The Power of Storytelling: Why your Brain loves Good Storytelling in Business too
Roxana Bl?gescu
Communication&Executive Coaching|Empowering Visionary CEOs&Global Leaders navigate change, own their transformation, lead with presence,& inspire with their voice across cultures|Mentor of choice|Founder SpeakUp Dynamics
It is dark and quiet. You are watching an action movie. The theatre is hushed. The main character shows up on the edge of a building as his enemy takes aim. Heart rates are increasing, palms sweating in the audience, the brain activity of the viewers is at high rate. An amazing neural ballet is taking place in your Brain as the story line is changing the activity in it.
Storytelling is an integral part of the human experience. For thousands of years, stories have allowed us to make sense of the world, build connections, and pass on knowledge and traditions. Our mind is actually a story craving. And our brains' tendency to organise information into narratives.
The main Neuroscience theories are showing that brain loves stories because of the sensory stimulation, it helps to make meaning out of the chaos and because of the social bonding.
And many business people have already discovered the power of storytelling in a practical sense – they have observed how compelling a well constructed narrative can be. As stories can engage, persuade, change our attitudes, beliefs, and behaviours.
As social creatures, humans are wired to connect with others. Stories allow us to simulate social experience even when we are alone. And we also depend on others for our survival and happiness, for our business.
The key element here is oxytocin a key signal in our brain showing that “it’s safe to approach others”. Oxytocin is also produced when we are trusted or shown a kindness, and it motivates cooperation with others, allowing us to connect on a deeper level. This neurochemical is enhancing the sense of empathy, our ability to experience others’ emotions. Empathy is crucial for social creatures because it allows us to understand how others are likely to react to a situation, including those with whom we work.
Studies revealed that character-driven stories do consistently cause oxytocin synthesis. Further, the amount of oxytocin released by the brain predicted how much people were willing to help others; for example, donating money to a charity associated with the narrative.
Stories do wonders when it comes to motivation. Especially those developing tension during the narrative as they enhance the desire of helping the others. If your story is able to stimulate that tension then it is likely that your audience will come to share the emotions in it, and after it ends, likely to continue mimicking the feelings and behaviours. This also explains the feeling of dominance you have after your superhero saves the world, and your motivation to work out after watching a movie where characters are fit.
Now imagine that you are using all this power of the storytelling in a business setting! As these Neuroscience findings are applying in such a scenery too. Furthermore, character-driven stories with emotional content result in a better understanding of the key points a speaker wishes to make and enable better recall of these points weeks later on. In terms of making impact, this blows the standard PowerPoint presentation to bits. Try to begin every presentation with a compelling, human-scale story and watch its effects. When building your story, you can also focus on answering to these questions:
The answer is really simple: these are the components that make information persuasive and memorable. As non native speaker too.
Storytelling is also effective in pitiable situations of your customers and how their problems were solved by your efforts. Make your audience and team empathise with the pain the customer experienced and they will also feel the pleasure of its resolution – all the more if some heroics went in to reducing suffering or struggle, or producing joy.
Stories tend to share a dramatic arc in which a character struggles and eventually finds heretofore unknown abilities and uses these to triumph over adversity and our brain tend to be highly attracted to this story style.
And finally, don’t forget that your organization has its own story – its founding myth. An effective way to communicate transcendent purpose is by sharing that tale. Surprisingly it provides guidance for daily decision-making as well as the motivation that comes with the conviction that the organization’s work must go on, and needs everyone’s full engagement to make a difference in people’s lives.
As conclusion, when you want to motivate, engage or persuade, or just remembered, strat with a story. Eventually a story about human struggle and a triumph. It will capture people’s hearts – by first attracting their brains.
If you want to find out more about The Art of Storytelling in Business as a Non Native Speaker and how to engage and persuade and you are in Bucharest on 29th of July, sign up at our next Workshop from the serie ”The Art of Public Speaking for Non Native Speakers” by using the link:
There are 5 more places available from 10!