You Winning Life Podcast guest Paul Smith The Importance of Story Telling Ep. 71

Hey everybody, welcome back to the You Winning Life podcast. I'm Jason Wasser, licensed marriage and family therapist, certified business coach, and certified neuro-emotional technique practitioner. Today's guest is Paul Smith, who is one of the world's leading experts in business storytelling, one of Inc. Magazine's top 100 leadership speakers of 2018, a storytelling coach, and bestselling author of the books The 10 Stories Great Leaders Tell, Lead with a Story, Sell with a Story, Parenting with a Story, and his most recent book, which just came out, 4 Days with Kenny Tedford. In his 20 years with Procter Gamble, Paul held leadership positions in both research and finance functions and most recently served as director of consumer and communications research. Prior to Procter Gamble, he was a consultant with Arthur Andersen and Company. His keynote speaking and training clients include international giants like Google, Hewlett-Packard, Bayer Medical, Walmart, Kaiser Permanente, Ford Motor Group, Luxottica, Procter Gamble, and many, many others. So Paul, welcome to the show. And you seem like you've already had the beginning of an amazing career, and I'm sure there's so much more ahead for you. How did you decide to go into the business world and more specifically the sales marketing research side of things?

Yeah, so nobody's ever asked me that question, but there's a very definite reason and it's not a very good one. So why did I decide to go into business? So when I was a kid, my passion was science. Like, I imagined myself being Neil Armstrong, you know, the next, you know, astronaut or a physicist or, you know, something like that. I just imagined I would be a scientist of some kind or another someday and I was just fascinated with astronomy in particular. And probably about the time I was a teenager, it occurred to me, still in high school, it— my father was a businessman, his father was a businessman, all of my father's friends were businessmen. And so I just assumed that a responsible adult male was supposed to go into business, right? Like, I didn't know anybody who was a scientist or a physicist or anything other than a businessman. And I just, And nobody told me otherwise. So, I started in my late high school years, I took an accounting class and then when I went to college, I studied economics and ended up getting an MBA and just out of sheer assumption that that's what I was supposed to do with my life and I abandoned my passion areas, which I'll admit to you, I've regretted on a number of occasions. Now, life's worked out pretty good. Yeah, I went into business for probably the worst reason you could think of.

Such an interesting context because I grew up as a third-generation now family furniture business that started with my grandfather after he escaped Nazi Germany, moved to Scranton, Pennsylvania. So we're talking about right, the '50s and '60s at that point. And my dad took it over. They moved it to South Florida. Then my younger brother and sister after college went in. And I'm the one who's the black sheep in the family doing this like mindset therapy, coaching, psychology. Therapy thing. And it's funny because it was in my blood. But the— but I find what you're saying is that the context in which you were in, in which you grew up in, radically had a strong influence on you. And sometimes how that can overpower someone's finding their most authentic self. But there's also a way to maybe rectify and align that.

Yeah, yeah. And so I've made sure that both my sons— I have two teenage boys now, and I'm— they both know that story I just told you. So you're the only adult that's asked me that question. But I made sure they asked me that question because I want them to know You don't have to grow up and do what I do. Like, nobody expects that. I want you to find your own passion in life. It's kind of a conversation I wish I had had myself as a child. But then, yeah, also I want them to see that I've made the best of it. And, you know, the second part of your question is how did I, you know, get into this sales and storytelling stuff and consumer understanding? And, you know, once I got into the business world, you know, then I remembered, well, you know, this really wasn't what I was passionate about, but surely there's something within this that I'm more interested in than other So, I kind of groped my way into— I started in accounting as an auditor and I didn't like that and I moved into consulting for a year or so and didn't like that and then moved into a financial analysis role and I liked that but I didn't love it. And then, I found my way into consumer research, was a little more human interaction and I liked that better but I still didn't love it. And that's kind of what led me to here was leaving that in my mid-40s to go do something that I I finally developed a passion for storytelling, which I guess is kind of your ultimate question there. I just, along that journey, I noticed that there were business leaders that I admired the most who were phenomenal storytellers. And they didn't teach me that in high school or college or business school. They didn't teach me that at Arthur Andersen where I worked. They didn't teach me that at Procter Gamble where I spent 20 years. And so I kind of just set out on my own little personal learning journey to go learn about that. Interviewing people who I thought were good at it, and one thing led to another, and I ended up writing a book about that topic. And that's what led to a career change for me. So I got here quite accidentally is the answer.

So the skills of storytelling, the passion of storytelling, the power of storytelling— what are some of the things that you've learned besides the technical side, but from the emotional side, from the grab from the relatability, from the connection between you and the person who's hearing the story? What comes from that? What comes out of that?

Yeah, so a couple of thoughts there. One is, and you probably know this better than I do, but a lot of the cognitive science in the last couple of decades has taught us that human beings don't make the, don't always make the rational, logical decisions we'd like to think we do, right? As I see you're nodding. Yeah, so, you know, we get essentially two brains, right? We've got this subconscious, more emotional processing part of our brain that tends to make most of our decisions, and then our rational, logical, conscious thinking part of our brain rationalizes that decision a few nanoseconds later. So the truth is, if you want to influence people, whether that's leadership or sales or marketing, the truth is you kind of need to talk to both parts of the brain. You can't just talk to that left logical part of the brain, and storytelling just has this uncanny ability to reach both parts of the brain, not just one or the other. So that's why storytelling is important in the business world, is because you're doing business with people, not machines. And people have this weird construct that they need an emotional part of their, their day, their life, to help them make decisions. In fact, We have a word for people who fail to take in emotions into account when they make decisions. You know what that word is?

My guess is a sociopath.

Exactly, sociopath, right? So it's not that using emotion to make decisions is this bad thing. It would be awful if you didn't, right? That's, that's why we call them sociopaths. They just, they fail to consider that. So we as humans need that, and stories are the vehicle that can let you exercise that part of your brain in a decision. Process, I think.

