Art of Storytelling
People keep saying communication skills, good English, etc. are good to learn and have while leading and working in a team setup. While these are good to have, I have very recently realized that speaking in the moment, when someone asks for something, fluently and eloquently, and helping the other person understand the context, is a good skill to have. I think I'm talking about storytelling.
While working in corporate setups, the best quality you can have is to convince others to believe in your story. Your work matters a lot in how people perceive you and how far you will be trusted for what you say, but your storytelling skills are what will get things done for you, without any resistance.
I realized how bad I am at storytelling, or at convincing others to believe what I want to convey:
My English is not so good, and I always use filler words.
My communication and confidence are weak.
If there is one bet that I can take on myself and get better at for disproportionate returns, it would be this one. Storytelling.
As usual, I vented about my lack of storytelling skills to Claude, and this is what it suggested. Definitely worth a try.
How to get better:
Filler words and imperfect English are mostly symptoms of searching for structure while already speaking. So the fix is to have a structure ready:
Point first, then reasons. Say the conclusion before building up to it.
What, so what, now what. What happened, why it matters, what we do next.
Situation, complication, resolution. Start from common ground, bring in the problem, then propose the answer.
And to practice it daily:
Record a 60-second answer each day to a question my manager or team might ask, and listen back.
Pause instead of using filler words.
Keep three or four real stories ready to tell in about 90 seconds.
When someone explains something well, note how they structured it.
Confidence will follow once you start hearing yourself clearer.
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