The Power of Storytelling
Being a good storyteller can help you gain power, wealth and influence, but it takes intentionality and practice.
“Those who tell the stories rule society.” - Plato
In 2009, Rob Walker and Joshua Glenn bought 200 objects for an average cost of $1.25 each from thrift stores and yard sales. They auctioned off these objects on eBay and reached out to 200 creative writers to write short stories for each individual object to put into the item descriptions. The combined thrift store flotsam sold for almost $8,000. This experiment demonstrated how the power of narrative can subjectively impact objective results and outcomes. The reason is simple: You are more likely to win someone over if they are emotionally invested.
If you want someone to listen and remember something, tell them a story. According to cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner, stories are up to 22x more memorable than facts alone. Just think about the talks you’ve listened to in the past, do you remember the statistics or the stories that were shared? The reason we remember stories more than statistics is because they trigger emotions and help us more easily grasp the main idea. Most people try to get a point across through convincing arguments and facts or figures. Our brains aren’t wired to retain facts and figures for very long, but they do retain stories. A story is the vessel that is used to deliver your message. Metrics are a means to an end to support and prove a point. Stories are the journey we are taken on to arrive at a destination and internalize the point.
When you weave a narrative around data, your audience becomes more emotionally engaged, putting you in the driver’s seat. You can lead them to your conclusion and persuade them more effectively. This is what makes storytelling so powerful. I used to think that people who took up airtime and talked for long stretches were full of themselves. But then I realized that they were the ones who everyone was listening to, and because they commanded all the attention in the room, they also had all the power. You need to take up the space you deserve by telling your stories.
My Relationship with Storytelling
In the 1960s and 1970s, after the Immigration Act of 1965, many well-educated Asian immigrants came to America and focused on careers in STEM that could make them financially secure. Engineering, science and medicine were fields that paid well and were less discriminatory and xenophobic than others where language barriers and cultural differences would be more challenging to overcome. They passed this mentality to their children and prioritized STEM subjects over liberal arts. You can get a job with a major in engineering or finance, but not with a major in English or philosophy. Growing up in an Asian household, it seemed like the ultimate goal of my education was to get a lucrative job and have financial security, not necessarily to learn for the sake of learning. The irony is that AI will inevitably replace many of these “reliable” STEM jobs that require logic and reasoning, which can now be replicated by computers.
While I was studying at the University of Pennsylvania as an undergrad, I majored in finance at the Wharton School, but I also minored in psychology in the College of Arts and Sciences and wanted to minor in political science. My biggest regret about college is that I chose a pre-professional program, but my parents refused to pay for a private school tuition if I didn’t. Instead of taking classes in art history, philosophy, and creative writing, I was taking marketing, operations and accounting classes. Instead of studying abroad, I was busy interviewing for summer investment banking internships. I definitely think I would have grown more as a person and been more interesting by spending time on the former rather than the latter. I would eventually study other subjects on my own as an adult, but often wonder what I missed out on.
I know that I’m not the only one that feels this way. Many of my Asian American peers who have become doctors, lawyers or engineers, make a great living, but seem miserable in their jobs. There is little room for creativity in their careers. They have to follow rigid protocols and rules. Some decide to leave those secure careers to pursue their creative endeavors. A number of friends who were lawyers have gone on to become acclaimed published authors. Min Jin Lee, author of Free Food for Millionaires and National Book Award finalist Pachinko, went to Georgetown Law School and was a corporate lawyer for two years. Charles Yu went to Columbia Law School and was a corporate attorney and associate general counsel at Belkin before winning the National Book Award for fiction for his novel Interior Chinatown.
During the pandemic, when anti-Asian hate crimes were on the rise and I was seeing horrible video after video of violence against Asian senior citizens, my heart sank. It sank because I was heartbroken for the innocent victims and families, but sank even further when I felt helpless to do anything about it. It wasn’t until the mass shootings in the Atlanta spas, that I decided I couldn’t live with myself if I did nothing. I opened Google Docs and started writing a letter that we eventually published in the Wall Street Journal. By sharing the story of many Asian Americans in this country, who have felt treated like foreigners in their own country for so long, it gave non-Asians a better understanding of our experience. Rather than share statistics, it was more important to emotionally connect with people through vulnerable and honest sharing. By taking readers on this journey, we could feel seen.
When there is a gap in a story, you allow other people to fill in that gap. For many people in this country, they have not had their stories told, so it leaves a void for fear and lies to be inserted. Asian cultures tend to value privacy and not standing out or drawing attention to ourselves. This means traditionally not being vocal or visible in public spaces or media. It has allowed for others to push narratives and stereotypes about Asians as model minorities, being only good at STEM, not having leadership qualities, or being untrustworthy or disloyal. I have seen firsthand the power of storytelling to change the narrative, from producing the HBO documentary 38 at the Garden, about Jeremy Lin. Many non-Asian people have come up to me and told me how they had no idea what the Asian American experience was really like until they watched our film. That is the power of story.