Well, I love that marketing and sales is talking about this idea of neurology and brain science in order to promote and connect with people. And I know Simon Sinek talks about this in Start With Why. And taking it a little bit deeper, the work that I do, not just as a therapist, but using this modality called neuro-emotional technique, which finds the unresolved physiological stress patterns that a person's holding on to by bypassing their rational brain and going into their nervous system we use this technique and it's really breaking it down even further from the two, the idea of those two parts of your brain to the three parts, the triune brain theory, where we have the neocortex, which is that rational brain. You know, you and I are talking right now in real time. I know you exist. You know I exist, right? That's our rational brain. Then we have the mammalian brain, which is our emotions connected to it, but it's also connected to time. So we can go back and think about an experience. Maybe it was the first time you've ever spoken and maybe if there was nervousness or concern that you might not perform well, or they may not like you. And you can feel that emotion today, even though you have become a successful speaker and coach and trainer and workshop leader and write all these amazing online courses on your website. But that emotion can still be triggered in our mammalian brain. And the reptilian brain is the fight or flight survival.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah. So when— right. So we know that when those three parts of our brain are what we call incongruent, we're going to have anxiety, stress, depression, but it's also going to affect us physically. And that can actually eventually turn into disease. And different types of syndromes and symptoms. So I love the fact that marketing and marketing science, which we can now probably even call it, is using this to leverage connecting to people. And as a therapist, I go through each one of those aspects with my clients, whether as a therapist or a coach with them, to find out, like, someone is concerned about investing in the process of therapy. They thought maybe their insurance would cover it and it won't. And I have to now find a way to say, Well, intellectually you think you can't afford it, right? But emotionally, what's the value you're gonna get? And how long has this been going on? What's part of the story, right? And I want them to tell their story about why they're calling me in the first place so they can find the value in return of spending more than they originally thought. So it's funny that people who are listening to this, if you're in the medical health field, you still have to do sales. You have to sell yourself, you have to sell your practice, you have to sell your business. And people And I wonder if you've seen this in your, throughout your career, that there are certain fields that don't realize that sales and storytelling and closing and handling objections are a huge part of what they're missing in their skill set. Mm-hmm.

Yes, of course. And that's why I'm gainfully employed, right? Yeah. So that's what I do for a living now is I teach leaders and executives and salespeople how to use that art and the science of storytelling because it Sadly and strangely, it doesn't come naturally to adults. It comes pretty naturally to kids, but somehow we've taught ourselves as we get up, grow up in the business world, that we should eschew those type of storytelling skills. And I have to retrain people, oddly enough, on them.

Yeah, well, I think a lot of that comes from the fear of other people not liking us, of rejection, where little kids are just so expansive with their emotions and their creativity and their play. In fact, I'm reading a book called She Running, and, and it talks about that when you watch a little kid run Their form is flawless and they're not constricted, they're not tightened up. And we, and I believe we do the same thing over years, not only with our body, but with our mind and our experiences that start getting shaped by, by family stuff and cultural stuff and whatever. And we start constricting ourself out of fear of being rejected, being separate, being other. And I didn't realize this until a few years ago, how powerful the platform of entrepreneurship is, how sales business can be as a psychotherapeutic modality for personal development and personal growth.

Interesting. Yeah, so I haven't heard it described that way. That does not surprise me though, because it just seems to be an amazing tool for all kinds of things.

So let's walk a little bit more into this idea of like storytelling as a successful strategy. What are some of the important things that someone needs to know when getting started? Because, right, there are people who can tell a story or will maybe give an example, but maybe they're not doing it in a rich or connective way. So what are some quick tips or thoughts that someone can keep in mind when trying to do this?

Yeah, so you know what, can I take a mulligan and go back for a second? I sensed a little yearning for a little more on that personal part. Sure. Because yeah, I mean, most of my books are about the professional use of storytelling, but my second book, Parenting with a Story, is all about the personal use of it in your own life. So let me circle back to that because I think there's something there that your audience is going to want to hear. So the best— my use of storytelling for parents and for home life might be a little different than yours. You probably use storytelling as a therapeutic thing to get people to tell you their stories, which is kind of a therapy exercise. The way I use it is to teach lessons, right? So we as parents, we, you know, we often tell stories about the mistakes we made as kids to teach our kids you know, life lessons, which is fabulous. The problem with that is, though, you probably only have 2 or 3 really great stories from when you were a kid, like real, like, like really worthy of passing on to the next generation. I've got 2 or 3, you know, your neighbor's got 2 or 3. Wouldn't it be great, I thought, if we could get 100 of those together in one book, you know? So I interviewed a bunch of people to find out, you know, to get 101 really worthy life lessons. And so, for example, the one that was most personal to me is one that my dad shared with me about him that radically changed my life. So, I'll share it with you so you can get an idea for how these stories can be life-changing. And this also answers part of your earlier question about how did I get into this business. So, 7 years ago, when my first book had just come out, I was struggling with, and I still had a full-time job at Procter Gamble, by the way. So, I did all this nights and weekends, and I didn't know if it would lead to a new, I was hoping it'd lead to a new career path, You know, who knows with books, you don't know if it's going to be successful or not. So I wrote this book. I'm struggling with the idea. Do I, you know, I'd just gotten an offer to write a second book and I had a few clients under my belt and I could see maybe it would make a viable long-term, you know, business plan. But the truth is I just didn't have the guts to do it because here I was in my mid-40s, too young to retire, a wife and two kids to get through college. And you know, it was scary. So I wrote my dad a letter and asked him what to do. I just asked him for advice, right? He's my dad. He should give me good advice. And I, and he's, he was 80 years old and hard of hearing. So I couldn't call him on the phone. So I literally had to write him a letter. And I thought he would tell me one of two things when he wrote me back. He was either going to tell me, oh, absolutely, go for it. You can do it, son. I believe in you. You know, be a good cheerleader. Or he was going to tell me, are you nuts?

