The CEO of a global corporation started our call with a confession.
Her leadership team was considering hiring me to present at an upcoming event and they were about to interview me. When executives think about spending a bunch of money, they put the purchase under a microscope first.
I looked at the Zoom squares of corporate interrogators and prepared for the grilling.
But then the CEO blurted. . .
“I’m nervous. I have no idea how to interview a comedian.”
As it turned out, everyone else felt the same. Their relieved laughter proved it. Yet they were all prepared to fake it. It was funny that this CEO was actually demonstrating a key principle of comedy.
Comics share what all people experience — but won’t admit.
And here’s what she accomplished in the first 9 seconds of a business call by sharing an honest, eleven-word story about herself.
One of the execs snort-laughed and her interrogation face could not be retrieved.
The VP of sales comically tore up his prepared list of questions for me.
We skipped over 30 minutes of posturing and got right to the point — how to create a great experience for their attendees.
A CEO like this literally reduces the incidence of cardiovascular disease, anxiety, depression and a host of other stress-related illnesses in the workplace.
The lesson?
We need to be more human at work. Authentic personal storytelling can help.
“Stories are a communal currency of humanity.” — Tahir Shah, author and journalist.
Imagine what your own professional life would be like if you shared as authentically as this leader did.
The truth is:
The colleague who remembers the name of your pet fish after you told the story of its escape will give priority to your work needs over coworkers they know nothing about.
The customer whose daughter goes to the same dance school as your kid will look for reasons to like your product or service.
The boss who knows about the 20th wedding anniversary trip you’ve been saving for is more likely to create a pathway to your next bonus.
Yet many of us hide our true selves at work.
Instead of sharing real stories about our lives, we manufacture a workplace persona that matches the plastic plants in the foyer.
“Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.” — Oscar Wilde
There’s a huge cost to living like someone else.
At 2 pm on Sunday, dread creeps into your bones and starts shutting down the organs of your spirit so you can make it through another week.
Why?
Because if there’s no room for your personal story at work, there’s no room for that work in your heart.
“We are all storytellers. We all live in a network of stories. There isn’t a stronger connection between people than storytelling.” — Jimmy Neil Smith, International Storytelling Center
Years ago, I presented at a corporate event for McGraw Hill Publishing.
The division leader had a brilliant executive assistant who ran this meeting like an orchestra conductor.
In her first interview for the assistant job she shared her dream of earning a college degree, but starting a family had made immediate income a priority. The leader hired her — but on the condition that she enroll and gradually work toward that degree via distance learning.
She did.
Ten years later, around the time of this corporate event, she was graduating.
Because of work and family responsibilities she couldn’t travel to the campus where her diploma would have been handed to her. It was coming in the mail.
I was sitting with the executive assistant, about to watch the company’s awards ceremony, which she had also planned.
Except for one key detail — withheld by her boss.
Her expression turned sour as her employer went rogue, going off script with a “surprise announcement.”
I watched her slowly shake her head as he was about to throw a big wrench into her precision planning. This was nothing new for her. The surprise, however, was the entrance of a guest from the back of the room.
It was the president of the out-of-state college she had graduated from.
Flown in by her boss to conduct a formal ceremony in front of her peers, he was there to celebrate her dedication to earning that degree.
First, a surprise cap and gown were handed to her by her boss, and then that diploma — that was supposed to be in the mail — was placed personally in her hands by the highest authority of the college.
I will never forget that demonstration of leadership. And it was all made possible because she shared her story.
If you want more of the joys of being human at work, you’ll need to share your stories too. The real stories of what has inspired you in the past, and the stories of the future you want to create.
Many more doors will open for you professionally once you’ve earned your diploma in authenticity and graduated with a major in being you.
Rick this was an extremely story-driven way to present the main ideas of a life-changing book for me, Radical Candor. People have to know you care, then everything else comes after. Love these examples. Brightened my morning to know there are people out there like this who push others in a personally caring way and celebrate them in a way they simply wouldn't celebrate themselves. Your story telling brought me right into the ceremony.
Loved this Rick :)