8 Ways You Can Gain Influence with Storytelling

group of people sitting in circle while discussing design project in office

Strong communicators know the human brain is hardwired to respond to stories. Stories light up the brain’s sensory cortex. They also help ensure a message sticks with its intended audience. 

In fact, cognitive psychologist Jerome Bruner said we are 22 times more likely to remember a fact when it’s shared within the context of a story.

But stories aren’t just for remembering facts or figures; they have a place in design contexts as well. Without a story around your message, cross-functional partners and business stakeholders will create their own meaning. That’s why it’s important to be intentional. 

Strategic storytelling can help you elevate your influence as a designer and inspire action in your organization. Consider these takeaways for design scenarios where storytelling is most powerful.

1. Thought Leadership

Highlight the conflict you’ve resolved if you want another team to adopt your methodology or bring colleagues around to your way of thinking. Integrate the key data points or the reasons why your approach works into a larger narrative to make those reasons stand out and the data points more memorable.

2. Performance Reviews 

Showcase the impact you’ve had through a concise, powerful story. Whether your end goal is getting valuable feedback or a coveted promotion, go beyond presenting your boss with a list of completed projects. Detail the challenges you overcame and weave a narrative arc around how your solutions made a difference for users—and maybe even the business at large. 

3. Research Readouts 

Make one user the protagonist of your story—walking your colleagues through particular challenges they face and why those challenges are relevant. Once you hook your audience with a story, you can branch out further. Storytelling can illuminate research insights and user testing results in new ways, helping as you ideate on how to implement user feedback or work to align various stakeholders.   

4. Future Vision

Create a character based on a persona—someone people can root for—to explain your vision. Consider the example of a busy, stressed-out parent who doesn’t have time for household chores. In the future vision, this parent is thriving, healthy, happy and able to spend quality time with their kids. That’s a powerful image that makes the case for your product: an app that lets users schedule household service providers.

5. Design Value

Share the story of how a particular user’s experience has improved because of a design change. Perhaps it’s because they’re spending less time on one particular task, they’re able to accomplish other things and be more effective at work. What a tribute to the impact of design—and a powerful way to explain why users love a new feature.

6. Techniques and Best Practices

Articulate the problem you’re solving and paint a picture of the experience your team will have when they implement a new technique. Teams may or may not be hungry for a change in process, and simply detailing a new approach isn’t as compelling as a story. 

7. Product collaboration 

Lean on character and plot to ensure cross-functional collaborators are working from a shared understanding of user pain points and goals. This will help the team avoid the trap of tacking on features that don’t actually support the resolution of the central conflict (a user achieving their goals).

8. Project review 

Craft a story about what your team accomplished at the close of a design project. Share how a persona’s goals were accomplished thanks to the work you did. Assessing the final results with stakeholders and gaining the feedback you need to move forward will be all the more effective.

As you encounter these scenarios at work, remember the power of strategic storytelling. A well-crafted story can help you expand your impact on your organization, your team and the product you’re building. 

* * *

Want to learn how to harness the power of storytelling—no matter the scenario—and get practice with crafting strategic narratives? Pragmatic Institute’s new course, Influence Through Storytelling, provides the tools and techniques you need to enhance collaboration with stakeholders, build influence, and change attitudes and behaviors through storytelling.

Author

  • Pragmatic Editorial Team

    The Pragmatic Editorial Team comprises a diverse team of writers, researchers, and subject matter experts. We are trained to share Pragmatic Institute’s insights and useful information to guide product, data, and design professionals on their career development journeys. Pragmatic Institute is the global leader in Product, Data, and Design training and certification programs for working professionals. Since 1993, we’ve issued over 250,000 product management and product marketing certifications to professionals at companies around the globe. For questions or inquiries, please contact [email protected].

Author:

Other Resources in this Series

Most Recent

Article

3 Effective Strategies for Communicating the Impact of Design on Revenue

This article provides designers with a robust strategy to effectively communicate the role and importance of design in driving revenue.
Category: Design
Article

Leadership Essentials for Designers: Key Takeaways from Brett Macfarlane

We had an exceptional guest on our Design Chats podcast, Brett Macfarlane, an organizational consultant who focuses on leadership development for innovation and change. We captured highlights from the episode in the below Q&A.
Category: Design
Article

Best Practices for Data-Driven Design for UX [2023]

This article dives into the world of data-driven design, the types of data that inform user experience design decisions, and how to effectively collect, analyze and implement data-driven insights.
Category: Design
Article

Knowing What You Want to Do Next: Finding Clarity in Your Design Career Path

Designers often take non-traditional, non-linear paths into the field. Once they’ve grasped their practice, some designers move into people leadership, while others become masters of their craft.
Category: Design
Article

Creating the Psychological Safety Needed for Product Innovation

High-performing product teams have psychological safety, meaning team members can share perspectives without fear of judgment and persecution. An expert shares how to create psychological safety to spark innovation along with a Jaguar Land Rover and...
Category: Design

OTHER ArticleS

Article

3 Effective Strategies for Communicating the Impact of Design on Revenue

This article provides designers with a robust strategy to effectively communicate the role and importance of design in driving revenue.
Category: Design
Article

Leadership Essentials for Designers: Key Takeaways from Brett Macfarlane

We had an exceptional guest on our Design Chats podcast, Brett Macfarlane, an organizational consultant who focuses on leadership development for innovation and change. We captured highlights from the episode in the below Q&A.
Category: Design

Sign up to stay up to date on the latest industry best practices.

Sign up to received invites to upcoming webinars, updates on our recent podcast episodes and the latest on industry best practices.

Subscribe

Subscribe