Crazy?

Keep your head down, you know, focus, like just Punch your pocket.

Don't make any waves. Right.

Don't make any waves.

Don't piss anybody off.

Retire nicely and then go play around with these silly ideas, right? Well, he didn't tell me either of those things. He just told me a story about himself that I'd never heard before and neither had any of my siblings. He said, I knew what I wanted to be in life when I was 5 years old. He said, I wanted to be a singer, you know, like Frank Sinatra, Tony Bennett, Sammy Davis, right? He's like, he's 80, right? That's his genre. And he said, I knew that for sure the first day of first grade. He said, the teacher asked all the students if any of us had any special talent. Like dancing or magic tricks or something. He said, well, I raised my hand and I said, I can sing. Despite the fact that he'd never sung in front of anybody but his mom in the kitchen, right? He's 5 years old, right? Of course he's, you know, not a singer. So anyway, of course, what do you think the teacher did? A good teacher, what would you do?

Well, I would hopefully call them up and allow them to sing in front of the class.

Absolutely. Yeah. So, all right, Bobby, get up and sing us a song. So little 5-year-old Bobby, Bobby Smith, stood up and belted out his favorite song right there in front of the teacher and the students. And he tells me in this letter, he says, "I nailed it." He said, "I got all the words right, all the melody. I was so proud of myself." He said, "The teacher and the other students stood up and applauded me. So I got a standing ovation my first time to sing in front of an audience." He went on to say in the letter, unfortunately, that wasn't just the first time he ever sang in front of an audience. It turned out to be the last time he ever sang in front of an audience. He said, "You know, life kind of got in the way. I grew up, you know, went to school, got a job, met your mom, had babies, whatever." But he said, "The truth is, son, I just never had the courage to go through with it. And he said, there is not a month that goes by that I don't regret that decision. Not every day, but every month of the last 70 years, I have regretted that decision. And he said, someday you're going to wake up, you're going to be 80 years old like me, and it's going to be too late. Now, as if that wasn't enough, and by the way, it was, I kid you not, he closed the letter with these words. He said, I'd love to see you achieve your dream, but that doesn't mean in your lifetime, son. That means in mine. And I mean, oh gosh, that just hit me right in the heart, right? I mean, tick-tock, the guy's 80, right? Yeah. So literally, Jason, 2 days later, I walked into my boss's office and I quit my job, my 20-year career, to pursue this dream. And I would not have done it that soon had he not shared that story. So stories can be powerful motivators, you know, and he's 80 years old and I was 45. So you're never too old to parent and to tend to child properly, right?

Well, I love the word that he used was courage.

Yeah.

And I see a lot of people don't use that word so much anymore, right? They talk about like hustle and grind and ballsiness and all these other things. But I find like, especially from the time of your father, right, these Rat Pack era words that are so salient. One of my professors who actually is a narrative family therapist, there's a whole field of marriage and family therapy that uses narrative and metaphors and rescripting and retelling and re-narrating a story from a different lens, from an empowerment model, a lot of which I use. He used to work, used to work, he used to use the word tenderness a lot. How can you be more tender? You don't hear that a lot. Right? So, so when I heard you use that word courage in your dad's story, it really does hit me on a deep level because this is really at the end of the day, what I think you and I are trying to do with everybody is to find the courage to put your mark in the world through your purpose, passion, and potential.

Yeah, amen. All right, yeah, so sorry about that aside. So go back and ask me your other question again. I've already forgotten it.

So let's break it down to a few techniques. Listen, I can stay on that topic for hours with you, but when it comes to some specific skills, some tangible tactics—

Telling stories.

Yeah, yeah, like right off, like, you know, not everybody— I was petrified of public speaking growing up. I would rather get Fs in elementary school or middle school than do anything, even a book report, whatever. And I really remember this like it was yesterday. And I remember I had a shift in my life when I became a board member in a youth group through my synagogue, that all of a sudden I had status. I wasn't just Jason. I was Jason, the whatever, vice president of programming or education or whatever it was. And I had this newfound ego that I didn't have just as being me, who wasn't the world's greatest student and very, very short and height-wise and all these other things. So I then started to practice things, but I never had any formal training. And from there, I've done speaking engagements, workshops, and leadership. And my largest was in front of 4,000 people over a few times.

Huge.

Yeah, which is incredible. So what would be some tips and tricks that, you know, first steps that a person should take to master storytelling?

Yeah. So a couple of thoughts. First of all, the most important thing is knowing what story to tell. Right, and when to tell it. The worst thing is to tell the wrong story or tell a story when one is not called for, and we can— let's cycle back to that next. But the simplest thing, and the thing that gets in most people's way when they're nervous about telling a story, is that they just, they don't know how to tell, they don't know how to start, they don't know what to say, what words do I use. They basically, they're afraid they're gonna sound like an idiot, right? That's what everybody's afraid of. I'm gonna be embarrassed because I'm just yammering on and not making any sense. What they need is basically a formula because I mean storytelling is an art and if you're not an artist, if you're not a storytelling artist, well, you don't know what you're doing. You need somebody to tell you what to do. You need a paint-by-numbers thing for your story. So that's what I teach executives. Here are the 8 questions that your story needs to answer and in this order. If you answer these 8 questions in this order, a story will emerge in the natural flow of a story that won't make you sound like an idiot, right? So here are the 8 questions that your story needs to answer, right? First of all, why should I bother listening to the story? Well, I, the person listening, I guess, right? So you need to give them in the first 10 or 15 seconds a reason to be interested in your story. Tell them why it's important to them to listen to your story. But once you've done that, then you've kind of earned the right to answer the next 5 questions. Where and when did it take place? Who's the main character and what did they want? What was the problem or opportunity they ran into? What did they do about it and how did it turn out in the end?

Right?

