TJ Walker (YouTube) explains how to use storytelling in presentations: every major point should be supported by a short, personal story to make it memorable. He offers a media-training anecdote about being a congressional aide whose imprecise answer to a reporter led to a quoted line that cost him his job, illustrating that media skills are learned and that stories efficiently communicate lessons.
Chapters
So how do you use storytelling when giving a presentation? This confuses a lot of people. They get scared and they say, TJ I'm not a natural born storyteller. Well, baloney. Everybody tells stories. That's how we as human beings communicate. Now, the key when giving a speech or a presentation is not to think, oh, I have to start with a big grand story story or end with it. No, you need a story for every single major point you're trying to make if you want people to remember it. What is a story? All it is is a conversation with you, another person, about a problem, where you were, how you felt, how it's resolved. That's all it is. And we do this all the time over the phone in the hallway, but we stand up to give the formal speech and we throw away the stories. Don't do it. You have stories within you. For example, when I'm doing media training with executives, I try to convey the message point that nobody's born knowing how to speak to the media. It's a learned skill to illustrate that I tell them a story. Now I don't tell them. I'm going to tell them a story. I just launch into 20 years ago. I was an aide for a member of Congress. The phone rings one day and it's a reporter from the Hill. And the reporter says, TJ tell me about HR 1400, the legislation your member of Congress is supporting. And I said, well, the legislation is unclear. It's being cleared up in committee. And when it does, people will realize it does X, Y and Z. So I hung up the phone. I was quite proud of myself. I was the spokesperson for this member of Congress. The reporter was quite happy, said, thank you very much. I went home that day. I packed my suitcase. I was going to Hawaii the next day at taxpayer expense. I was working for a Hawaiian member of Congress. So I packed my bathing suit, I packed my sunglasses, the tanning oil. I come in the next day carrying my suitcase. Put it down there. Right on my desk is the newspaper. I look at it. There is the story about this legislation. And in the first paragraph, According to spokesperson TJ Walker, the legislation is unclear, end of quote. Page B57 was the rest of my quote, saying all the good things about it. Well, a couple minutes later, the buzzer rings. The chief of staff says, TJ Why don't you come on in? TJ I've got good news and bad news. The good news is, is you're all packed. The bad news, you're not going to Hawaii. You're not going anywhere. Get out. You're fired. So I learned firsthand that anybody can make mistakes with the media. Because of how I gave a complex answer, I ended up with a quote that made me lose my job. So if you're not completely comfortable, you know how to deal with the media, you're in good shape. It's a learned skill. I learned the hard way. And as Warren Buffett said, smart people don't learn from their mistakes, they learn from other people's mistakes. You can learn how to be great with every media interview without making mistakes that cost your job. Okay, so that was a story. It took less than two minutes to say, but it illustrates the key point that nobody's born knowing how to be great with the media. I used a story to illustrate point. It makes it more memorable. You can do the same thing.
