What is your story? What has happened to you, what do you tell to others? What have you been able to achieve in the past, what will you accomplish in the future? How you share all this with people around you? Have you ever paused to think what is the story of your organization, or you team?
I will have a huge privilege to talk soon in a seminar which ends almost a year long executive program. In a situation like this one really think what kind of topic would be most valuable to those people who you have learned to know during the program. Now I thought that one part of the seminar will be dedicated to our stories, or to be more accurate we will focus on ways to develop stories, our own and also those which relate to our organizations..
The key point here is my contention that we have some freedom to choose how we create our story. I wish emphasize right away that we are not entering into realm of lies here but into realm where we in a very deep level define to ourselves. A lot has happened to us all, but which events get our attention, which events we remember and tell further, that is our topic. These choices are vitally important, on their part they tell to each of us who we really are. Hence it is our unavoidable challenge to think what is our story now and what it will be in the future. We must pause to reflect what is our own attitude here, do aim to be authors in our story, or are we more characters in a story which just happens to us. Evidently the proposition is that let us assume the author role where ever it is somehow possible.
Let us first hear three narratives which I have just encountered. These all give us an idea what the author role could mean and why it is so important. One story comes from our executive MBA student. I call him mr K, the other story is based on the lecture which magnificent Brian Tracy gave in Jyväskylä, Finland and the third story can be found from an excellent TED talk delivered by Elizabeth Gilbert.
First story, police and truck driver
This happened a while ago when one seminar day ended and we walked to the restaurant for a dinner. While we were walking one member of our group, mr K., shared one of his story with us. This had happened several years ago just when he had received his driving license. He had stopped in a gasoline station and when he returned back to the main road he noticed a truck approaching with very high speed. He was forced to speed up...I think you guess the rest, the police patrol was there and they stopped the young man. But then a story gets a new twist, the truck driver stopped his vehicle and the driver told to the police men that the young driver really needed to speed up, because that was the situation on the road. As a result the young driver did not get the ticket.
To me this was a very interesting event. Not so much the story as such but more because this was a narrative what someone decided to remember and tell. Here I started to think how we all encounter all kind of things and accidents every day, but what we decide to remember, what we decide to tell to other people? How our story will affect to us, what it will do the others?
Second story, Brian Tracy and no answers
Brian Tracy visited my home town Jyväskylä few weeks ago and he gave a lecture in Nordic Business Forum seminar. It was an excellent speech but what I write below is my summary and interpretation concerning only one part of the lecture.Brian Tracy told that whoever works in sales he will probably encounter no answer from customers. And this may not be a rare exception but something which is quite often part of the work and sometimes that part can start to feel very demanding both for the sales personnel and also for a person who is in the charge of sales. But also here we may have some freedom how create the story. My interpretation is that Brian Tracy offered at least three most interesting ways how to be an author of your story in a situation like this.
First, you may decide that for you the word no does not mean failure and negative thing, but you can learn from such an event and head for a next event with a new energy, wisdom and determination. Yes, this is easy to say, but think about it, in case you have some freedom to decide how to interpret different situations, why not at least try to interpret them in a way which helps you to continue.
Second, Brian Tracy suggested that perhaps you could try something new in your organization which might help your team to manage with nos. So, why not organize a competition where a person who gets first 10 nos is winner. Sounds odd at first but let us think about this. Why not. Could we be active and innovative in creating a story around the word "no" where that word could mean also something else than in typical story. Certainly this could not change everything, and as a result of this kind of story people would not live in a fantasy world where "no" would be new goal in real sense - that is not the point. But perhaps we could nudge our story to a direction which could help us to do our work. Thirdly Brian Tracy told a story of a sales man who had lost his energy to make those efforts which do not result in business. Here it helped when the sales expert started to think that every effort is needed as necessary step and how all efforts in a way provide results, although the actual sales may happen later. No effort is vain, each of them earn a part of the result.
Third story, Elizabeth Gilbert and the danger of success
Here I really recommend that you enjoy the TED talk by Elizabeth Gilbert, because what I write here is just a one possible interpretation of that excellent speech. However, I wish to include the discussion of that speech to my blog because it is most evocative example about how to be the author of your own story. Here we can see how developing a story can give strength and endurance to a person who is in a most challenging situation.
The crux here is that Elizabeth Gilbert wrote a book which became an enormous success. She says that after that event people around her seemed to think that she was doomed - how an earth she might be able repeat or even surpass the achievement which she had just done. And also Elizabeth herself felt the pressure, how to be so creative once again, and how to keep on being creative year after year.
In this situation she tells a story which could be helpful to all of us who do creative work and who will never know whether we can repeat or even surpass the achievements which we have just done. In short Elizabeth Gilbert looks back in history and she suggest that when the humanity put a single person in the center of everything we did put too much pressure to one single mind. In this person centric thinking it is suggested that a one person should be able to provide the acts of creativity time after time. This is a daunting demand.
Hence, Elizabeth Gilbert says that she searched for a thinking model, a story, which could be different. And what she found was that creativity was perceived differently in ancient Rome and Greece. At that time people thought that creativity was something where people get help from the outside, perhaps from the ghosts or gods of that era. In a way at that time it was thought that people had kind of guardian angels which helped the individual ih her creativity, sometimes the help was excellent sometimes not that excellent. In that world the burden of creativity was shared.
Well, our thinking models have changed but nevertheless, we might assume an attitude that whenever we do something creative, we do our share, we work hard and we do what we can. In case a very special spark of creativity happens to enlighten our work - that will be just great. However, in every case we can do our part. This is how Elizabeth Gilbert constructed her story, a story which could the meet that challenges of creative work.
To sum up. I do hope this blog is interesting to read as a standalone text. This text will also serve as a background material in our fortcoming seminar where we will talk a lot more about how we are authors in our stories.
