Great Leaders Tell Great Stories

“Storytelling is the single most powerful tool in a leader’s toolkit,” says Harvard’s Howard Gardner, author of numerous books including Leading Mind and Changing Minds—and many other management experts agree. To get everyone moving in the same direction, leaders need to clearly communicate the organization’s vision, mission and goals. The way to do that is to enliven concepts by relating examples of real-life business experiences and “people caught doing things right.”

As reported in Around the Corporate Campfire: How Great Leaders Use Stories to Inspire Success, a growing number of global leaders are following the example set by FedEx, Nike, Mary Kay, The Container Store and Costco Wholesale, where stories are systematically used for company-wide communications. Great leaders tell great stories.

Especially in times of shrinking budgets and declining sales, organizations can’t afford to waste even a small fraction of their resources. With budgets slashed month after month in some cases, it’s imperative that leaders optimize every dollar to ensure the highest productivity humanly (and humanely) possible and keep everyone moving in the same direction. That’s the only way to win and retain the most profitable customers as well as attract and retain the most successful employees. That’s why stories are crucial.

Using stories deliberately (telling the right story at the right time to the right audience for the right reason) has a significant impact on a company’s performance. The results of effective storytelling were reported years ago in Built to Last, and as awareness of the data has spread, the practice of storytelling as a management communication tool has caught on worldwide in the past decade.

Stories are powerful for a number of reasons. Here are the top three: first, stories touch people’s hearts and make an lasting imprint on their minds; second, they build connections, serving as the “glue” that helps people stick together; and third, they make abstract concepts understandable by clearly painting the picture of how employees successfully enact the company’s mission and goals.

When a corporate leader articulates the organization’s core story consistently, people at all levels are captivated by the vision and begin “singing from the same page.” Their unity solidifies commitment to the mission and engenders success.

Here are five ways you can begin using stories to power up your organization:

1. Convey corporate values: Leaders need to continually remind people of the organization’s core values. By telling stories about employees “caught doing something right,” they also give recognition to deserving employees and celebrate individuals’ successes.

2. Attract and retain employees: Organizations that accurately convey their values and culture attract and retain employees who not only fit in easily but also become loyal supporters who stay with the company.

3. Build more effective teams: When a new team forms, have the members share stories of their experiences--in the organization, their careers or their personal lives. This builds connections and solidifies relationships, leading to better mutual support and, ultimately, improved customer service.

4. Help people cope with change: As a company goes through major change, such as a merger, acquisition, or reorganization, morale and productivity can dive. Managers who share their vision for the future and share their own “war stories” of successfully adapting to change will calm employees’ fears and increase workforce effectiveness and commitment.

5. Increase sales: Many salespeople are natural storytellers, often relating the experiences of satisfied customers to explain product or service benefits to prospective customers. Also, rather than focusing on raw sales figures, sales managers can share stories of exceptional customer service. By relating “how it was done,” they help salespeople develop their skills and, in turn, improve results.

Great leaders tell great stories. Isn't it time your management team learns to leverage the power of storytelling?