JEAN PHILIP DE TENDER

Soms val je op een boek dat je een woaw- of aha-gevoel geeft. “Believe me” van Michael Margolis is zo’n boek. Ik heb het hieronder “handig samengevat” aan de hand van een aantal (sub)titels uit het boek, maar het geeft heel goed de essentie van het verhaal weer. Toch raad ik je aan om het helemaal te lezen. Het manifest kan je overigens gratis downloaden. Een echte boekenreeks volgt nog op het manifest.

Act I in het boek sluit nauw aan bij mijn boek “Alles is een verhaal”. Beseffen dat alles een verhaal is. Dat mensen niet alleen mensen zijn, maar ook verhalen. Dat voorwerpen niet alleen voorwerpen zijn, maar ook verhalen.

ACT II en III vertellen je hoe je impact kunt hebben op een verhaal. Hoe je het m.a.w. kan sturen. En wat de antropologische context is van storytelling.

Het boek is een blikopener, al heb ik het moeilijker met het-bewust-sturen-op-de-verhalen. Uiteraard is dit common sense in reclame en marketing.  Het zit impliciet in wat men van leiders verwacht. Maar wat ik mis bij Margolis zijn de dimensies authenticiteit en het individuele van een verhaal.

Hoedanook, lezen !

ACT I : HOW IDEAS BECOME REALITY.

1. Meaning

People don’t really buy a product, solution or idea. They buy the story that is attached to it.

2. Relationship

Every story exists in relationship to everything else around it. Storytelling becomes an invitation into relationship.

3. Memory

We all want to look back at the story of our lives and know that it made sense.

We don’t remember an exact experience, but instead produce a story that represents our interpretation or relationship to that event.

Human memory is a narrative driven process.

4. Choices

The stories we tell literally make our world.

Much of our collective story is shaped by an elite few. Reality is a subjective choice and there is no bigger power than framing the collective conversation.

With great power comes great responsibility, which you must accept if you are to assume your role as personal chief storyteller.

ACT II : ENGAGING THE STATUS QUO

1. Disbelief

The power of your story grows exponentially as more and more people accept your story as their truth.

Stories reflect collective agreements about reality.

Only when people can locate themselves inside the story will they truly belong and participate in your narrative.

2. Culture

If you want to learn more about a culture, listen to the stories. If you want to change a culture, change the stories.

3. Leadership

Leaders lead by telling stories that give others permission to lead, not to follow.

Confidence in our leaders is based on their ability to live the story.

Real leaders know they are not the story.

4. Convergence

Storytelling is our most basic technoloy, evolved through 21st century innovation.

The means of story production have been democratized. Technology is just the means, not the end in itself. The story is what’s really at stake.

5. Epic

We all seek to experience our life in the most heroic of terms.

There is no greater feeling than being the hero in your story.

ACT III : FINDING RELEVANCE

1. Change

Nobody likes a change story, especially a change story we have no control over. What people really need is a continuity story.

Your story needs to speak to your audience’s hearts, interests and worldview.

You can’t change a story about something you hate or dislike.

2. Identity

Our fate as species is contained in the story. Both tyranny and freedom  are constructed through well-supported narrative.

We seek stories to know who we are and where we belong.

I Story, therefore I am.

3. Freedom

Storytelling empowers, because it escapes the need to claim absolute truth.

As as a storyteller you are forever at the mercy of your audience.

4. Evolution

Reinvention is the new storyline.

5. Prophecy

Storytelling is like fortune-telling. The act of choosing a certain story determines the probability of future outcomes.