Why Narrative?
This is the inaugural blog post for Go Narrative! A new company, founded by Matthew Woodget, predicated on a passion for helping others lead more fulling lives and successful businesses fueled by the power of the modern narrative.
I got this, Isn't this just storytelling?
No! If you have been in business during the past five years you will have been hard pressed not to be exposed to the "storytelling" craze. If you were in high-tech, let along marketing then I'd be flat out surprised if it wasn't on your radar. I for one embraced it. I've always loved stories. Not just written or film. The very act of telling a story. Hearing a story. Being steeping in a story as an experience that I recognized was so profound that I'd be forever changed.
Hi-tech, among other industries, desperately needs impactful, well-crafted narratives. The competition. The Noise. The cloud services which are oh-so-easy to cancel your subscription from. Sticky customer journey require stories and proper storytelling requires intentional narratives.
Storytelling is a vast topic. It is massive. And most people just don't know how to decode a business problem and re-code it into the story format. Let alone how to land that story across multiple products, markets, channels and the customer journeys found in each. How can something which is so much a part of who we are (well said here by Story & Heart) be so hard to apply practically.
One word.
Narrative.
Story is really just all the who, what, how, when and where. It can be sliced and diced in many, many (I'll throw that in again for effect… MANY) ways. How you tell it can greatly affect the outcome, as any liar will tell you. The reason, there are many narratives. Every story has multiple, dozens or even hundreds.
Take something we have all done, going on vacation, and think about the planning, the journey, the experience at the destination and so forth. Did you have fun (I hope so)? Were you robbed (I hope not)? What did you learn, see, experience? You can tell a macro narrative of "the vacation". You can share how you were moved and changed by something you experienced (a sub narrative) or a lesson you learned in this different place (a micro narrative). All of these sit in the storyscape of your vacation and the story is tied together by narratives.
It just so happens that the same goes for your business and you are probably getting it wrong.
I'll end with some story-porn. I'm a sucker for a good film - you can pack so many narratives into one five minute piece. Imagery. Music. Narration.
As Story & Heart shared in the link above here is Blood & Oil by Cale Glendening. Enjoy!