Storytelling: Creating Stories and Characters

00:00 When you're telling a story, it's crucial that you relive actual conversations with real people, that you share the dialogue.

00:08 And the problem most people have is they become this boring narrator looking down.

00:12 And the customer explained to me he was dissatisfied with our level of service.

00:17 See how boring that sounds? How sort of clinical it sounds.

00:22 It's much more effective to say, Well, Jane Smathers said, Gee, I can't believe you haven't delivered the product yet.

00:30 I'm going to demand a refund.

00:32 And I said, Well, calm down, Jane.

00:34 That's dialogue.

00:37 When you're actually reliving a real conversation with a real person, what they said to you and what you said back, we all do this all the time, talking to friends, family, one on one.

00:50 A client calls us on the phone at the office.

00:52 We all tell stories using dialogue.

00:55 The problem is, when we're getting up to give a so-called formal speech, we tend to strip the dialogue out of everything, and we boil it down to its bland, boring essence.

01:06 Don't do it. The dialogue is what makes it interesting.

01:10 Captivating gives us your audience a sense of being there, the flavor of it, and that's why it's crucial.

01:17 So you must have dialogue when telling your story.

01:22 And no, you don't have to make it up.

01:24 Just relive actual conversations you had.

01:27 When you're telling a story in a presentation or speech, you have to introduce characters and describe what the problem is.

01:34 What's the conflict now? Unless you sit in your office all day long and the phone doesn't ring once, and you just get one email at the end of the day with your boss saying, Hope you had a good day.

01:43 See you tomorrow. All of us experience conflicts from time to time.

01:48 We all have problems.

01:49 So when you're telling a story, all you're doing is recounting the problem.

01:54 Now, don't say it's with a customer.

01:57 That's an abstraction.

01:59 Don't say it's with the Smith Company.

02:01 Say it's with Jim Smithers, the vice president of sales at the Smith Company.

02:08 Explain exactly who the problem is and explain what the problem is. He's he is saying, T.J., we got a big problem.

02:16 This delivery isn't here.

02:17 We've already prepaid.

02:19 We demand a refund.

02:22 That's describing the problem in detail with the character.

02:26 So don't be abstract.

02:28 Don't say they don't say customers paint a picture with someone specific, a real person.

02:34 Now you can change the name if you need to or change the last name.

02:39 I'm not asking you to violate anyone's confidentiality.

02:42 It's a client, but you need to paint a picture with a real person and describe what the real problem or conflict is in your story.

02:51 When telling a story, you must have a resolution.

02:54 How did things end up? What's the point of it? Again, you may have made the point at the beginning of the story.

03:00 Now you've told it.

03:02 How did things end up in such a way that it fleshes out your key point? Don't leave people hanging.

03:08 Don't let them wonder in your guessing what happens.

03:10 Because if they're wondering about you off in the jungle here and now, you're on to some new point of finance, they're not with you.

03:17 So tie your story together and make sure people understand. There was a beginning, there was a middle, and there's an ending.

03:25 Here's how it ended and why we should care now.

03:30 The whole key to telling stories effectively when you're giving a speech or presentation is that you're not actually telling stories.

03:38 You're simply reliving an actual experience you have.

03:41 You're reliving a conversation you had.

03:43 You can see it.

03:45 If a client or customer was angry with you, you're envisioning them yelling at you or yelling at you over the phone.

03:51 You're not making up dialogue.

03:54 You're simply recounting an actual conversation.

03:57 Here's the real secret a lot of people don't understand about great speakers.

04:01 Great speakers are often lazy.

04:04 They're not out writing and rewriting and rewriting interesting stories till two in the morning. They're simply reliving actual experiences they had and using them.

04:16 When there is a story where there's a message there that's relevant, again, message is what drives everything.

04:21 The stories are the ways of amplifying the message and getting people to remember it.

04:27 So don't try to create or think of new stories from scratch.

04:32 Simply relive, recount, real experiences you had.

04:37 That's what will be powerful for your audience.