Week 5: Leadership as process – storytelling
Introduction
Stories play an important role in leadership process and in human communication generally. They can reach people emotionally in a way that dry facts cannot – stories can make us laugh, cry or even make us angry. Anchoring us in specific experiences, stories can give topics or issues a human face, allowing us to identify with them.
Storytelling and oral histories have always been important means by which cultural norms, ethical standards, spiritual beliefs and collective memories are passed through generations – and this is particularly relevant for African countries and for indigenous people. Verbal histories are alive in a way that written histories are not. They can be modified, given emphasis through telling, and can make the past feel alive and relevant. Coming alive in this way, storytelling can generate a sense of identity, teaching us why certain values and practices are important.
This week, you will start by learning about the basic features of storytelling. Then you will learn about genres of stories and how each conveys a certain set of feelings. Along the way, you will hear from an accomplished storyteller and experiment with crafting your own stories. You will start thinking about how power shapes which stories are told and which are suppressed, and how telling alternative stories can help generate new possibilities.
By the end of this week, you should be able to:
- define what is distinctive about a story, so that you can use storytelling effectively in leadership
- identify stories according to their genre(s) and the effects they are trying to produce in listeners
- practise re-storying as a leadership technique that reclaims lost histories and offers new emancipatory alternatives.