How Do I Tell A Great Story?

Posted in: Leadership Presenting Posted on

In This Episode

Heard a good story lately?  Who’s the best story teller you know?  Are you a good story teller?  What makes for a good story?  These are just some of the questions we tackle in today’s episode.

Today’s show was inspired by a recent encounter Adam had with incoming Rotary International President Jennifer Jones who is a fantastic story teller.  Jennifer’s presentation was so impactful that it had an unintended effect on Adam which he shared during the show today.

Some of the things we covered that helps make a story good include:

  • Emotion: a good story brings you into the scene so you as the listener experience many of the same emotions as the person who experienced the story whether that means they make you laugh, cry, or something in between.
  • Paint The Picture: good stories include enough detail to paint a picture for what happened during the story. The story will include things that touch on all your senses from visual to smell to taste and feel.  The story teller brings you into the scene with them.
  • Passion/Enthusiasm: it’s hard to tell a good story if you don’t have some enthusiasm or passion where you tell it in a way that stirs people’s emotions.
  • Pace: take your time when telling a story. But at the same time, don’t take so long to tell it that you lose people’s interest along the way.  Be sure not to go so fast that folks can’t keep up either.
  • Foreshadowing: the person listening to the story will often try to figure out what’s going to happen next. It’s helpful to provide a little foreshadowing of where things might be going as it builds anticipation to see if you can guess the outcome.

As a business owner it can help to be a good story teller.  You will have lots of chances to practice telling stories whether it be to your team, current or potential customers, vendors, bankers, or investors.  The better you get at telling stories the better chance you have for your message to be received and remembered.

People, Companies and Resources We Mentioned in the Show

Join Us Next Time

Join us next week when we will be joined by Terry Walkerly of Filta Environmental NEO (http://www.gofilta.com/locations/ohio/cleveland-cooking-oil-filtration-service).  Terry will share his entrepreneurial story which includes being unemployable as he was fired from every job he’s ever had, including multiple times by his father!

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