Some Further Thoughts on Corporate Narratives

Last week, I posted a blog exploring the power of corporate narratives while challenging what most people view as a corporate narrative. This was only the latest installment in my continuing exploration of narratives that began with an earlier blog posting and a talk that I gave earlier this year at SXSW.

At its core, I'm trying to draw a distinction between “stories” and “narratives” as I define them. From my perspective, stories are self-contained – they have a beginning, a middle and an end. Narratives on the other hand are open-ended – the outcome is unresolved, yet to be determined.  Stories are also about me, the story-teller, or other people; they are not about you.  In contrast, the resolution of narratives depends on the choice you make and the actions you take – you will determine the outcome and you are therefore an integral part of the narrative.

This latest blog posting has triggered a lot of response – most of it very positive but also some strong criticism. I thank all those who have embraced my perspective, but I’d like to take a moment to address some of the key elements of the criticism I’ve received, because it reflects some serious misunderstandings and responding may help to clarify my message.

Stories versus narratives?

First, the most common criticism is that I am somehow recommending abandoning stories or “taking stories out of narratives.” Nothing could be further from the truth.  I'm a strong proponent of stories and their ability to engage and deepen understanding.  I simply believe that narratives, as I've defined them, have even greater power to engage, deepen understanding and, most importantly, motivate action.

But this is not an either/or proposition.  Stories play a key role in helping to make narratives more tangible, believable and relevant in very diverse contexts.  Narratives, on the other hand, can help to draw connections across stories and link them to a much broader series of events. Narratives also make clearer to the listeners what they can and need to do in order to achieve the potential outlined by the narrative. I strongly believe that stories and narratives not only can and should co-exist, but they in fact amplify and reinforce each other in powerful ways.

Narratives as a connected set of related events

At least some of this misunderstanding stems from my somewhat abbreviated summary (this is a blog after all, not an essay or book) of the corporate narratives communicated by Apple and Nike. A number of people have commented that my rendition of these narratives seemed more like a set of beliefs or a mental model rather than a “connected set of related events.”  Both of these narratives in fact capture an important connected set of related events and it was my fault for not rendering this more explicitly.

Let me try to illustrate with an enhanced rendition of the Apple narrative as I understand it. Here it is:

The earliest generation of computers came into society [Event 1] and transformed the way we run our institutions. [Event 2] But, in the process, they also reinforced the grip of mass society on all of us as individuals, converting us into numbers to be processed by mainframes so that we can be more easily manipulated by those who run the computers [Event 3]. Now, we have a new generation of computers and related technology [Event 4] that provides us for the first time with tools that we can individually use to free ourselves from the constraints and pressures to fit into mass society and that allow us to express our unique individuality and achieve more of our potential [Event 5].  But, this outcome is not a given; it requires each of us to “think different” – will you “think different”? [Possible Event 6 to infinity]. Now, I may be wrong, but to me this is a connected set of relevant events that speaks to all of us.

Yes, there are beliefs and perhaps even a mental model buried in this narrative but I suspect there are beliefs and mental models buried in all engaging stories or narratives.  I don’t think the presence of beliefs or mental models diminishes a narrative.

A key point about this narrative that I tried to underscore in my earlier posting is that it's not about Apple - it's about us and the challenges and opportunities created by new generations of technology. Of course, Apple has a role to play in the unfolding of the narrative, but the narrative is about what new generations of technology mean for us and the choices we increasingly will need to make to harness the potential of this technology. Even some of the folks who have supported my view of narratives tend to fall back to old ways when giving examples of corporate narratives - the narratives are much more about the company, rather than about us.

Narratives and slogans

Someone also made the claim that narratives can’t be condensed into slogans. I beg to differ – “think different” admirably captures the much richer narrative of Apple. Of course, it can never replace the narrative, but slogans can be a great way to get to the essence of a narrative, especially the call to action.

The goodness of narratives

One critic commented that there's nothing intrinsically good about narratives – that there are many dysfunctional and debilitating narratives.  Point well taken but, again, I don’t think I ever made the case that all narratives are good.  I simply am trying to make the case that narratives are a powerful tool to inspire action and participation.  Like any powerful tool, narratives can be used for good or evil.

What is a story anyway?

Others have challenged my effort to characterize stories as self-contained with a beginning, middle and an end and as being about a story-teller or other people, not about you.  The push back appears to be that these are not really stories, that really well-crafted stories are open-ended and about you.  Well, if they’re not stories, what are they?  I have to say that virtually all the stories I’ve heard have these two characteristics.  To simply say these are not “true” stories seems a bit disingenuous. 

Bottom line

I still believe there’s a powerful distinction to be made between stories and narratives as I’ve defined them and that we diminish our impact by just focusing on stories.  At the end of the day, we can disagree on semantics and what to call the two entities that I’m describing – perhaps there are better terms, but I’ve not yet heard anyone suggest viable alternatives. Call them "bloop" and "bleep" for all I care. My key point is that, whatever we call them, we need to pay attention to the distinction. As an optimist, I’d like to be believe that many of my “critics” would embrace my perspective if I can further clarify misunderstandings that give the impression of disagreement.

I’ll be exploring the power of narratives more fully in postings ahead and I look to all of you to challenge me and encourage me to elaborate where I may not be clear. Together, we can do amazing things.

Comments

[James]

And so it is with brands and their users, who, like Sancho and the Don, not only need each other functionally and emotionally, but, in acting on this mutual need, mutually identify a set of shared values. And there ain't no good story without a moral, is there?

[James]

I'd never considered the distinction. What you call narrative, I tend to think of as meta-narrative, or maybe saga. The drawing together of a large (possibly countless) number of events into a single journey of many strands.

