Storytelling Tips for Public Speakers

Since the beginning of time, humans have been able to understand complex ideas through stories. Primitive humans sitting around campfires told stories about adventures of going off to the seashore or up the highest mountains. And because of what we learned we've been able not just to survive, but thrive under every type of condition. 

The human brain has this amygdala which serves as a kind of ‘experience-simulator.' When we hear stories, our minds have the same patterns as if they were really happening to us. This allows us to try on new experiences over and over again before we experience them in real life. 

A well-told story engages your audience and connects them to the content in a way that nothing else ever can. Research suggests most PowerPoint presentations are forgotten moments after you walk out the door, but we will remember stories, sometimes, for the rest of our lives. 

So what goes into storytelling? Here are ten tips to make you a better storyteller.

1. Make your story about your audience

The best type of story for your audience is one that is about…your audience. That's right, make it about them. Start by including them in the setup. "Have you ever been angry? Like, really angry?" You start to see some nods. "Have you ever been so angry you couldn't make words? Like you'd try to say something, and it would come out as gibberish?" This process is a way to invite them into your story and make it, kind of, about them. 

So, the process goes, before you tell them your story and stuff about you, first connect it to stuff about them. "Does anyone here have a child? What do little children do when you say ‘no…you can't have it' at the grocery store? (pause) That's right, the supermassive full-blown complete child meltdown. Laying in the aisle, screaming. Clenched fists." This process then allows you to go into your story about your child and the audience is right there with you.

2. Don't be the hero

One word of caution, don't be the hero of your own story. Realizing this hThis has been so hard for me. I begin to tell a story and understand this story ends up looking like I am bragging. No one likes an egotist or a know-it-all. When we build ourselves up, the audience loses interest in our message. Tell stories about yourself but tell stories about when you didn't know something or didn't understand something. Self-deprecating stories can be fun and funny and memorable. They allow you to get a laugh and to help people understand the message.

3. Tell the truth, but…

One of the conversations get into a lot is about how absolutely truthful we need to be in a story. And here's my thinking. We are telling stories to help our audience, to educate and elevate our audience. To inspire them and make their lives better. Sometimes, to be clear or make our point we reorganize our stories. We clean them up a bit. After all, we aren't journalists, we aren't on trial. Often a story that has been massaged a bit and cleaned up makes our point better and is more natural for our audience to understand. Are we lying? No. I would never advocate telling a lie. You don't want to say to people you've been shot down over Vietnam. That's not the point. The point is real-life stories are often messy and hard to follow. To tell that story better means making it more transparent and easy to follow. I'd love to hear your opinion, but I think we are doing our audience a favor by telling a better story.

4. Get your audience involved from the beginning

Margaret starts her presentation with a question. "What is the first thing you notice when you walk into a patient's room? Come on, we've all been nurses for a long time. What do you notice?" After a few people chime in Margaret says, "I always notice the bed rails. If the bed rails are down…guess what?" The audience suggests the patient is at risk. "Exactly!" This is Margaret's style of speaking. We've termed it as ‘Call and Response.' The speaker actively involves the audience at every stage of the story. They make it universal. How many of you get angry while driving? Does this make sense? They can be rhetorical questions or questions where a response is expected, but by involving the audience at every step you've made this into a presentation, they feel like they are a part of. As you move through your story, involve the audience as much as possible. They will reward you with their undivided attention.

5. Connect your stories back to your message

We don't tell stories to entertain, we tell stories to illustrate our points. You mention the story about being lost in the forest as a kid to demonstrate how it feels to be vulnerable. You tell the story about sitting bedside with your grandmother as a way to discuss what caring and compassion looks like. Every time our stories serve as tools to the higher purpose of elevating and educating our audience. That said, it is often necessary to give your audience an obvious connection. They may be wondering, how in the heck does this story connect to what we are talking about? Once the story is done, step out and relate it back to your content. "The reason I told you about the donkey in the well is that often we feel like that donkey, don't we? Overwhelmed by all the negativity? Do you ever feel that way? And what did the donkey do? He took everything that was thrown at him and stomped it down until he could just walk out. And that's what I want you to do." 

