Storytelling workshop
Management reports convey information, stories an experience. If you combine the two, the result is a perfect look. Just like a stack of pancakes, you can layer facts and stories on top of each other. The alternation between facts and stories creates tension and thus the impetus with which you can give your audience an impulse to do what you want them to do.
Presentations and speeches are a powerful tool for convincing a large number of people of your ideas. If you spice up your presentations and speeches with stories, your ideas are more likely to prevail.
Storytelling – like sugar on a tablet
Stories are like the sugar layer on the tablet, they make the contents digestible and easier to digest. Unfortunately, it is now the cultural norm in business to write presentations as fact-based reports and not as stories. However, presentations are not management reports. And just because the report was created with Microsoft PowerPoint doesn’t make it an effective presentation!
Management reports are distributed and presentations are given. Management reports are not presentations and presentations are not management reports. Both have their own format – and should ideally be treated as such.
Number cemeteries and lead deserts
The content of your presentations is important and very relevant for your audience. To have a lasting effect, you don’t have to project everything on the wall and allow everyone to read along. Only when you connect your facts with people does something really change.
Of course, it is more convenient and less time-consuming to present cemeteries of figures and deserts of lead. However, this approach does not connect people with ideas. Your audience will immediately notice how (un)important it is to you if you go on stage with obviously minimal preparation.
Good stories have structure
Once you know you are presenting, your mindset should change. It’s not just about conveying facts, but also about creating an experience. This is the first step on the way from a mere report to an effective and memorable story.
Why do some stories captivate and why not others? Why are there movies that are not tediously long despite being overlong? Why are reports from Disney or National Geographic internationally successful and not from ARD and ZDF? In short: What makes a good story?
The answer is already in the title: Good stories have structure.
Drama, baby, drama!
All good stories, whether it’s a Pixar movie, a successful novel by your favorite author or your presentation, follow a certain dramaturgical structure. There is no secret sauce, just a clean structure. The most famous one is by the German playwright Gustav Freytag and comes in the form of a pyramid. It states that effective stories can be divided into elements, which usually include the introduction of the protagonists, a rising action, the climax, the falling action and the catastrophe.
Yes, Freytag was a playwright. Disney is a different story. And you too, of course! You certainly have a lot of great stories and anecdotes just waiting to be used.
Great coaches will be happy to show you how!