Welcome back to the Look and Sound of Leadership, an ongoing series of executive

coaching tips designed to help you be perceived in the workplace the way you

want to be perceived. I'm Tom Henschel, your executive coach, and today we're talking

about making stories sore. Varena keeps more detailed information in her head on a daily basis than I can cram into my brain in a year,

and she cites it with precision but without pretension.

She's also smart enough to know that all those facts don't

motivate people. Discussing her upcoming offsite, she told me about a new initiative she was going to roll out.

I've got lots of business reasons why this is a good idea, she told me, but I need

something more. She stopped and smiled at me. We both knew where she was headed. We had talked about this before.

All right already, Tom, she said. I need a story and you know I can't tell one.

Verena knows stories touch people in a way that facts and figures never will.

She longs to develop this crucial leadership skill, so I reiterated my storytelling advice.

Stories come to life when you follow two rules.

Rule number one, tell us details of what people did, said, and felt. I often explain this by saying,

don't hover over the forest telling us about the landscape, bring us down onto the forest floor so we can

enter the landscape. Give us the leaves and the roots and the

details of what people did said and felt pull us into the story.

Rule number two,

connect all those details to other details.

The details of what people did, said, and felt

must connect to, and influence other details of what people did, said, and felt.

The details you tell us need to feel important.

...