That should sound like the natural flow of a story and of course it is. But if you're keeping track, that's only 6. So the 2 more questions, what did you learn from the story and what should you go do now or I go do now, the person listening? It's your recommendation, right? So if you Answer those 8 questions in that order, you'll have a natural flow of a story that leads to an action that you want without a bunch of yammering and stuttering and stammering and not knowing where to go in the story or what part to tell first. So having a structure really helps people. It's a good crutch.

What's so funny when you're saying that, the first image I have in mind is actually Estelle Getty, right, in The Golden Girls, where every time she would tell a story, I don't know if you're right, for, we're aging ourselves here, but she would say, "Picture it, Sicily, 1942," right? And that was, so for the people that—

Where it went, right up front.

Where it went right in front, and it was just like very like, right, dramatic. Picture it, Sicily, 1942. And that was any time she was gonna go into a story, right? So I love that that's like, that you have to have this emotional pull, you have to have the setup, right? It's what's in it for me in this story. Really sad.

Right, yeah, and so that question number one, what's in it for me, that's, That's the hook. The where and the when, now she did it in a rather dramatic Hollywood fashion. Now of course in the business world you wouldn't do that. Like, can you imagine being in a boardroom and having the guy, you know, or woman next to you turn, you know, open up to the group and say, so there I was in the middle of the Serengeti and it was sweltering heat and it was, you know, it was like some 19th century romance novel. Like, that's not the way you do it, right? You just very simply answer the question You know, 1, 2, 3, 4, and it will— and you do it in a conversational tone. You don't make a dramatic production out of it because that's what makes you look silly when you're trying to do this.

Yeah. So for the people who have that fear, who have that stage fright, who even think of themselves as someone who doesn't do public speaking or doesn't like doing any type of presentations, they're the behind the scenes person, the logistic person, whatever they want to call themselves. What insight would you say to them to just help them get past that and find their courage?

Yeah, so it's probably— let me coach you and them right now on how to answer that question number one, because that's the first hurdle you've got to get over. And that's the one they like— they, I don't know how to start my story. Like, I stand up and I just freeze. I don't know what to do to get started. Okay, so here's what not to do. First of all, Don't apologize or ask permission to tell your story in a meeting. Leaders don't ask permission to lead, right? They just lead. Never ask, "Oh, I'm sorry to interrupt, but can I just tell a quick story? I promise it'll just take a minute." All that apologetic nature, you're undermining the value of the story right up front, okay? Thirdly, don't use the word story. I mean, unless your audience is kindergartners, They don't want to be told, well, gather around boys and girls, it's story time. Like, you're talking to adults, you don't tell them you're going to tell them a story, just tell the story. And then lastly, don't give away the ending. Don't tell them the lesson in the story up front because then they have no motivation to listen to your story, right? Stories, the end comes at the end, not the beginning. So that's how not to do it. Here's how to answer that first question. It's very, it's very simple. It's like one sentence or sometimes less than a sentence. You're basically telling them that if they will listen to you for the next 2 minutes, you're going to tell them something that's important to them, not to you, but to them. So for example, somebody asks you something and you want to answer it with a story, you might say, "You know, I think the best example of that I've ever seen was when," and now you're telling a story, or you might say, "Gosh, Jason Wasser, that's a tough problem. Let me tell you what I did last year when I ran into that same problem. I did blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." Well, now you're telling a story. So that first sentence or two is just an easy, comfortable way to transition from just talking to telling a story without making a big production of it, but by letting the person know, "I'm going to answer your question by telling you a story," without saying those words. So that's how to answer question number 1, and that's just a much more comfortable way for somebody to start their story. Once they get it started, as long as they answer those 8 questions, the nervousness tends to go away.

I once heard from a friend of mine who was a public speaker that he also loved using stories and storytelling as part of his experience connecting with people, and he actually would collect them from either books or articles or newspapers, and he would file them by category in like a little index card box.

Good for him.

So over the course of, you know, 10, 15, 20 years, he was in the education field and group leadership field, that he would have like a compilation of stories to go to based on the theme and the leadership. Is there anything that you have done to help you collect besides, you know, or in addition to your personal experiences, but really great stories out there to help you recall them, remember them, and put them in some type of structure that makes sense to you?

Yes. So first of all, the fact that he did that is fabulous. And I recommend to all my clients that they do exactly the same or something similar. You need to— I call it database now. You need to database your stories. I mean, in the business world today, we database everything, right? Payroll and production schedules and customer files. But our stories tend to just live in people's heads where they're pretty subject to attrition, right, or being forgotten. Those are really valuable company assets. You should write them down or videotape yourself telling them or somehow, whatever is most convenient for you, save them because they're really valuable. Now, for me, it's pretty easy. I write my stories into books, right? There's— I've got probably 300 stories across my 5 books. So I've documented them in pages, right, in one big fat Word file, but I actually recommend to my clients to do something similar, even if you're not gonna publish a book, just whatever you use to write a memo, Microsoft Word, write your stories in there, write all of them in one file so it's easy to search for the topic, the name of the person the story was about, the, you know, whatever, you can easily search it to find that one story that, oh, oh, what's that one about the, the chicken and the, you know, what, you know, you'll just search my little database for it and I'll find it, right? You absolutely should do something like that.

So taking it back, all of these storytelling and experiences, and you know, most part of it, of your life has been with the business side, and then you wrote regarding parenting. How can we take this and now apply this into our personal lives, interpersonal relationships, dating, marriage, friendship, stuff like that.

