Business Storytelling Quotes & Sayings

In my long career in this historical fiction business, though, I've found that the most effective storytelling concept is this: Once upon a time it was now.
That has become my credo and my method as a longtime historical novelist.
It's quite simple, if you see as Janus sees:
Today is now.
Yesterday was now.
Tomorrow will be now.
Three hundred years ago, the eighteenth century was now.
You, as a historical novelist, can make any time now by taking your reader into that time. Once you grasp that, the rest is just hard work.
Stay with me, and you'll see how such work is done. — James Alexander Thom

As I quietly stare off into space, eyes glazed over and brow thoughtfully taut, know that I am going about my business. I am a storyteller. Daydreaming is the best part of my job. — Richelle E. Goodrich

Storytelling is all about using the imagination, for me at least it is. That's why I'm bored sometimes to see movies. I'm bored to see TV. I never see TV. I see news sometimes. I'm sorry to say, I work in this business and I love working in it, but I haven't seen a movie in so many years. — Peter Stormare

Pulitzer's Gold is a goldmine of inspiration for both journalists and non-journalists. Those in the newspaper business, who now find themselves obsessing about staff cutbacks and circulation declines, should embrace this book as a reminder of the highest ideals, and the absolute thrills, to be found in their profession. As for regular readers, Pulitzer's Gold offers marvelous storytelling, real-life adventures, and absolute proof that journalism can change our world for the better. — Jeffrey Zaslow

I see all art as a complement to telling people's stories. I'm in the storytelling business. I believe that the humanity that all of us share is the stories of our lives, and everybody has a story. Your story is as important as the next person's story. — Oprah Winfrey

Since the opposition (shadow) is capable of preventing the audience (hero) from achieving success, the goal of a business narrative is to defeat the opposition (shadow). — Luis Cubero

Buyer Legends is a business process that uses storytelling techniques to map the critical paths a prospective buyer might follow on his journey to becoming a buyer.

This process aligns strategy to brand story to the buyer's actual experience on their customer journey.

These easy-to-tell stories reveal the opportunities and gaps in the customer's experience versus the current marketing & sales process.

These legends communicate the brand's story intent and critical touch point responsibilities within every level of an organization, from the boardroom to the stockroom.

Buyer Legends reconcile the creative process to data analysis; aligning metrics with previously hard-to-measure marketing, sales, and customer service processes. The first result is improved execution, communications, and testing. The second result is a big boost to the bottom line. — Bryan Eisenberg

Scratch the surface in a typical boardroom and we're all just cavemen with briefcases, hungry for a wise person to tell us stories. — Alan Kay

I can see how I could write a bold account of myself as a passionate man who rose from humble beginnings to cut a wide swath in the world, whose crimes along the way might be written off to extravagance and love and art, and could even almost believe some of it myself on certain days after the sun went down if I'd had a snort or two and was in Los Angeles and it was February and I was twenty-four, but I find a truer account in the Herald-Star, where it says: "Mr. Gary Keillor visited at the home of Al and Florence Crandall on Monday and after lunch returned to St. Paul, where he is currently employed in the radio show business ... Lunch was fried chicken with gravy and creamed peas". — Garrison Keillor

Storytelling is by far the most underrated skill in business. — Gary Vaynerchuk

Your entire presentation is the story. — Luis Cubero

In Haiti, as I understand it, storytelling and history itself are not a business of necessarily elucidating facts or the truth of an incident, but finding the version that is most entertaining and therefore will get retold and live in immortality. — John Edgar Wideman

The business of stories is not enchantment. The business of stories is not escape. The business of stories is waking up. — Martin Shaw

As soon as we open our eyes in the morning, what we want most is to matter, to live a life and to do a work that has meaning. We have evolved to feel this way. Man's first thought was 'I AM'. — Bernadette Jiwa

When developing a business story, keep in mind that the opposition character (shadow) is just as important as the audience character (hero) is. — Luis Cubero

The focus of your presentation is the audience. You are missing the point if you focus on a product or your company. — Luis Cubero

I mean, I'm in the business of storytelling, not message making. — John Le Carre

Storytelling is a business of unique snowflakes. Every writer is different; every book is different; every reader is different. This is why it's so hard to give writing advice, because what works for me might be poison to someone else. But if I could make one absolute assertion, it would be this: If you are not enjoying your writing, you're doing it wrong. A book is not a battle, nor is it a conquest. A book is a story, and telling it should be an enjoyable exercise. So the next time you don't want to write, don't waste time beating yourself up. Instead, stop and ask yourself why. Why do you not want to do this fundamentally enjoyable thing? What's really going on? — Rachel Aaron

Experience shows that, once you start using the business storytelling process, you are unlikely to return to your old methods. — Luis Cubero

One of the most intriguing things in management and in business is the role of storytelling - people need the anecdotes to do the work that they do. — Anita Roddick

I got this story from someone who had no business in the telling of it. — Edgar Rice Burroughs

Personally, I've made myself a very small window of what I enjoy in this business, which is I love being a big part of the storytelling process. — Bradley Cooper

I'm in the storytelling business, and so you're always drawn to the unusual. And early on, I discovered that's the easiest way to tell stories. If you come up through a newspaper as I did, your whole goal is to get a story on the front page, and you only get something on the front page if it's unusual — Malcolm Gladwell