StoryQuest Blog

Business Narrative; the concept leveraged more and more these days in the corporate world. But what is it? What are its components? How can it be used?

In essence, a business narrative is a type of storytelling. Stories, just the same as we were told at bedtime as children, which speak to the commonalities of us as people. These “Narratives” pontificate upon our strengths, our weaknesses, our triumphs, and our failures, but most importantly, the journey to get there

Corporations have realized that their greatest resource is often within its walls: their own people. Better than a memo or a PowerPoint presentation, they can inspire their people through their own personal stories and experiences.

As Robert Dickman explains in his article, “The Business of Narrative and How it Works,” every business narrative has four essential components.

Passion

“Every successful story must have passion, the raw emotion that is wrapped around our narrative’s central fact. Passion is the fire that draws an audience’s attention,” according to Dickman. The person telling the story really has to have a fire under his belly so to speak to keep the audience interested and engaged. Technical terms and statistics will only take you so far. A story of skepticism, defeat and then overcoming circumstances to triumph will stay with a person more than a number or a graph.

Hero

This is where all the passion is derived from in the first place. The hero isn’t necessarily super in nature, but is the main character and the voice that takes the audience on the journey, or story arch.

Action

Confronting the problem or challenge, which in a good business narrative, is a shared concern or problem with the audience listening to it. Without the challenge, the skepticism or even an initial failure, this story could very easily come off as a PR or more commercial piece.  Dickman states the important point, “Powerful obstacles in the narrative make it ring true. Problems help the audience identify more deeply with the story.

Transformation

The transformation is the most essential part of the process. This is the part in the book or movie where the hero overcomes the villain and gets the girl. On a more realistic scale, this is where our hero overcomes the obstacle or problem facing their business. Dickman says, “Sacrifice and repeated effort is demanded for the problem to be overcome. Somehow audiences sense how difficult it is to create real change. They feel satisfied when they see the hero emerge from the fires of hell and a changed and better human being.”