Yeah, so I— well, maybe I answered this question too early then. It's— so for me, the, the way I use it is to, to share lessons, right? So things I've learned, I'm, you know, stories I heard from other people where I'm learning. I would imagine, and you'll be better to speak to this than I would, that the act of sharing the lesson is also very therapeutic. It builds relationships. In fact, in my third book, which is Sell with a Story, One whole chapter is about stories to help build relationships between the seller and the buyer. But of course, the same thing is true between husband and wife or parent and child or siblings or whatever, friends. The act of sharing stories, in fact, most people when they meet, whether it's in a professional setting or a personal setting, it takes months if not years to really develop a relationship of a bond of trust, right? But just sharing a few personal stories can get you there, I think, in a matter of minutes. And so we'll let you judge if you think what I'm about to say is true or not. But there was a study done in the New York Times back around 1999, 2000, asked a fascinating question. It asked, "What percent of the population is trustworthy?" And the answer was somewhere around 30%. So it's one of those disappointing moments where you're like, you know, look to your left, look to your right. Between the 3 of you, one of you is trustworthy, the other 2 are not, right?

But that's so mind-blowing, but it also sets up where we're at in our culture today with it. Yeah, yeah.

So yeah, that number's probably lower today, and it was pretty low then. Yeah, but then they asked the question a slightly different way. They said, uh, of the people you know personally, what percent are trustworthy? And the answer shot up to like 80 or 90%. Now you don't have to be a math genius to figure out that There's something weird there, right? Like, unless the people who are not trustworthy don't know anybody, on average, those numbers should be about the same, right? But they're not, and they never will be. And the reason is because, I think, correct me if I'm wrong, but human beings naturally distrust people they don't know. I've never met you before, you could be bad, I don't know, I'm not gonna trust you. But we naturally trust people that we do know personally until they give us a reason not to. So our default fault switch flips when you go from I don't know you to I do know you. And so that's why it might take 6 or 12 months to get to know somebody professionally at work before they really trust you. But if they know you personally because you live in the neighborhood, we go to church together or whatever, automatically they trust you. So a few stories, a few personal stories can move you from outside that circle of trust to inside that circle of trust like that. And I think that works at work and at home.

I find that so profound in the world of conflict resolution that when you start talking about a shared experience, shared traumas, or you find the leverage of perspective that both sides have, then you're going to start building that connection and start breaking down the walls. But it also reminds me of a story of someone I met at a friend's house for dinner. And at the end of the dinner, they came over to me and they're like, oh dude, like, I would love to grab a cup of coffee with you. When are you free? And it turned out, whatever, a day or two later, we met up at Starbucks and Right off the bat, he just went into a sales pitch. He was in financial planning. And I said, listen, like, you know, I have someone I'm already working with. Person happened to be a friend of mine that established a relationship the way you said beforehand, right? And he's like, well, we have better offerings and we do this better than that. Like, it was immediately like all the things you don't do.

And you weren't expecting that.

Not only was I not expecting it, but like, I just don't find it respectful to now bash another company that has been in history for, you know, the same length of time your business has been in, and then expect me to immediately, like, want to be persuaded to switch over to you.

And he skipped the rapport building phase of the sales process, right?

And I see this person all the time, and I just can't even really connect on any deeper level. We're in the same social circles at some level. And it's just like, man, you blew a big opportunity for me to become an advocate for you. Now, it doesn't mean I'm going to refer every single person in that field to you, right? Because I really do believe that there's personality matches and more specific niche need matches. But now I won't even refer to that person or have any relationship with that person at all. So I really do believe in this power of taking the time to build that rapport over a long haul. And I think that's really missed in this instant gratification DM, slide into my DM, you know, hit me up, sell me, because I'm sure you get this all the time on LinkedIn, right? People trying to pitch you stuff and there's no rapport. So, right.

Well, in this case, with it, with, with your buddy there at lunch, it wasn't even that he skipped the long-term rapport building. He skipped the short-term one too, which— and, and you can't just read somebody your resume. But I mean, he could have done so much better in like 4 minutes by just telling you a few personal stories about himself. And having you reciprocate. I mean, in fact, the way I articulate it the shortest I can is that I think storytelling is the shortest distance between being a stranger and a friend, right? It just takes a few minutes. Yeah, yeah.

And one of the people I do refer to, when we met and we created a friendship first, and he then told me his story of why he decided to go into this field, and a very tragic family story, and then why other members in his family decided to go into this specific field, right? So there was that emotional hook, there was that humanity, there was that compassion involved. But it also can tell that there's some integrity with it as well. And I know that as a business owner, right, as a therapist, as someone who's working with people and their emotions and their potential, is where does their integrity lie? And I, and I know that using stories and shared experiences really can help bring that out. Yep. So what are some of the other tools? I know that you talk, right, in the sales process outside of storytelling that you feel are really important. For people to learn and to scale up on?

Yeah, so, so the— so once you've got that structure down, the other thing you need to understand is what stories do I need to tell? In fact, and this, this may sound ironic because I spend most of my time teaching executives how to tell stories, but the good executives, the first question they ask me is not how do I tell these stories better. The first question they ask is what stories do I need to tell?? And that's the right first question to ask. In fact, the whole purpose for me writing my last book, The 10 Stories Great Leaders Tell, is to answer that question because I think I covered 60 or 70 different types of storytelling, stories that you tell in my previous books, and that's just a lot of stories. It's too many for people to put in their head at one time. So if you want a place to start, let me just tell you what those 10 stories are. So here's the executive summary of the whole book, right, in one minute. So I think there are the 10 most important stories for any leader to tell are these, and the first 4 go together because they're about setting direction for the organization. So where we came from, so that's a founding story, our company founding story. Why we can't stay there, so that's a case for change, why we can't, why we need to make a change. Where we're going, which is a vision story, and how we're going to get there, which is a strategy story, because strategy is about how you're going to get from where you are now to where you want to be. So if you can articulate those 4 stories, I think you've got a much better chance of the organization getting where you want them to go. All right, so the next 4 go together as well, but they're more about who we are as an organization. So what we believe, so that's a corporate values and ethics story. Who we serve, so that's a customer story, a story about your customer so that everybody at the company has a personal visceral understanding of and sort of relationship with the people you're serving. What we do for our customers, so that's a classical sales story so that, you know, you can easily articulate what it is that you do that's so awesome that people should pay you money to do it more, right? And then number 8 is how we're different from our competitors. So that's— I call that a marketing story because marketing is often about how do you differentiate yourself from your competitors. So if you can tell those 4 stories and think about that, you can easily articulate who we are, who we serve, what we do, and how we're different from our competitors. Every leader needs to be able to tell those 4 stories. All right, so that leaves 2 more, but they're more personal to you as the leader. So number 9 is why I lead the way I do. So that's a personal leadership philosophy story, why I lead in the way that I do, what made me the leader I am today. And number 10 is why you should want to work here, you the person I'm telling the story to, right? Because Every leader's job is to bring in talented people and have them stay, right? It's not just the job of HR recruiting or whatever. Every leader needs to do that. So those, I think, are the top 10. That's a good place to start. Those are the kind of stories that I think leaders need to be able to tell. Now, there are dozens of others, and I cover those in some of the other books, but if you want a place to start, those are the 10. In that book, there's one example of each of those 10 stories and a few tips to help you find and craft your own story like that, because those 10 examples are somebody else's story, right? You gotta, you gotta come up with your own, but they're like these stories.