Writing and storytelling are powerful tools and weapons. Being inspiring and persuasive will ultimately be a far more valuable skillset than being able to do math. With rapid advancement, AI will do all of the quantitative calculations, and commoditize mathematical ability. But leaders are people who are compelling and effective communicators. No one wants to follow someone because they are good at math. No coach will inspire their players because they’re good at the Xs and Os. That’s what an assistant coach does. The head coach has to give the fiery pep talks to motivate their players and team to win. People vote for a President or hire a CEO who has charisma. Who do you suspect has more interesting conversations: someone who spends all day doing Excel or someone who studies social psychology?
To put it bluntly, the person who is only good with numbers makes for a great analyst or individual contributor. The person who is a great storyteller makes for a great manager or leader. The former is a worker bee, the latter is a high potential star. Other leaders promote those who they want to spend time with, whom they consider interesting and inspiring. Having a high IQ can be helpful early on in your career, but as you become more senior, emotional intelligence is far more valuable and a better predictor of success (Feist & Barron, 1996). A popular CareerBuilder survey from 2011 showed that 71% of employers valued emotional intelligence in an employee over IQ. It also found that 59% of employers said they would not hire someone who had a high IQ but a low emotional intelligence.
When you focus on facts and figures, you are fixated on the past and present. When you tell a story, you take someone on a journey and lead them to a future of possibility.
Why Storytelling is So Important
Whether you’re trying to teach a lesson, prove a point, motivate others, or persuade someone, you are far more likely to succeed if you are a good at storytelling. You can tell someone your product is great, or you can tell a story about how your product changed a customer’s life for the better. You can tell someone you’re a strong leader, or you can share a story of how you led a team through a challenging time of turmoil at your last job. Being an effective storyteller can help your professional career and personal life in many ways:
Sales - Closing a deal or convincing someone to buy from you
Fundraising - Persuading someone to invest in you
Interviewing - Making someone believe you’re the right person for the job
Promotions - Proving to your manager that you deserve a raise or promotion
Managing - Motivating and inspiring someone to perform
Networking - Building relationships by being more interesting
Dating - Engaging someone to be more attracted to you
Marketing - Designing an effective campaign or brand
Producing - Creating films or content
Activism - Convincing people to support your cause
When you focus on facts and figures, you are fixated on the past and present. When you tell a story, you take someone on a journey and lead them to a future of possibility. Research has shown that fiction is more effective than non-fiction at changing beliefs and perceptions because it allows you to see and experience the world in someone else’s shoes which creates empathy. If you are fundraising and sharing a pitch, and you only present the world as it is, it does not inspire the investor to see the upside and why they should take a risk on you. If you take them on a vision story with you on why you are the right person to bet on because of the future you believe to be true, they will be more likely to invest.
“Stories are the greatest human invention. People need stories in order to cooperate,” says Yuval Noah Harari, author of the bestselling non-fiction book Sapiens. “But there’s also something else very important: they can change the way they cooperate by changing the stories they believe.”
“Storytelling is our superpower,” Harari told me.
“We are the only species with the ability to use language—not just to describe things we can see, taste, and touch, but also to invent stories about things that don’t exist.”
In other words, narrative is the first and most crucial step for leaders who want to solve big problems and shape the world for the better. After all, a person can have the greatest idea in the world, but if they fail to rally others to make that idea come alive, nothing gets done.
What is Storytelling?
When people hear the term “storytelling,” they often envision a group of people sitting around a campfire listening to someone telling a tale. Not all stories have to start with “Once upon a time…” A story doesn’t even have to have a protagonist or resolution. Stories can be told with a film, a graphic novel, a LinkedIn post, or a TikTok video. Storytelling is about creating a narrative arc around supporting information to drive home a message or point. That can happen over two hours or two minutes. The beauty of storytelling is that it has no constraints.
When you think about your stories, you should start from the end and work backwards to the beginning. You don’t go on a trip without knowing what the destination is. When you are telling a story, you should know the goal and message of your story. Where do you ultimately want to take the listener? When you are a good storyteller, you focus on the story itself and not on yourself or the details. A good story makes the listener forget that they’re even listening to a story, because they’re already emotionally invested. The story takes center stage and you no longer worry about others judging you as the storyteller. Doing so allows you to separate yourself from the story and make sure the story itself shines. The goal is to get the audience engaged in your story and in turn, desperate to know the ending. This means being able to an effective communicator, being vulnerable and knowing your audience. The easiest story to tell should be your own personal story, because know one knows it better than you.
