Storytelling in San Francisco
Storytelling is increasingly being sought-after as a tool to get ahead. Leaders from all over the world are reaching out to us to improve their storytelling skills to stand out and have their messages heard. It’s no different in San Francisco and is probably even more true because of the number of leading companies based there.
Steve Jobs was a fantastic storyteller. He distilled complex information into easy to understand messages. You can see this at work in the video below, where he and Bill Gates are being interviewed. When asked a question, Bill starts to answer with facts, numbers, and names that the average person might not be familiar with. You may notice yourself switch off a little when you’re listening to his response.
Jobs steps in and asks to tell the story, which he does. All of a sudden, the answer is a lot clearer. This is a crucial skill for leaders, which a lot of us need help with.
If you want to develop these storytelling skills, I’ll be in San Francisco on Monday next week delivering a public Storytelling for Leaders workshop right around the corner from Union Square. If you’d like to know more or get tickets, you can click here.
If you can’t make it or want to know more about storytelling in business, you can check out our podcast, Anecdotally Speaking.
Shawn, author of Putting Stories to Work, is one of the world's leading business storytelling consultants. He helps executive teams find and tell the story of their strategy. When he is not working on strategy communication, Shawn is helping leaders find and tell business stories to engage, to influence and to inspire. Shawn works with Global 1000 companies including Shell, IBM, SAP, Bayer, Microsoft & Danone. Connect with Shawn on: