seuss’s Horton hears a Who take up the dangerous opportunity of saving the tiny city on the clover? Because Horton believes “a person’s a person no matter how small”. It is this belief that sets him apart from the other creatures in the story – interestingly underlined by the fact that he himself is the largest ‘person’ in the story. This belief not only gets Horton to commit to the adventure, but also pulls him through when it becomes difficult to continue.

Gandalf convinces Frodo in Tolkien’s ‘The Lord of the Rings’ to take on the treacherous journey to destroy the ring and save Middle Earth, by appealing to his Hobbit nature.  Frodo gets angry and resistant, but Gandalf goes even deeper. He calls upon ‘the pity of Bilbo’, Frodo’s uncle,  as a trait that not only Frodo possesses too, but one that could be the key to success. Frodo, who dearly loves his uncle and who is also Bilbo’s heir, understands the gravity of this idea that he had also inherited Bilbo’s nature as one who takes pity. He sees that he is the one to take up the challenge.

It is the ability of the guide or mentor to see the best in the hero that inspires the hero to take on the challenge. It is similarly the job of us as speakers and trainers to see the potential in our audience and view them as possessing the special qualities that will make them successful. In this way we begin to overcome personal resistance early on.

The teacher who looks at her class and sees difficult teenagers who would rather Mxit than learn, has a very hard time teaching them. Another teacher looks at the same group and sees teenagers desperate for something intriguing and worthwhile to learn.  She has a ball in class  inspiring them to achieve new heights. She even uses Mxit in her learning strategy to help them internalise her teaching.

How do you enroll your audience as heroes? Here are some examples I have used with success:

1. Name tags: At a youth conference we printed the designation ‘chosen one’ on the name tags worn by the audience identifying their roles as heroes with an important job.

2. Hand outs: with a vision and values alignment workshop we printed the handout in the form of a passport and enrolled the delegates as ‘ambassadors’ for the newly articulated vision and values statement..

3. Interactive devices: At a staff conference of Spier Wine Farm on customer service, we asked the audience to be judges of the presentation enrolling them as the experts on customer service. We devised a tool whereby they could intervene and fix the service disasters we were presenting to them.

As we look over to our audience what do we see? People in need of our rescue, or people endowed with exactly the right character and nature to make the change themselves?

Sure, you say, but what of those experiences where the resistance in the room and the scepticism is so thick you can cut it with a knife? Change is difficult and often painful and people will resist it.

Dealing with the other 3 kinds of resistance is the subject of Story Secrets for Speakers #3, 4 and 5. Read more in next month’s newsletter.

Dr. Petro Janse van Vuuren

Professional Speaker and Story Strategist

 

Story Secrets for Speakers #1: Paint a Picture of the Possibility

What made James in Roald Dahl;s ‘James and the Giant Peach’ climb inside a giant peach, befriend life size bugs and steer across an ocean to go to New York? What made Cinderella get out of the ashes and off to the Prince’s ball? What made the frog turn into a prince?

The answer to all these questions is the same: they believed that it was possible. Of course, none of them started out believing it, they all needed someone to paint them a picture of the possibility. James lost hope when his cruel aunts destroyed the picture his deceased father had given him showing the big vibrant city of New York.  This dream needed reviving by the peculiar little man with the shiny green things. Cinderella was shattered and crying in the ashes when the Fairy Godmother found her. As for the frog: it was the arrival of the princess that sparked his hope.

So why then do most marketing gurus tell you that, if you want to sell yourself as a speaker, you have to paint a picture of the problem that you want to solve for your client? ‘Make them feel the pain’ is one piece of advice I had received. Speaking to your audience is, in essence, nothing different than selling an idea, so what gives?

Stories, being metaphors for life, provide a possible solution to this question. In stories some of the guides or mentors also opt for painting the picture of the problem rather than of the possibility, but this happens mostly when they want to get the hero to change the lot of others rather than her own lot.

Gandalf tells Frodo an elaborate and alarming tale highlighting the dangers of the magic ring and pointing to the evil it could bring to the hobbits of the Shire. It is in response to the plight of his fellow hobbits that Frodo takes up the burden of the ring and sets off on his impossible mission to destroy it. Similarly, if you want your client to spend money on your keynote or your training, you may well have to paint them a picture of the problems their staff and their company may experience should their issues go unaddressed. Doing this enroles them as the potential hero: the one who will save his or her community from the dragons they face.

But, behold, if you want them to change their own lives and take up new habits, you will have to sell to them the possibility of life beyond where they are. People are notoriously blind and even resistant to seeing their own flaws. You may show them what problems their colleagues, children or managers might be facing, but this does not help them to face their own demons, for that, they need more preparation.

For people to really see their own weakness and choose to do something about it,  you need the rest of the story – you need the other 6 story secrets. A story is nothing other than the sequence of events that are necessary for the main character to change, to undergo a permanent shift in perspective as they face their own demons.

As guide and mentor the first step is to paint a picture of the possibility so that they can ‘feel the pain’ of not being there yet and begin to yearn for change. Your first job is to ask ‘What if…” What if you could go to New York in a giant peach What if you, the lowly Cinderella could dance with the royal heir?  What if a frog could be a prince?

What if you knew all 7 secrets of how to get the Cinderellas and the frogs in your audiences to change their own fates?

Watch this space for the next instalment of 7 Story Secrets for Speakers: Story Secret #2 Call on the hero’s character.

Dr. Petro Janse van Vuuren

Researcher, Speaker and Coach

Find all the sectrets here:

  1. Paint a picture of the possibility contrasted with the pain of the current reality.
  2. Call on the Hero’s Character This is the chosen one, the one whom the prophesies mention
  3. Demonstrate your magic: by providing a personalised tool
  4. Your secret weapon and the power of 3,5 and 7
  5. Introduce the travelling companions so they know who is in it with them
  6. Reframe the situation with a fresh perspective when the pawpaw hits the fan and then:
  7. Die with grace…

Need a speaking coach? Contact Petro

Interested in a course in facilitation and coaching? Click here

Looking for a speaker or storyteller at your event? Contact Petro

What your posture and breathing says about you

I see the speaking space as one of those precious in-between worlds where fears and fantasies both come to life. If you are able to manage your fears all your fantasies can come true!

This week 10 people who attended my workshops in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa, are starting work on the roots of their voice: Posture and breathing. They are on a six week do it yourself voice training course using my book ‘Grow Your Voice to Speak with Confidence’ and the training CD that goes with it. You can join them by following this blog. If you want the book and CD, click here.

Check your posture constantly, but especially while you are speaking. Your body reveals if you are over eager, do not care enough, or self-conscious. From a neutral ‘perfect’ posture you can go anywhere and take your audience with you. Your muscles are relaxed and ready to respond to your intention and serve your message.

When you are in ‘perfect’ neutral posture, you also have the maximum capacity for breathing. Always keep your chest extended and only breathe from the lower lungs. Here you have control and increased capacity.

To inspire you, here is a link to a youtube video of Victoria Labalme. She is a speaker/performer. She begins her talk immediately after dancing. Yes a dancing. Out of breath she begins her talk. You can hear how she catches her breath in between sentences, but he speech itself is unaffected by this. Watch how she manages to control her speech completely in spite of being out of breath. This is only possible because she knows how to breathe, keep her voice in her chest, use her articulation to shape words and maintain control the meaning of the words not letting her rushed breathing and heightened energy take over.

When you are done watching, come back and tell me what you got from watching.

Victoria Labalme: Check her voice control after dancing.

Full video

Shorter version that starts after the dance.

Maritzburg, when are you putting in your 12 minutes? Share with each other by commenting on this post.

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