A WHOLE NEW MINDWhy Right Brainers will rule the

futureDaniel H. Pink

Chapter 5: STORY

Time for a pop quiz

• Question 1. According to the research cited on Asia, how many dollars in American wages are expected to shift to these low- cost locales over the next ten years?

• Question 2. In relation to the section on Automation, who is the John Henry of the Conceptual age?

• Question 1. Needs photographic memory to answer .That is recalling facts. Answer is $136 billion.

• Question 2. To remember a story. Answer is the chess grand master Garry Kasparov

• “ Narrative imaging- story- is fundamental instrument of thought" and how we remember

• Story is just as integral to human experience as design

• Stories amuse; Facts illuminates

• Stories divert; Facts reveal

• Stories are for cover; Facts are real

• “Humans are not ideally set up to understand logic, they are ideally set up to understand stories” –ROGER C. SCHANK cognitive scientist

• Finding facts wasn’t always so easy, until recently- Today Facts are ubiquitous, nearly free and available at the speed of lights--- Internet

• The more facts become so widely available and instantly accessible, the less valuable it becomes

• What matter more is the ability to place facts in CONTEXT and to deliver them with emotional impact

• Story is high concept because it sharpens our understanding of one thing by showing it in the context of something else (parables)

• Story is to convey a complex idea in a more memorable and meaningful way—River Pruitt

• E. M. Foster famous observation:• A fact is “The queen died and the king died”• story is “The queen died and the king died of a broken

heart”

• THINGS THAT MAKES US SMART, DON NORMAN• Logic tries to generalize• Strip decision making from the specific context• Remove it from subjective emotions• Stories have the felicitous capacity of capturing

exactly those elements that formal decision methods leave out

• Stories encapsulate, into one compact package, information, knowledge, context and emotion

• Stories are important cognitive events

• High-concept and high- touch capacity to weave events into an emotional compelling narrative has become an essential aptitude in business, medicine and personal life

 • The hero’s journey has three main parts: Departure, Initiation and

Return• Samples are Homer’s Odyssey, King Arthur, Star Wars, Matrix etc• The hero’s journey is the underlying story of this book.” A Whole

New Mind”• It begin with the knowledged worker , the master of L-Directed

aptitudes• She faces a transformative crisis (wrought by abundance, Asia,

and Automation) and must answer the call (of a new way to work and live) she resisted the call at first ( protesting outsourcing, denying that things need to change)

• Eventually she crosses the threshold ( into the Conceptual age) she faces challenges and difficulties ( mastering R-Directed aptitudes)

• She perseveres, acquires these capabilities, and returns as someone who can inhabit both worlds (she has a whole new mind)

THE STORY BUSINESS• Persuasion advertising, counseling, consulting and so on- accounts for 25 percent

of US gross domestic product ( Economist Deidre McCloskey and Arjo Klamer• If story is a component of half these persuasive effort , then story is worth about

$1 trillion a year to the US economy• “Organizational Storytelling” used in pursuit of organizational goal (Steve Denning

founder)• “Storytelling doesn’t replace analytical thinking” “It supplements it by enabling us

to imagine new perspectives and new worlds….Abstract analysis is easier to understand when seen through the lens of a well-chosen story” Denning

• 3M gives it top executives storytelling lessons• NASA has begun using story telling in its knowledge management initiatives• Xerox-recognized that its repair personnel learned to fix machines by trading

stories rather than by reading manuals- (Eureka $100million)• Story Quest based in suburban Chicago assist companies in this regard

• Richard Oliver of UK created the “mytho drama” theory• Richard says Successful business people must be able to combine the science of

accounting with the art of story

Another important impact of story on business

• Like design it is becoming a key way for individuals and entrepreneurs to distinguish their goods and services in a crowded market place-

• Personal story: Realtor and Wine

The Story of Healing• “Stories-that’s how people make sense of what’s happening to them when they get sick. They tell stories about themselves. Our ability as doctors to treat

and heal is bound up in our ability to accurately perceive a patient’s story. If you can’t do that, you’re working with one hand tied behind your back”

-DR. HOWARD BRODY-Family practice physician

• 20 years research show that doctors interrupted their patience in consulting room after 21 seconds of talking.• Recent research show that doctors interrupts their patient after 23 seconds an

improvement of 3 seconds.