Being an Effective Communicator
Surveys indicate that 77% of the population has a fear of public speaking to a certain degree. But being an effective communicator isn’t just about speaking to large crowds. You can always be a better communicator, even if it’s to an audience of one. Learning how your words, pauses, body language and eye contact, all impact how another person receives the message. This is important to remember in situations like a job interview, performance review or even a date.
To be an effective communicator, work on these areas:
Be clear and concise. Less is more. Small words are better than big words.
Prepare in advance. Know what you are going to say before you say it. Plan ahead for potential responses or reactions. Rehearse.
Be aware of nonverbal signals. Your hand gestures, body language and facial expressions need to match your words. Read the room and adjust accordingly.
Tone matters. Make sure your tone reflects the situation. Be aware of how you might come across when in person or via written communications.
Practice active listening. Pay full attention to the speaker. Don’t get distracted and start thinking of your response. Repeat back or paraphrase what you’ve heard to acknowledge you were listening.
Be Vulnerable
Far too often, we try to protect ourselves with the armor of the superficial. We make small talk that is meaningless and forgettable. Often this is because we fear judgment and rejection or we want to keep our distance from others, because we’re afraid they could hurt us. No one can build trust if they are distant. Building relationships requires trust, and vulnerability leads to trust. Vulnerability cultivates empathy within a relationship. Stories are most effective when they are authentic. Be brave enough to be vulnerable and others will reciprocate. Create intimacy by sharing your stories. Only then will you build meaningful relationships.
A friend recently told me about her Shabbat dinners on Fridays. She and other moms get together and ask reflective and introspective questions which allow them to share beyond the surface. These questions lower the guard of everyone else in the room to be authentic and real. In Asian cultures, this is rare, as many people are guarded and care a lot about “keeping face,” lest they be judged by others. Cultural baggage can make it challenging for Asian Americans to lower their guard and be vulnerable with others, even their closest friends.
Being vulnerable is a learned skill and takes time to master. Putting yourself out there can be intimidating, but it can also be extremely liberating and rewarding. When you no longer have to hide who you are or pretend to be someone you’re not, it can make you feel much less alone and isolated. The more often you do it, the easier and more natural it becomes.
Know Your Audience
Not everyone will receive your stories the same way. You need to adapt your stories to your audience and know what will resonate with them. Approaching an inspirational speech to your basketball teammates is very different than how you would communicate with a group of disgruntled customers. Knowing the situation and audience will determine how you deliver your story, the tone, the pace and the body language. If you do your homework on the audience beforehand, it will help you prepare accordingly. Ultimately, you want to be able to make your story resonate with whomever your audience happens to be.
Whether you’re speaking to an auditorium of employees or at an informal dinner with a small group friends, you can leverage the power of storytelling. Every post to social media is an opportunity to tell a story. Your audience can be one or it can be thousands. So every time you speak or write, you have the chance to create and share a narrative and influence people. You may or may not change someone’s mind, but you will definitely make them think and consider just by reading or listening to you. That is what makes storytelling so powerful.
Know Your Own Story
When you describe yourself, do you merely recite your resume bullet point by bullet point? Or do you walk through your personal journey of where you’ve been and how that has made you the person you are today. The former is a shallow brochure, the latter is an intimate look into who you are. You will be far more memorable if you know how to tell your own story and tell it well. Telling your own personal story will always be the easiest to remember, because you’ve lived it, but it’s also the one that will be most effective, because you are the main character relating to your audience. It takes time and practice, but it’s the most important story you will ever tell. And if you don’t tell your story, someone else will.
When you tell your story, you make people feel closer to you. When they feel closer to you, they will want to help you and root for your success even more. These connections are valuable to building relationships and a strong network. The default is to believe that your accomplishments and achievements will speak for themselves. The reality is that a resume is a cold list of facts and figures, that while impressive, do not invoke any emotional connection. Your story humanizes you and makes you real to another person. Telling your story is building your brand, which in turns helps expand your reach and impact. These are two of the rules of power I discuss in my essay: Why You Have No Power.
Some people might be afraid that they will come across as arrogant when telling their own story. Instead, you should consider it an opportunity to make a lasting impression on someone you’re meeting for the first time. What parts of your life story are most important to who you are. What made you care about the things you care about? Why should someone invest in getting to know you? What would they take away from your story? Take people along on a journey to where you want to go. Your story is your chance to fill in the gaps for others to how you see yourself. This is the difference between being a good leader who can execute vs. a great leader who inspires others to follow them.
Get Coaching
It takes practice to become a good storyteller. You need to know how to modulate your voice, optimize your diction, choose the right pacing and pauses, and use the appropriate body language. These are all skills you can learn. Recording yourself telling a story is the best way of seeing how you come across to others. How you think others perceive you, may be very different once you see yourself on video. It can be helpful to have a communications coach who can help give you feedback and advice on how to improve your storytelling. As with anything, getting professional coaching to provide helpful feedback can be an extremely valuable and efficient way of improving your storytelling.
