The Storyteller: How Leaders Build a Culture of Storytelling
Listen to the Common Good Data Podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube.
In this episode of The Common Good Data Podcast, we continue our three-part series exploring the “The Storyteller” as leader. Listen in to learn why storytelling isn’t just a communications strategy — it’s a leadership practice.
Every nonprofit and prevention organization is full of powerful stories. But too often, those stories live in hallway conversations, side comments, or moments that never get shared. Great leaders know how to create a culture where stories are noticed, collected, and told well.
We’ll break down three core practices of a storytelling leader:
Listening for stories and finding meaning in everyday moments
Building simple systems for gathering them
Sharing stories with integrity, respect, and care
Plus, we’ll talk about how stories and data work best together — creating a fuller, more human picture of your impact.
If you want to build the storytelling muscle of your organization — not just for marketing, but for learning, trust, and connection — this episode is for you.
-
Well, hello everyone and welcome back to the Common Good Data Podcast. My name's Drew Reynolds, and today we're going to talk about leaders as storytellers. Now, you may recall that I've put together two episodes on the Strategist and the Analyst earlier this year as a part of a three-part series on data-driven leadership abilities.
Now, this last one I'm gonna share with you is about storytelling, and it's not just about conducting interviews, collecting testimonials, though of course we'll get to that and also in a future episode on those topics. This episode is really about you as a leader and the role you play in shaping how your organization tells its story, and to kind of talk a little bit about what characteristics of leadership of leaders there are out there that really focus on storytelling skills, because storytelling is just so important to the nonprofit and social sector.
But it's not just a communication strategy, it's really a leadership practice, that creates a culture where stories are noticed, they're collected, they're shared well, and it's done every day. It's made a part of your everyday work, and therefore it then kind of becomes part of your culture. I. And you know, I think when I, when I was preparing for this episode, I, I thought it would be good to, to think a little bit about the best leaders that you've ever worked with.
And I think that all of the best leaders that we can think of have some. Ability to, to have that sort of charismatic capacity to share a good story. They don't just recite numbers at board meetings. They don't just talk about processes or outputs or activities, which of course I do all the time in this podcast, but they really turn them into stories and make meaning out of them.
They tell stories that connect people to their purpose, to their organization's mission, and remind the team why the work matters. And, and the reality is, is that in many organization stories, they exist, but they, they kind of live in marginal spaces. Maybe we, we, we don't kind of think about them. They show up in a passing conversation in the hallway, during a program, a child or a youth says something that.
You think it's interesting, but then it's gone. I, and this reminds me, I have, you know, um, children of my own and, and my wife and I are often like, oh man, that was a really funny story. We should write it down and we never do. Right. So those experiences are happening in your organization too. Um, and, and the key is, is as a leader, is to figure out how to kind of draw those stories out, center them, and build processes to, to be able to lift up those stories and make them a part of your organization.
I'll share just three practices that I think are characteristic of storytelling leaders or storytellers as leaders. And the first is that storytellers listen for meaning and I think that the first verb in there listens is super important because it's really, that's where it begins. Leaders develop their ability to listen, to identify.
Who has these important stories and what those stories are and where they are, and developing practices for understanding that. Storytellers don't always tell stories. They're, they're, they're listening. They're listening to those people around 'em. That's where, that's where it all comes from, right. Um, but I think that the key part of this, you're gonna hear that listening is an important part of storytelling.
I think in most places you look, but I think. The key connection you have to make is that you're listening for meaning, that you're able to identify the meaning in a story because we can all think of like a moment in at the workplace that's funny or interesting. that might be something that you remember because it made you laugh or it made you think a little differently.
But it's when you can tie that moment, that funny interaction that. Impactful or deeper or, or dramatic moment and, and tie it into something core and interesting about your mission. And it's making that connection that the storyteller can do that I think really is important for leaders. I think too, as a part of that.
You know, leaders who are doing this, meaning making, are always taking time for reflection on those passing moments, those conversations with someone they're serving or with a staff member, and then able to, and then interpret and understand how those stories . Can in turn make meaning. So the first one, storytellers listen for meaning.
Second, the storyteller also also builds systems for gathering stories and, and some people are just naturals at this. They just have incredible memories and they can just identify a situation or remember a moment and then recall that moment and tell that story. Some of the best stories can do, storytellers can do that.
I am not one of those people I wish I were. But I just don't have the, the memory and the capacity to connect those things. Uh, and, and maybe if you feel that way too, this particular section resonates with you because storytelling, you, you can't just depend on chance. You know, you kind of. I think the best leaders are gonna build some of those rhythms and sisters, or sorry, and, and systems where stories get noticed and you know, if you're a person who can do that by memory and naturally.
Awesome. Congratulations. I'll give you a high five. I wish I could. Uh, but for me it's really about. Uh, building in some of those systems and helping those that I work with the organizations that I serve to be able to do the same thing. And that can be anything from asking reflection questions on surveys and intake forms, um, building a culture of testimonial, sharing in meetings.
Hey, tell me an interesting story about something that happened in your work this week and starting off. One of your staff meetings that way can be so impactful. Uh, and 'cause it gives people a place to, to talk about it and share it. They'll remember, Hey, that really cool thing happened. I'm gonna share that next staff meeting.