• Today, at Columbia, all second-year medical students take a seminar in narrative medicine….They learn to listen more empathically

• These young doctors will broaden their inquiry

• “Tell me where it hurt” becomes “tell me about your life”

• Charon says, "being a good doctor requires narrative competence- “ competence that human beings use to absorb, interpret, and respond to stories”

• Narrative medicine is part of a wider trend to incorporate an R-Directed approach into what has long been a bastion of L-Directed muscle-flexing

• Fifteen years ago, about one out of three American medical schools offered humanities courses

• Today, three out of four schools offered humanities courses

• The future of medicine requires physicians who can both think rigorously and feel empathically , physicians who can both analyze a test ,appreciate a story , physicians with a whole new mind

• The Conceptual Age can remind us what has always been true but rarely been acted upon-that we must listen to each other’s stories and that we are each the authors of our own lives

• Extremely short stories- just fifty words long…no more ….no less. It should have beginning, a middle, and an end

Sample of Mini Saga:A life

BY JANE ROSENBERG, BRIGHTON, UNITED KINGDOMJoey, third of five, left home at sixteen, traveled the

country and wound up in Nottingham with a wife and kids, they do shifts the, the kids play out and ends never meet. Sometimes he’d give anything to walk away but be knows she’s only got a year and she doesn’t.

PORTFOLIOWriting a Mini-Saga

• Enlisting in Story Corps

• More info: www.storycorps.net

• Whip Out the Tape Recorder

• Interview some one and record it

Visit a Storytelling Festival• National storytelling Festival :

www.storytellingcenter.com• Yukon International Storytelling Festival:

www.storytelling.yk.net• Bay Area Storytelling Festival:

www.bayareastorytelling.org• Digital Storytelling Festival: www.dstory.com• Cape Clear Island International Storytelling Festival:

www.indigo.iel~stories• Sharing the Fire New England Storytelling

Conference: www.lanes.org/stf/sharing_the_fire.html

• Get One Story: www.one-story.com

Riff on Opening Lines• Underline a sentence in a book or magazine and

craft a story that evolves from this “opening line”

• Group Activity: Everyone writes an opening line on an index card, trade cards and on the spot, tell a story that begins with the line on the card

• In a business setting, apply this exercise to a particular product, service, or experience in your company

Play Photo Finish

• Select a photo from any source and fashion a tale about what is happening in the picture

• Challenge yourself not only to describe the obvious, but also tell the “back story”

• Art and photography on display in museums (or on museum websites) offer another rich source of material

• Experiment with Digital Storytelling• Digital cameras, Photoshop, and CD burners are all good

sources of telling stories with pictures and sound: www.fray.com, www.citystories.com

Ask Yourself:” Who Are These People?”

• At airports, shopping mall, movie theaters, or sports stadiums. Make up a story about two of the people in your proximity; who are they? What are their names? Are they coworkers? Lovers? Siblings? Enemies? Why are they here? Where are they going next? Etc

• If you are with friends or a group, together select a few people, craft your own stories, and then compare the results.

• What do you ignore that your friend emphasizes?• Which details do you focus on that they might not even see?• This exercise can help you challenge assumptions, bypass

stereotypes ,etc • If nothing else, it can make waiting for a bus a bit more

entertaining

Read These Books• The best method for heightening your aptitude for story is just

to read great stories• Particularly the archetypal stories found in Aesop’s fables;

Greek; Nordic; Natives American; South Asian and Japanese myths; the Bible; and Shakespeare play

• Story: Substance, structure, Style, and the Principles of Screen writing by Robert McKee

• Stealing Fire from God: A Dynamic New Story Model for Writers and Filmmakers by James Bonnet

• Beyond Bullet Points: Using Microsoft PowerPoint to create Presentations that inform, motivate, and inspire by Cliff Atkinson

• Understanding Comics. The Invisible Art by Scott Mc Cloud• The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell – “hero’s

journey”• More info: www.jcf.org/works.php