And one thing I'm kind of ciphering or decipher— trying to decipher in my head is what's the difference at this point from your perspective in leadership versus management? And I wonder, based on your— you're uniquely positioned in order to really have a good insight on that.

Yeah, so I think leadership is anytime you're trying to influence people. Like, I think of management as managing things and processes and machines and protocol and getting— managing a decision-making system or, you know, whatever. But leading involves people. It's a very human endeavor. So in fact, the— my my first book lays out 21 different leadership challenges, not management challenges, but leadership challenges where storytelling is going to be helpful for you to navigate the situation. So it's some of them on that list of 10, right? So it's setting a vision, it's getting people to be more collaborative with each other, getting people to be more creative and innovative, helping people become better problem solvers, getting people to be more passionate about their job. Those are all very human aspects of running a business. And so that, to me, those are leadership responsibilities, not management responsibilities. And, and therefore storytelling is very helpful for them, whereas storytelling is not as helpful in managing processes or decisions or, you know, things that are not leadership. The storytelling is a leadership tool, not a management tool.

So a company or a person's mission statement really is the part of the story And I'm finding that as I work with different companies or businesses, that they may have come up with a business or mission statement, but in a lot of ways it's incredibly cliché, and they do it once, they stick it on the wall, or they stick it on a poster, or they stick it somewhere on their desk, and they never go back and look at it again, or what they're ending up doing might even be contradictory to their mission statement. So what are you finding out there in your experiences, and how can you help how can we help people sync those two things together where you can actually be in alignment with your mission statement and then put it into play on a daily basis?

Right. Yeah. So first of all, your observation is correct. Most people have a mission statement. They don't have a mission story. And those are two very different things. So the difference in a vision statement and a vision story. So a vision or a mission might be we want to be the fastest growing restaurant chain on the East Coast. Or we want to build the world's quietest jet engine or something like that. And that's, that's a great mission or vision, but it's not a good story, right? A story— because it's not a story at all, it's just a statement, right? So a story is a narrative about something that happened to someone. So if you want to create a story out of your vision or your mission, it needs to be a real story about, about— in this case, it's going to be a fictional story because it's in the future. Future hasn't happened yet, so by definition it's fictional. But You put yourself in the future at a period of time when you should have by then accomplished your vision, looking back to today, observing how much awesomer it is to be here in this future than it was in the past, right? So if, if you become the fastest-growing restaurant chain on the East Coast, so what? Why is that good? Who's it good for? Is it going to mean bigger Christmas bonuses for the employees? Is it going to mean we're going to all be in the newspaper and we're going to be famous? Is it— does it mean I don't know, what does it mean for you? Put yourself into that future and write a story about what a day in your life is like or a day in the life of your average employee in that world and they can compare it to this world. And if that world is more attractive, they'll want to help you get there. But if that's not any more attractive, why would they want to help you get there? So a vision or a mission story is literally a fictional story about the future, a day in your life And then you can compare that to today because, because in short, I guess a vision is a picture of the future so attractive that people want to follow you and help you get there, right? That's a story.

And I think one of the struggles I find that my clients have, and I see this thematically just in general throughout the world, is that we maybe set a vision, a mission, or a goal— and I'm just going to use those words interchangeably in this context— too small, because we might think about what we want out there in the future. And will only go to a place that's just short of it being anxiety-provoking. Because we can achieve that as long as it doesn't cause us any personal struggles or challenges. So we might be like, well, I want to have an incredibly large private practice with 15 employees and office manager and this and that, and an operating budget of $1 million. And that person might automatically say, but I've never made a million dollars in my life together. And then all of a sudden, like, well, okay, well, that's too big. And they're shrink back. So how can we challenge people out there that, yes, we want to push them to have this incredible vision, this incredible mission, these incredible goals. How do you have the courage to break through, to not jump into the resistance and thinking about something that actually might be too small because of where we're looking at it from the vantage point of where we're looking at it from? It's just way too big and way too stress-provoking. So how would you suggest breaking through that barrier and maybe even getting to something even more in alignment, more successful, more purposeful for them?

So is the question, how do you avoid making sure your vision is big enough or it's not too big? I couldn't tell which way.

Well, I would say from the perspective that people might think that they set a goal and they may say, wow, that's a really big goal. They have anxiety about that. Okay. And then they back off that. But yet if they didn't have that anxiety or resistance around it, that goal that they might actually set would even be bigger. More purposeful, more in alignment with their potential, more in alignment with what they're truly capable of being, but that resistance, anxiety comes in and makes them think the big goal they're already setting is already way too big.