Um, also training your staff to ask good open-ended questions and to seek meaning themselves, right? So when they have conversations with I. A youth who's trying to work out or make sense something or tell a story, or maybe they're just observing. You know, they have that ability to kind of ask those open-ended questions and be ready to, to receive and listen for stories.
Right. And then above all, I think, you know, building processes for. Structure for structured story story gathering, where you can do that through interviews or focus groups, testimonials, any of those as a part of your regular assessment and evaluation work. So when there is, um, a. You are working with maybe a particular client or a family over a long period of time.
You know, as you come to that close, you know, having an existing process where you can invite that person to share their story in some kind of structured way, and you have a very clear process from start to finish to be able to do that. And that way it becomes more of a habit. Rather than, than this one-off thing or this sort of, happenstance kind of situation, but rather that it becomes a regular process of which you work.
So when you need to, seek out a story that you would like to share at a gala or as a part of an annual report, or when you're having a conversation with a potential, stakeholder, volunteer or funder or something like that. That those stories are already kind of there and have been, thought about and, gathered in ways that are meaningful and respectful.
So it's about processes. Second one, storyteller builds systems and processes for story gathering. One thing I'll mention on this too is that I think that storytelling , can be a great way to build a sense of community among your work that you're doing. So, or among your team. When I was a high school teacher, I taught with six other teachers.
We all live together in this house. Um, in a small town in Mississippi and we would often come back after our days of stor of teaching and tell stories about things that happened in the classroom or at the school. And we were all first or second year teachers, so we were new to teaching and I. You know, we shared our moments of total failure when we tried to teach and it just didn't work in the classroom.
We would tell a story when a student would tell, would share something kind of funny or something that would come up in the, you know, a, a teacher room or something like that. And, and this storytelling process for us was a really important way that we could, for one laugh a little bit because it was stressful in the first year.
If you're ever gonna first year teacher, second year teacher, you know, you know how stressful it is. But it's an opportunity to kind of like to share that moment and laugh, but also to kind of make meaning of the experience that we were having together as seven teachers living together and teaching in different schools, in this community.
Um, and I think that when I reflect back on that experience. I think about organizations now, when you have opportunities to get together and tell stories, it helps your team make meaning of their experience. And then in that process of telling stories, you are then able to kind of reconnect your organization.
Back to its mission. And that is what I think is just so critical and important. You know, we kind of think of storytelling as like the gala video or like the one really impactful story that maybe, I often hear the term tugs at the heartstrings. I'm not sure where that phrase came from. Um, but I, I hear that term used a lot when it comes to storytelling and, I think we have to be mindful of that. Storytelling is. It doesn't come off as, you know, manipulative or, or especially around emotions and things like that. But what, what I think sometimes can be missed is that . How does that happen? How do you develop that deep emotional resonance with the person that you're speaking to when you have an authentic interaction, that is telling a story, that is communicating important meaning in some way.
And so when you develop that practice as a team and you're, you know, when we were teachers at this house, we would do it, you know, over dinner or something like that. But if you do it as a part of a staff meeting and, and create that as a part of your culture, it's going to help connect everyone around you.
Closer to their mission, the mission of your organization. Now lastly, the third one is storyteller leaders share with integrity. Now this is really, really important that you're aware that stories can be powerful but also sensitive. And you have to develop some ethical practices around storytelling.
Things like being sure to center the participant's voice in. Be careful about how much of your own voice sometimes can be put in there or sometimes dominate over, the person whose story really is. So you have to be careful about that as a leader. avoiding that extraction, process that can sometimes come with storytelling.
You know, I talked about the importance process of gathering-, building systems for gathering stories in your community that's important. At the same time, you wanna be mindful that that process is not extractive, that it's really kind of a two-way street as best as you can. You know, I sometimes people feel a little bit guilty about asking people to tell their stories.
Maybe it's a, you know, can you tell the story of this particular journey that you went through with our organization? Might be something that might be hard for somebody to do, or somebody to ask for. But the way I kind of try to frame it for folks is to say, Hey, you know. Sometimes when you're asking someone, uh, to help you tell stories, uh, it's actually an opportunity for them to give something to you.
So many times you're, you know, when you're working, especially in the human services areas where people are, are always seen as people who are recipients of services, recipients of funds, recipients of programs. You know, letting them kind of be in the driver's seat and say, Hey, look, you know, our organization needs your help.
Can you help us too? By telling the story, it kind of. I think, uh, evens the power balance there and says like, Hey, we both have something to share. We both have something to give, and we both have something to receive in this relationship. again, it's always important to keep being mindful of, you know, making sure that storytelling is voluntary, that it isn't something that people are forced to do, and that they have some control over what that story ultimately turns out to be.
And how it's told with your organization. So giving people ownership over their story I think is really, really important. And certainly asking for consent and developing processes for consent, written whenever possible, but you can have your own processes at your organization to determine that as well.
So anyways, those are some three things that I'd like you just to think, reflect on as you're thinking about storytelling in your organization. Storytellers listen for meaning, they build systems for. gathering stories, and then they share those stories with, with integrity and with ethics. Now, if you want to improve your storytelling skills, using qualitative strategies like interviews and focus groups and gathering testimonials and all that kind of stuff, check out, a new toolkit that we have at commongooddata.com/storytelling.
Again, that's commongooddata.com/storytelling and there you'll get a more in-depth look. Kind of what I talked about today, to guide you as you improve your storytelling skills. So I hope this has been useful for you and that you have a wonderful week.
