cap g storysession_theclaschreuders
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StoryCapgemini RDV training
Thecla Schreuders
Today
• Why story
• What is story
• Brain and story
• Classic stories
• Character
• Action
• Brands and story
• Making story
Why do we talk about story?
We are social animals
Practice interaction, learn codes & customs, how to be human
As children we play at story by instinct
How we extract meaning from experience
We tell stories to ‘continue’ ourselves
It’s what we do already, all the time
Why do we talk about story?
During our lifetimes we spend more time in stories than anywhere else
• 65% of speaking time is on social topics
• 46% of our waking hours spent daydreaming*
• We dream in stories every night
Why do we talk about story?
Story as distillation
Story helps us understand
• Our client
• Our client’s business
• Our client’s problem
• Our client’s clients
• Our project objectives
• Ourselves …
Three parts and the whole
Story =
Audience
Content
Structure
= Experience
Ernest Hemingway once said his best work was a story he wrote in just six words:
For sale:baby shoes, never worn.
What is ‘story’?
What is ‘story’
More than a list of facts
Causally linked events which unfold over time
Interaction of ‘intentional agents’ with minds and motivations
Engage audience through recognisable emotions & believable interactions
Elements of story?
Elements of story
Character
Objective or desire
Obstacles to achieving it
Action & behaviour
Beginning – middle – end
Who What Where When Why How
End = satisfying resolution to problem
“What happened?”
“What happens next?”
Story =
1 + 1 = 3
Story = interactive
Relies on audience’s cognitive & emotional responses to make connections
Story makes you part of it as you anticipate actions, feelings, outcome
Every experience of story is unique, relies on the audience’s own prior experience, associations & character
Story is manipulation
Wired for story
Memory
Procedural
Episodic
Semantic
Thinking
Thinking, fast and slow
System 1 = fast, unconscious, intuitive, automatic
Relies on emotion, accumulated experience
System 2 = slow, conscious, logical, effortful
Relies on attention, choice, willed action
Thinking, fast and slow
Thinking, fast and slow
17 x 24 =
Mirror neurons
Stories are universal
Classic story modes
• Romantic – the trials of love
• Heroic – quest for precious outcome or power struggles
• Sacrificial – from bad comes good
Hero’s journey
• Ordinary world
• Call to adventure
• Refusal of call, hesitation, doubt
• Mentor
• Allies, tests, enemies
• Ordeal, transformation
• Use new knowledge to defeat enemies
• Return with holy grail
Gladiator
• The title character just wants to go home.
• What happens to him instead turns into the longest, bloodiest commute imaginable
So?
Story =
Rational & emotional
Logical & magical
‘Right brain’ & ‘left brain’
Conscious & unconscious
Man at work
Ask questions, such as …
who is this man?
what is he doing and why?
what is he thinking, feeling; his hopes, fears, plans?
what’s the context, and the mood of the moment?
what happens next?
Story
“Let’s talk about me …”
My story
What’s happening inside?
• I define
• You infer
• Assumptions & prior knowledge
• Fill in, flesh out, fine tune
• Confirm
Your story
‘Who are you?’
• Define
• Infer
• Cohere
More story elements
• ‘Character is conflict’
• Premise: a proposition leading to a conclusion
• Set up = expectation
• Payoff = result
• Anticipation = forward drive
Character // Audience …
Stories are about and for people, all overcoming obstacles in pursuit of a goal
Every story needs an audience
Business needs customers
Site needs users
Motivation & action
I think therefore I am
I WANT therefore I DO
Goldhawk Rd pub
Goldhawk Rd pub
• What do you do?
• Why?
• What do your actions say about you?
Brands use story
• Business or brand idea
• Customer value proposition
–Customer needs, product benefits, competitive difference
• Brand tagline
• Advertising and campaigns
• Tone of voice
The client’s story
• Creation myths
• Heroism
• Purpose
• Brand story
• Unique benefits and solutions
Life. Then Strategy http://www.markpollard.net/
Brand, strategy and story
• Find the real problem and state it interestingly
• Find a deep human insight – hit a nerve• Find what’s truly unique and motivating about the brand/product/problem/ opportunity
• Link the insight and b/p/p/o ‘truth’ to a simple strategy statement
• Flip the perspective on b/p/p/o to find core strategic idea
• Get others to contribute
A reminder …
Storytelling = audience, content and structure, to produce experience
Audience = who, first principles
Content = what, gives focus
Structure = how, provides framework
Experience = attainment of goals
Users’ worlds
Social world
Outer worldInner world
Persuasion
Pathos / logos / ethos
Desires / benefits / reputation
Finding things out
• Formal interviews, direct questions but also conversation
• Observe using ‘soft eyes’: put assumptions aside
• Framing: not ‘what is it?’ but ‘what do you like most about it, and why?’
A conversation with yourself
• Ask: ‘what single detail would make me care more about this situation / person?
• Ask: ‘what single factor would provide a compelling circumstance?’
• Ask: if I were in their shoes, what would I think / feel / want?’
‘I am not other people’
Making story
Finding Nemo: an inspiration ….
Making story
Making story is messy
Research is crucial
Believability: actual vs. symbolic truth
Big picture AND drama in the detail: about solving problems
Even though you THINK you know where a story is going, you don’t until you’re in it
Stories have an internal logic. Won’t always get it right first time so be open to the process
A web epic
• Ordinary world
• ‘I need …’
• What? Where? How?
• User journey of discovery
• Apply information, tool, options
• Fulfil goals
• Change, satisfaction, return