One thing all effective stories and narratives have in common is a hero, who ain't nothing without a sidekick. The two coming together is a vital element in any good tale, from Luke and Han to Noddy and Big Ears. The entire first book of LOTR is premised on it: The Fellowship of the Ring.

[Bonifer]

Your story/narrative distinction keeps popping up in my network, John, and so I am compelled to keep responding.

Your instincts are good, there is a distinction to be made, but it's not between story and narrative. That's you being quixotic. (It takes one to know one ; ) The important distinction is in the physics of storytelling. Different story forms require different kinds of "telling." This is a very complex subject that I'll simplify by saying that one kind of telling is scripted and the other kind is emergent. When it comes to emergent stories, "telling" means more like "revealing."

The physics of the scripted story is deterministic (think Newtonian). The physics of the emergent story must account for uncertainty (think Quantum). To the extent that your definition of "narrative" holds water, it's that emergent stories emerge from a "story field" of possible futures. A story field holds infinite possible beginnings, middles and ends.

Again, I applaud your instincts. You're toying with a powerful idea. It's not the idea I object to. It's the toying. When you say, for example, that "Think Different" is a narrative, it reads like a joke to me. That's an ad slogan, John! It's like saying that "Think Teats" is a narrative for the Holstein breed of dairy cow. (I'm in Wisconsin now, so keeping it local). You'd be closer to a salient observation with something like "an appreciation of artful technology fuels Apple's brand storytelling." This, at least, offers product differentiation and connects the brand with customers in meaningful ways. The exploration of themes like "artful technology" generates stories/narratives/yarns/sagas/tweets/comments/compositions/collaborations etc etc etc--whatever we choose to call the storylike outcomes--on a quantum scale. And many other positive outcomes, too, that are not as storylike: loyalty, social sharing, transactions, personality, suggestions, engagement, innovations, etc).

Thanks again for the discussion. Definitely relevant and worth having. Happy Thanksgiving!

[Dscofield]

John - ever since I heard you make the distinction between stories and narratives at BIF-7 (was it that long ago?), it's been a powerful meme for me. Stories are classic; stories are wonderful and many are timeless and also, depending on the story, very comforting - providing hope, a path forward, lessons learned and applied...yet to me, stories are also finite. Narratives let people come in when they're ready or realize it's relevant...they let you be a part of it even if you weren't there at the beginning. I think that narratives let you come and go, let more diverse perspectives participate and be heard. It's not that stories aren't relevant and important. They are different and have different applications. We have and love stories. It's time we started to to create more narratives - to let people be a part of the 'doing.' Thank you!

[Bonifer]

The "miss," John, as you and I have gone back and forth on, is in your attempt to make the distinction between story and narrative instead of addressing the fact that stories form and get shared differently in networks and in organizations than they do in linear channels and repeatable cycles. This distinction between stories with beginnings/middles/ends (say, Finding Nemo or a customer's journey from awareness to purchase) and Living Stories that are emergent in the present (say, Congress Dithers While the U.S. Burns) quite literally calls for a new physics of story. One that is not solely dependent on the causality/determinacy valuations of discrete channel communication, but, rather, one that can account for uncertainty and the effects of chaos theory (i.e. environmental effect) in networks. The primo work in this area, as I've mentioned, is being done by Dr. David Boje at New Mexico State University in Las Cruces. Tamaraland the journal on organizational theory he begin 20 years ago is still going strong, and represents a profound shift in the way organizations can think about story. Boje's concept of "antenarrative" accounts for the difference between stories that have Newtonian (i.e. linear and cyclical) properties and those that have Quantum properties. The distinction between story and narrative is, imho, a fruitless distinction to make, John. These two words are too entangled in terms of meaning, and any insistence on separating that meaning is going to be conflicted, because you cannot separate the definitions faster, or on a more massive scale, than the rest of the world can conflate those definitions. Which is why it doesn't make any sense to me for you, me, or anyone to parse the meaning of the words, when what needs parsing is the actual properties and characteristics of different kinds of stories. Boje and I, ourselves, disagree on the definitions of story and narrative. Or at least, our past writing does. We spend zero time debating it. Instead, we focus on the physics of storytelling. Boje's next book is going to be called Storytelling Organizational Practices: Managing in the Quantum Age and comes out next year. Super dense and academic, it can really only be understood by a layman like myself as metaphor (blacksmithing, music, tribal business practices, improvisation, dance, real estate are a few that people use). I hope you begin picking up on it. Your ability to explain things and Boje's theories can, I feel, bring lots of good juju to management and organizational theory and practices. Thanks for continuing this conversation. It's a good one!

[Bruce Waltuck]

Thank you, John, for a great post. I very much appreciate the distinction you make between "story" and "narrative." I wondered if you have read Alicia Juarrero's book, Dynamics In Action, which has unique, and I think useful, insights on narrative and causality in complex human systems (like organizations)? The distinction you draw also suggests a difference between domains of knowns/knowables (story) as opposed to the domain of unknowns/unknowables. Does this make sense, given your own usage of the terms story and narrative?

Good luck with your journey into story and narrative. I look forward to reading more of your posts.

[Charles Thrasher]

I think it disingenuous for some to claim a story has no end. Beginning and ending, plot, character, conflict and resolution - these are the things that define a story whatever the context, be it boardroom or a open fire beneath a winter sky.

Try telling a story that has no ending and see how many times people listen repeatedly as they will to the Iliad or Harry Potter. To satisfy a story must end but people will participate in a narrative that's evolving, uncertain, and endless. They will become engaged and committed to the right narrative. The history of US democracy is an example, perhaps a cautionary one.