The Importance of Storytelling in Leadership

The Importance of Storytelling in Leadership

Mandy Hickson

25 years: Ex-RAF pilot & leadership expert

In the first video of this new series on Leadership, Mandy highlights the importance of storytelling as one of the most powerful means that leaders have to influence, teach, and inspire and discusses why it is so effective for learning.

In the first video of this new series on Leadership, Mandy highlights the importance of storytelling as one of the most powerful means that leaders have to influence, teach, and inspire and discusses why it is so effective for learning.

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The Importance of Storytelling in Leadership

2 mins 53 secs

Key learning objectives:

  • Learn what makes storytelling so effective for learning

  • Identify the different types of learners

  • Understand how the aspects of storytelling work for all three types of learners

  • Outline the benefit to the leaders for sharing a personal story

Overview:

Storytelling provides connection, engagement, inspires motivation and conveys learning that sticks. It’s no wonder that more and more organisations are embracing storytelling as an effective way for their leaders to influence, inspire and teach.

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Summary

What makes storytelling so effective for learning?

  • Storytelling forges connections among people, and between people and ideas
  • They build familiarity and trust, and allow the listener to enter the story where they are, making them more open to learning
  • Good stories can contain multiple meanings so they convey complex ideas in graspable ways
  • Stories are more engaging than a dry recital of data points or a discussion of abstract ideas
  • Stories are easy to remember - In fact, psychologist Jermone Burner suggests that facts are 20 times more likely to be remembered if they’re part of a story

What are the different types of learners?

  1. In any group, roughly 40% will be visual learners, who learn best from videos, diagrams, or illustrations
  2. Another 40% will be auditory, learning best through lectures and discussions.
  3. The remaining 20% are kinesthetic learners, who learn best by doing, experiencing, or feeling.

How do the aspects of storytelling work for all three types of learners?

Visual learners appreciate the mental pictures storytelling evokes. Auditory learners focus on the words and the storyteller’s voice and Kinesthetic learners remember the emotional connections and feelings from the story.

What is the benefit to the leaders for sharing a personal story?

  • They’ve conveyed underlying values
  • Offered insight into the evolution of their own experience and knowledge
  • Presented themselves as more approachable
  • Inspired others to want to know more

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Mandy Hickson

Mandy Hickson

Mandy Hickson was one of the first female fighter pilots in the Royal Air Force having joined in 1994. Mandy has over 25 years experience within aviation, operating in hostile environments, including patrolling the ‘No Fly’ zone, flying over 50 combat missions over Iraq. Drawing on her experience of calculated risk-taking, leadership, decision-making under pressure and the critical role of the human in the system, Mandy now transfers these lessons from the cockpit to many other management and leadership contexts.

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