6. The right level of detail makes it ‘real' for your audience

One of the most challenging balances we have to make when telling stories is, how much detail do we put in? Too much detail and the audience become bored. Too little detail and the audience doesn't experience your story as being real. How do you strike that balance? The fact is, you don't need a lot of detail, you need the RIGHT details. When taking your audience, back to a time you went camping, ask these four questions. What would they see? What would they hear? What would they smell? And what would they feel or touch? A couple of quick details can place them with you on that camping trip quickly. "The campfire crackled and spit. The smell of smoke and recent rain drifted over us. We heard a raven complain from up above us in the Pine trees."

7. Everyone loves a mystery

In one group a nurse named Jason told his own story, but he said it in the wrong order. He started with the conclusion: he has Crohn's disease. Then he shared with us his medical journey as he went from being a healthy young man to being in and out of hospitals as the doctors searched for his problem. It was a great story, just told in the wrong order. We build interest in our stories by creating a mystery. Rebuilt Jason's story became much more compelling. A young healthy even athletic man drops to the ground passed out. Doctors struggle to find a cause. Test after test. Hypothesis tried and discarded. Treatments that look promising but fail. Then, only then, and almost accidentally they tested him for Crohn's disease and were able to cure him. In popular media, it's called a ‘spoiler alert' when someone destroys the fun of a good mystery by telling you the outcome up front. 

8. Master the Mini-Story

Not every story has to be a full-blown story with a beginning, middle, and end. Many stories are really mini-stories, just a few sentences long. Something like, "Did you have trouble filling out that form? I did. I was here two months before Allison sat me down and went through it line-by-line. She was patient. She was thorough. And a task that felt overwhelming to me suddenly became easy. I didn't have a WILL problem. I had a SKILL problem." Mini-stories can be used in almost every paragraph to help your audience follow along. So don't think when someone suggests using stories everything needs to be Lawrence of Arabia. Some are short and yet still remarkably effective.

9. Don't forget to shut the door!

Every story has a beginning, middle and an end. But don't shortchange the audience by leaving off the end of the story. For instance, in one of our group classes, a lady named Karen talked about problems her baby had at birth. "Instead of handing my baby to me, they whisked him away. I was confused. The nurse told me, "We have to do something to your baby RIGHT NOW, or he might not live." Karen went on to describe the incredible hospital and staff and how important it is for us to continue funding their neonatal department. But when she sat down, we all had the same question. "What happened to your baby?" Frankly, we were all afraid to ask. I surveyed the class. Did Karen's story leave you with any questions? They squirmed and hesitated. I asked, "How many of you want to know what happened to her baby?" Every hand shot up. She told a great story. But without the close, we were all left hanging. The baby was fine and is now a high school student. The message here is to make sure you close your stories and don't leave your audience hanging.

10. Become Master of Emotions

When we are trying to convince a group, people say, "Connect with their hearts and minds." Notice in that statement "hearts" comes first. While people think they are logical in reality, they all are emotionally-driven. If we don't connect with them emotionally, they might ‘think' they agree with us, but deep down they aren't sold. That is until we connect with them emotionally. A perfect way to get emotional is with a well-told story. In healthcare, we have many profoundly moving stories. Patients who didn't make it, or miracles as they did. And those stories are amazing. Kids, babies, parents, the care team, the physicians. We are surrounded by these fantastic stories. Get emotional. Get the stories that connect us back to why we do this in the first place. When we connect with the hearts…as well as the minds, we can make a difference.

Bonus Tip: Great storytellers are great story collectors

As you think of adding stories to your presentation get in the habit of collecting stories. They are all around us all of the time. Get a journal and write them down as you hear them or as you experience them. Great storytellers always seem to have a perfect story to connect back the message, and that's not accidental. The great storytellers spend years being story collectors. I love having had this time with you. Let me know how it goes. Telling stories is and always will be the way humans connect. Thank you.