So one of those many jobs of leadership that's different than management is inspiring people, right? Inspiring and motivating them to achieve things that they didn't think they were capable of. So one of the types of stories that leaders need to tell, and it didn't make my list of the top 10, but it, you know, I cover it in other books and it's definitely important, is stories to inspire and motivate the group. So for example, one of the leaders that I interviewed for that first book would tell her— so her team was a team of people who were charged with creating something that had never been created before at the company they worked at. It wasn't even close. It wasn't like just a, you know, the next generation of what they were, what they normally built. It was like off the charts. And so they were in this private team in a sequestered part of the building. It was all top secret. In fact, it was so top secret that they weren't even allowed to tell anybody else they worked with at the company what they were working on. It was that top secret. So this team found it hard to stay motivated because everybody else was working on current business projects that, you know, you had daily shipment reports and market share reports to tell you how you were doing. But these people were working on something that wouldn't see the light of day for a decade. And they couldn't even talk to anybody about it. So they were lonely and not very motivated. So she would tell them stories that would help, like, that would motivate them. For example, one of their favorites was about the Western development of the United States. So back in the 1800s, the Old West, right? They're actually, actually probably a little bit before that. There were two types of people brave enough to leave the eastern seaboard of the United States: pioneers and and settlers, right? So the pioneers were the first ones out into the new territory, and you know, their, their job was, you know, figuring out how to, how to bridge a river or, you know, a trailblaze through a forest, uh, you know, and sometimes their most important assets were the just the courage to fend off a hungry wolf or, uh, you know, or figuring out how to, to ford that unfordable river, whatever. Um, so, you know, they would find a, a new place that was places that looked somewhat inhabitable, that maybe had good land for farming and access to water, and start a crude village there. Well, after they did their job, well, then it's time for the settlers to come in, right? Now, the settlers come in on, you know, in covered wagons, which was luxury transportation at the time. They weren't just on horseback, right? And their skill set is a lot more refined than the the pioneers, right? They were blacksmiths and carpenters and pharmacists, you know, and they would come in and settle the town. They would improve on the crude buildings the pioneers had built. And at that point, the pioneer's life got boring, right? Their days were just, you know, they were wandering around this town that they had helped found, but there wasn't much exciting for them to do anymore, right? So it was eventually they got restless and it was their time to move on to the next frontier town, to build, to find and build the next frontier town and leave a trail for other men and women to follow. And she would tell them the stories about these pioneers and settlers and explain to them, you are pioneers, the rest of us are settlers. Your job is to go where nobody has been before and leave that trail. Everyone else's job is to settle in behind you. So, yes, it's lonely out there sometimes. Yes, it's scary out there sometimes, but nobody else is a pioneer at this company. You're it, right? And so, you know, that may sound cliché, and you could probably tell some stories about, you know, your favorite football team or whatever and be all rah-rah, but the point is stories can be very inspiring to people who are in situations where you think they're uninspirable, like her team was.

Well, that's a perfect segue into your most recent book that just came out, right? And the Four Days with Kenny Tedford. And it's such an unusual pivot from what you have been doing into this world of this individual. So let's spend the next few minutes talking about that.

Yeah, so Kenny Tedford, one of the most truly unique human beings I think I've ever met. And I met him about 7 years ago. At a storytelling conference, believe it or not. He and I were both speakers at the conference in different rooms and didn't know it, and we ended up meeting on the front row of somebody else's set. But I immediately knew he was interesting and that I wanted to get to know him better. So Kenny Tedford, he's— he was born deaf in both ears, partially blind in one eye. He couldn't speak well until the age of 10, so kind of like Helen Keller in that aspect, but he also was born with a learning disability. So he cognitively tests at around the 3rd or 4th grade level, even though he's a 66-year-old man now. So he's kind of like a combination of Helen Keller and Forrest Gump, if I could make that kind of awkward analogy. Um, so obviously just a fascinating human being. And, you know, when I met him, I, I thought, you know, if that were me, I think I might be a bitter human being, right? That I, I, that life dealt me this all these challenges in life that most people don't have. But he wasn't. He was just the most charming, was and is the most charming human being I think I've ever met. And that just fascinated me. And I wanted to know why. And I, you know, after a year or so after I'd met him, I had just signed a contract for my second book. And I was looking for interesting people to, this is the Parenting the Storybook I mentioned earlier. So I was looking for interesting people to interview for the book. And he's the first person I thought of. Oh, I got to interview that guy, Kenny Tedford, that I met at that conference last year, remember? So I, you know, I couldn't call him up because he's deaf. But we did a FaceTime, like you and I are doing, a video chat. He can read my lips, thankfully. Anyway, so I'm interviewing him. And he's telling me all these fascinating stories about his life. And at exactly 39 minutes into this interview, and I know this because I recorded it, right, like you're recording this now. I said something that shocked me as much as it shocked him. Well, I asked him, I said, "Gosh, have you ever written all your stories down? I mean, this is fascinating. Like you could write a whole book on your life." And he said, "No, I've never done that because I can't write. That's part of my mental challenge is I just really, I can speak, but I don't know how to write well. And I'd love if somebody would do that someday." And that's 39 minutes is when I said the thing that just kind of changed my life since then. I said, "Well, I'll do it, Kenny. I'll write your book." And even though I literally hadn't written a single word of a book I was contractually obligated to write now that had nothing to do with him. It took me a while to do it, but he ended up spending 4 days at my house for our first set of interviews where we got most of the interviews done. And I, in 4 days, I got to watch this man's whole life go by. And it was just fascinating. I mean, it was, there were joyous parts and just tragic, tear-jerking parts and hopeful parts and hilarious parts. Because you can imagine, imagine what it would be like to walk around the world in a grown man's body, but with a, child's mind. I mean, just funny things are going to happen to you, right? I mean, so his life is full of all ups and downs. And I just— it was an amazing experience getting to write this book. So, um, Four Days with Kenny Tedford is really written as that set of interviews between he and I and what went on in my house and the impact he was having on me and what I was thinking about, the lessons I was learning from the stories he was telling me, and the impact it was having on my wife and kids who are over there in the corner listening to these You know, funny stories. And so it just turned out to be something I'm super proud of. And I just think the world's gonna be a much better place when people get to know Mr. Kenny Tedford.

