We often get asked “does storytelling work with finance folk, scientists or engineers?” There's an assumption in their question that some professions only care about the numbers, the facts, and they don’t have time or an interest for stories. Well, nothing can be further from the truth, everyone tells and listens to stories--it’s a human condition. But as a business storyteller it’s important to understand that if you are talking to engineers then they are most interested in engineering stories. And these stories are often laden with data.

This show features an engineering story. It’s about a little known near-disaster from the centre of New York City that was averted through the good work of engineers, lawyers, clients, insurers and city officials. I sometimes tell this story to engineers to get them thinking about what does it mean to be a true professional.

I first learned of this story from an article in the New Yorker. Contrasting the written version by Joe Morgenstern with my oral retelling gives you a good example of how much is left out. Select the moments to tell is perhaps the most important decision you will make when translating from written to oral. There are some events that just must be told such as receiving the phone call from the student, the retesting of the wind models, the realisation that the student was right, the discovery of bolts instead of welding, telling the client, fixing the problem. The rest become choices of dramatic effect such as the trip to his cabin.

How to remember a written story

You might think this is a lot of work just to tell a story. This view if common if you haven’t read a story and then retold it off the top of your head, no notes. But here’s the thing, when we ask participants to do just that in our workshops they find the exercise remarkably easy. We seem to be hardwired to make sense and remember a story.

A good way to get a written story converted to an oral story is simply to read it and really picture what’s happening, hear the sounds, take in the smells and tastes. Use all your senses. Then read it again and note the facts and figures, the names of people and places (you have to rote learn these). Then put the written version aside and tell the story to someone and notice what you include. That’s your first version. Now work out the point of the story and then tell it again prefacing the story with your point.

Morgenstern, J. (1995). The Fifty-Nine-Story Crisis. The New Yorker, 29/5/1995, pp 45-53.