Story Power — How to wield storytelling power effectively.

There are two types of power in organizations; hierarchical power and storytelling power.

Hierarchical power comes from position on an org chart. This is hard power endowed by title: Director of disruption, SVP of synergy, Grand Poobah of best practices. Your boss, and your boss’s boss. That power, simply put, is the ability to compel action. It's not absolute, and it can be abused.

The limits of hierarchical power are tested by culture, intransigence, lack of know-how, or the ability to work the system. You see its limits with a team that swirls, scrambles, or hunkers down. Faced with change, the unit motto is “This too shall pass.” Inaction leads to reaction; a spiral of bosshole behaviors: micromanagement, dismissiveness, or favoritism.

All of this can be remedied by the other type of power: storytelling power. This is a soft power that influences behavior and inspires action. It is the carrot to hierarchical power’s stick—the ability to shape culture, drive change, and create movements.

So, how do you tap into this storytelling superpower? Is there a silver bullet, a magic bean, or a genie in a lamp? Not quite. Instead, a humdrum list, hard work, and practice: six ways to up your storytelling game:

#1. Understand the structure and mechanics of story.

#2. Read, write, write.

#3. Get people and politics.

#4. Speak.

#5. Cultivate empathy.

#6. Collect and curate stories.

#1. Understand the structure and mechanics of story.

Stories are vehicles of influence; information daubed with emotion that wriggles into your brain. They have common elements: heroes, villains, inciting incidents, magic bullets, and highs and lows. The hero is your audience, the villain is the problem they're struggling with, the inciting incident is the spark of your idea, the magic bullet a solution, all strung together with “but,” “therefore,” and “meanwhile” to keep the highs high and the lows low.

Use tools to help you understand your audience, such as a T-leaf. Get comfortable with concrete language, and learn basic story structures—a hook, meat, and payoff.

Your structure carries the story, giving a familiar and followable cadence. Use visuals to amplify the mechanics of your story—to highlight major points, explain nuanced topics, or help people remember.

#2. Read, write, write.

Words are the fundamental unit of communication. Business storytelling requires that you string them together in a commercially rewarding order. That you choose words that stick. Vivid, relatable phrases to inspire.

This starts by paying attention to what moves you. This could be a line of dialogue, a lyric, or a passage in a book. Rarely is it a bullet on a PowerPoint slide. That wordplay, with statistical certainty, will be a rhetorical device: a metaphor, a word hack, allusions, or parallels.

Write for clarity, brevity, and impact. Author and writer Nicolas Cole advises a rapid rate of reveal—make your point and move on. Don't dwell or meander, slot your argument together quickly, each line punching through a new piece of information.

Use emojis. 😉 Founders of news organization Axios, and authors of the book, Smart Brevity, Jim VandeHei, Mike Allen, and Roy Schwartz, have fully embraced the humble emoji as a cornerstone of the modern world. In their words, “Take an emoji for a 🏃. Your results will be a 🥇.”

One last tip to practice in your writing, from Gary Provost, author of 100 Ways to Improve Your Writing. “Don’t just write words. Write music.”

#3. Get people and politics.

Storytelling is human engineering. The engineering part is easy, the human part is hard. Understanding those humans, their wants and needs, hopes and fears, is basic physics. So too, is navigating the political currents they swim in.

The motive triangle is a simple tool to divine the agenda of your audience. Never mind the ruthless logic of your business case, what are your audience’s secret wishes? What are their hopes and fears?

Answering that question gives you insight into their agenda—a baby step in negotiating organizational politics. Add to that a sense of timing and optics—when to position something and how. Using opportunities to presell ideas, or using your political capital to gain air cover. Politics, in this sense, isn't a dirty word, it's a Latin one: gravitas, the weight and influence you hold within the organization.

Tailor your stories to address the concerns, interests, and aspirations of different audiences; make your narrative relevant and persuasive.

#4. Speak.

“It” —whatever it is, has to sound good. Word choice gets you some of the way, but the way you say it carries even more weight. Tone, emphasis, and pacing can turn whatever you say into something better. This is why Morgan Freeman reading a shopping list sounds profound.

Before you rush out for elocution lessons, remember there is no one right way to present. Robin Williams was frenetic. Steven Wright is deadpan. Where Williams would electrify a crowd with his energetic delivery, Wright would use simple, mundane phrases that, on their own, aren't particularly funny. However, his monotonous tone, slow pacing, and deliberate pauses make the delivery work. For example, he might say, "I spilled spot remover on my dog. Now he's gone." The humor doesn't just come from the clever wordplay, but from the way Wright delivers it—completely deadpan, as if it's a serious matter.

In speaking—especially in a business context—you want to be authentically you, but the best version of you. Are you clear and concise? How do you add ‘entertaining?’ Are you witty and memorable, but need to be more crisp? Know what’s missing and work on it.

Whether you're presenting an idea, giving feedback, or telling a story, how you speak can make all the difference in engaging and persuading your audience. It's not just what you say, but how you say it.

#5. Cultivate empathy.

Storytelling is an exercise in emotion. It’s minimal. With a story conveying some information and sensation, it leaves the audience to fill in gaps. Ultimately, a story is a shared experience between the teller and the told. Subtlety and nuance, not technical detail, make a story sing.

Empathy plays a crucial role in creating emotional impact. People will forget what you said, but—according to Maya Angelou—they will never forget how you made them feel. Empathy, as a storyteller, is the fuel for context and subtext.

Cognitive empathy, aka "perspective-taking," aka “walking in someone else’s shoes,” provides a glimpse into what someone else is feeling or thinking. It allows storytellers to tailor messages that resonate, ensuring relevance and effectiveness.

Compassionate empathy; caring for and wanting to help your audience, fosters trust, encouraging the audience to engage with you as a storyteller. This form of empathy is not just about understanding or sharing someone’s feelings, but also about being moved to supportive action.

Empathy goes beyond sharing stories, it forges bonds.

#6. Collect and curate stories.

Everyone has experiences. Life, happening in moments that are funny or sad, surprising or routine. We all have triumphs and disappointments. Your job as a storyteller is to collect and hone them. Figure out what makes the story work; what to keep in, and what to leave out. What to embellish, and what to downplay.

These become your signature stories. A repository of narratives that suit the situation. They have a moral, a surprise, or a lesson learned. They establish a point of view or highlight a value. There are origin stories—how you started in a particular place or field; stories of triumph over adversity, with a moral to keep going; horror stories of mistakes you have made and learned from.

They all have one thing in common—they're compelling. But that’s not all. They stick in the mind, becoming stories your audience won’t easily forget. They’re relatable, striking a chord with universal truths we all share.

Most importantly, they're authentic, grounded in reality that cuts through the noise. This authenticity gives your stories weight, making them more than just narratives. They resonate, leaving a lasting impact and sometimes, maybe a little, prompting change.

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