Is there one story that really impacted you the most from this time with him?

Yeah, so when he was in the second grade, you know, this is back in the 1950s, and they would have called a kid back then, they would have called him retarded, right? And so, but his school didn't have a special ed class. Class. So he just had to sit in class with the rest of the kids. But of course, you know, they put him in the back and he just— they gave him crayons and said, you just draw pictures because you can't hear us and you can't really see and you can't participate. So just sit back there and color. And, um, uh, yeah, the psychologist would come by once every month and look at the pictures he drew and evaluate him psychologically based on the pictures. Because even the psychologist couldn't interact with him because he couldn't really even speak yet. Right. And so the psychologist came by this one day and looked at one of the pictures. He'd drawn a picture of a butterfly and it was black and gray and white and obviously wasn't very colorful and he didn't think it was well done. And he gave him a D, you know, a grade, ABC, gave him a D. Said, you know, not very smart, whatever. And so that just crushed little Kenny because, you know, he's thinking coloring is the only thing I do and I'm awful at that apparently, right? So he like starts crying, he leaves class that day, he's walking down the hallway to go home and the teacher, another teacher sees him in the hallway, you know, distraught and asks him what's wrong, you know, and he could talk barely enough to be communicative and she, and he basically explained what happened to her. You know, she pulled him into her room and said, well, show me your crayons. And so he got his backpack off and pulled out his crayons and handed them to her, this little tiny box like the one that you and I would get in a restaurant. One for your kids to play with. You know, it's got 4 crayons in it, right? And she gave him— and it was black, white, and gray, and that was it. And she said, this is all you got? She goes, yeah, that's the only crayons I have. So she gave him one of those, you know, 64, you know, color boxes of crayons that, you know, most of us, you know, had. And she said, now you go home and you draw another butterfly with all these colors, and then you you make up a story to go with this butterfly. So the next time that psychologist comes by, you've got a story to tell him and you've got a better butterfly. And so he goes off and he does exactly that. And of course the next day he shows up and the next time the psychologist comes by, Kenny's got a beautiful butterfly for him and a story to go with it. And, and you know, that gives him an A this time. And anyway, the lesson I learned from that was that If you give somebody like Kenny Tedford the same crayons that you'd give any other kid, you'll be surprised and amazed at what they can do with it. Just give people the same opportunities and I think they'll surprise you. He certainly did.

I couldn't agree with that more. And it's great in a way, it's leveraging the playing field, especially for children with things that are going on in the world and trauma and resources and education and reading and all these different things that I see this left and right in my practice. Practice where people come in and whatever their family history is, whether it's about their relationships or about their business or about anxiety, that they just didn't get the skills and the tools along the ways for whatever reason. And our job, right, your job, my job, and other people's job out there is to help them realize that maybe they already have the skills and they were just told that they don't, or to help them figure out where they can acquire them. So as we wrap this all up, I love asking this final question, which is my On One Foot question. And it goes that if you had 2 minutes to spend time with someone and you knew that you would never have the opportunity to share your wisdom with them again, what would you say to them?

I'm not sure I would say a whole lot. I think I would just ask a couple of questions. That's probably putting myself in your shoes, though. Yeah, I kind of— so in addition to telling stories that I believe pass along wisdom, I also believe in the Socratic method, right? So I think I would try and ask the right questions that would help them find their own wisdom. So for example, my kid today, my oldest teenager, bought a brand new computer for his college class that started yesterday. And he's trying to set it up today and it didn't work. And he's calling me on the phone from the dorm, "Dad, it doesn't work. It won't boot up." It's, you know, telling me all the technical things that's going wrong. And I'm like, okay, well, son, what do you think you should do about that? Well, you know, I could reinstall the software, I could go find the discs, I could do, you know, he went through all the technical stuff that he could do. And he said, but I don't think that would work. It would take too long. And I'm like, so if you just couldn't figure out what to do, what would you do? Well, I don't know, maybe I'd call the people we bought it from and try and get it fixed or a new one. I said, that's pretty smart. I think that's what I would do. So I'd probably ask questions, Jason.

I love it, I love it. So yeah, you basically just took my job away from me, so thanks. So, but that's it, that's right, with the best questions already have the answers couched in them, and if we learn to empower, right, if people can learn how to empower other people just by being more curious, by being investigative reporters instead of judge, jury, and executioner, I think that we're going to get a lot more of the people around us that we are partnering with, that we're in relationships with, that we're working with. And if people want more of what you have to offer, I know not only do you have these incredible books— I'm going to put all the links in the show notes for all the books— but you also have some online courses and some YouTube videos. And so where can they find all of that?

Oh yeah, so thanks. The best place is just my website, which has all that stuff on it. So it's leadwithastory.com. That's just the name of my first book. I never got more creative after that with website names, I guess. Yeah, leadwithastory.com. You have access to all that stuff.

Awesome. I really, really, really want to thank you for giving us so much information today. And I know there's gonna be a lot out there that the people might have some questions about. Is there a way that they can reach out to you directly if they have a specific question, or if they wanted to track you down or bring you in? Is that— will be through the same place?

Yeah, yeah, the website has got some of this as well. But yeah, if you want my like direct email address, it's paul@leadwithastory.com. I'll be happy to respond.

All right, so everybody out there, if you found value in this episode, and you think someone else might find value in this episode, As always, please share it out with someone that you might know. Don't forget to subscribe, leave us a 5-star review on iTunes. Really would help us get more of this out to other people if they can find us easier, uh, the more positive reviews that we get. And again, Paul, thank you so much for joining us today.

You're welcome. Thanks for having me on.

My pleasure.