Monthly Archives

December 2016

best practices brand stories

Want to gamble? Hide the objective in your story.

Before you watch the video (which you may have seen already and should watch again anyway) and before you read the NPR article about it (which has spoilers so watch the video first) please reflect on this. Can your organization show a story where you don’t tell the objective until the end?  I don’t typically advise this approach because it is so high risk. You’d have to make all the other components of your set up so good to keep the audience interested. You’d…

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best practices character selection self-advocacy

Don’t make a long story too short

Board trainings are the best. One day, a buttoned up guy with a fabulous head of silver hair—we’ll call him Peter—moved himself to tears. He sat in a windowless conference room surrounded by a dozen fellow board members he had just met. Peter told us a story about a teenage hooligan, Jimmy, falling through the cracks. A very special nun, Sister Bea, went to bat for Jimmy and got him a gig as an orderly. As Peter spoke about Jimmy’s struggles and Sister Bea’s compassion he choked…

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