What Makes a Good Story
Think back to your favorite college professors. I doubt that you remember the ones that just wrote formulas on the board or regurgitated facts. The most interesting lecturers tell fascinating and memorable stories about the subjects they are trying to teach. When you tie a thread through all it using a narrative arc, it connects the head to the heart. You can completely change how people look at data when it is delivered via a story.
I will never forget what the “bystander effect” and “diffusion of responsibility” are because of the story of Kitty Genovese, a woman who was murdered in the courtyard of her apartment building while dozens of onlookers watched from their apartments. Nor have I forgotten the “Stockholm Syndrome” after hearing the story of the Stanford Prison Experiment by Philip Zimbardo. I first learned about both almost 30 years ago in college, but the stories have been ingrained in my memory, and so have the concepts they were meant to teach.
A good story is one that makes you forget you’re listening to a story. It typically has well-developed characters that are relatable to the audience, a well-structured plot, a conflict to keep the audience engaged, and finally a resolution to drive home the message and leave a lasting impression on the audience. The best stories, including your own, will leave the audience thinking about the story long after they’ve heard it.
Stories Change the World
Stories have the power to change hearts and minds. They are extremely effective tools of persuasion (and unfortunately manipulation) to get someone to believe something. Marketers can use stories to convince you to buy their product. Politicians can use stories to convince you to vote for them. Professors can use stories to teach you lessons.
One of the most talented storytellers of our generation is screenwriter, filmmaker and producer Ava DuVernay. She has won awards from BAFTA and Sundance, and been nominated for an Academy Award and Golden Globe. She grew up in South Central, Los Angeles and has told stories of the Black experience in America. Her film Selma, about Martin Luther King Jr. was nominated for Best Picture at the 2014 Academy Awards. Her Netflix documentary 13th which centered around the mass incarceration of Black men in America and the perpetuation of slavery. Through the use of narrative, interviews with inmates and scholars, and historical data, DuVernay effectively made her case. It forced people to rethink their beliefs on the criminal justice system and the prison system. She used storytelling to win over both hearts and minds by being empathetic for those whose lives have been unjustly ruined, while engendering anger and frustration at an unfair and biased system.
DuVernay immediately followed 13th with the Netflix series When They See Us, about the Central Park Five, a dramatization of the real life story of five innocent Black and Latino teenagers that were falsely accused and prosecuted for raping and assaulting a white woman jogging in Central Park. It was another example of the failure and bias of the American justice system that she had laid out in 13th. When They See Us was streamed by over 23 million viewers within the first month of release and received a record 16 Emmy nominations. DuVernay has used storytelling through film and television as a powerful and effective vehicle for her advocacy to reach countless people.
Every great movement starts with a story. Malala Yousafzai was an only a 15-year old girl who was shot in the head by a Taliban gunman when she was riding the bus home from school in Pakistan. She miraculously survived and now she uses her story to fight for girls’ education around the world. In 2014, she won a Nobel Peace Prize for her work. Amanda Nguyen was raped while she was a college student at Harvard. She had a rape kit performed and was told that it would be destroyed if she did not file an extension. Nguyen went on to lead the charge to get the Sexual Assault Survivors’ Rights Act passed in Congress in 2016, to fix the broken system and lessen the burden on victims of sexual assault. Never underestimate the impact of a story to move people.
Stories can alter broader attitudes as well, Green says — like our views on relationships, politics or the environment. Messages that feel like commands — even good advice coming from a friend — aren't always received well. If you feel like you're being pushed into a corner, you're more likely to push back. But if someone tells you a story about the time they, too, had to end a painful relationship, for example, the information will likely come across less like a lecture and more like a personal truth.
…Solid information in any form is good, Green says. "But that's not necessarily enough." A vivid, emotional story "can give that extra push to make it feel more real or more important." If you look at the times somebody's beliefs have been changed, she says, it's often because of a story that "hits them in the heart."
How Stories Connect And Persuade Us: Unleashing The Brain Power Of Narrative
Stories motivate. Stories mobilize. Stories connect in a way that can move you from one place to another. If you are able to harness the power of story, you can do almost anything. It can help you gain power by winning elections or getting promotions. It can make you more wealthy by persuading investors and getting access to deals. It can make you more influential and allow you to make societal impact and change. Winston Churchill, Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Steve Jobs, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and Oprah Winfrey all used storytelling to win people over and become powerful and/or wealthy.
Work on being an effective communicator. Know your own story. Be more vulnerable. Practice your storytelling. Adjust your story to your audience. All of these will payoff in the short run and in the long run. Investing your time and energy into becoming a better storyteller will yield returns far greater than you can ever imagine, both personally and professionally.