In a story workshop I was leading in Chicago last year, an employee stood up during a recap in front of 20 co-workers, including his boss, and said, “I’ve been here [at the company] for a year, and this [workshop] was the first time I felt like I knew what I was supposed to be doing.”
This did not go over well with his boss, who prided herself on running a tight shop. It was one of those moments when a person goes public with a personal truth that would’ve been better shared in private. Awk! Ward!
What the rookie could’ve said without offending his boss was that he enjoyed the process by which we break macro problems into their micro-parts using storytelling.
He could’ve explained that when we are focused only on the big picture we can lose sight of the little snapshots–the productive moment-to-moment, day-to-day actions that comprise the big picture.
He could’ve said that he’s so far down the chain of command that he struggles to make a connection between his role and the company’s mission.
But he didn’t. He awked his moment.
[Here’s where I hear a TV commercial announcer voice in my head: DON’T LET THIS HAPPEN TO YOU! Introducing 21 Day Story! All the Moments, with none of the Awkward!]
A 21 Day Story immerses people in a problem and lets them collaborate on how the problem will be resolved, one piece of the story at a time. That’s what the Chicago rookie experienced. We oriented him to the business problem in a way that gave him his bearings. A role he understood, in a story he and his team were building together.
Stories are designed to solve problems. The ending to a story is literally a problem solved. So if we look at a business objective–better sales, more customer engagement, or any type of strategic initiative, etc.–as a problem that needs solving, we can build a story that resolves itself as the achieving of that objective.
The micro-parts of a 21 Day Story — 90 second experiences twice a day– continuously feed forward: Day 2 informs Day 5…Day 6 informs Days 8 and 13…and so on. Meanwhile, the 21 Day Story experiences inform all the company’s ongoing communication practices, ultimately culminating in Day 21, and a roadmap and backlog.
On Day 22, you will know what to do. And you will come to believe, as we do, as the Chicago rookie did at the time but bobbled the ball when putting it into words–
A problem will get solved faster and better if the people responsible for solving it co-create the solution.
