Page 3 - August 2020- CommExpert Digest - LCO as a Storyteller

“Storytelling” typically conjures So…how do we learn to tell better Wellness
images of a group of people, stories to ourselves? Below are a Resources
intently listening to an engaging few ideas to start:
speaker as they recount an • Learn something new: • https://www.brown.edu/academic
s/college/swearer/storytelling-
uplifting tale that anyone can Experience something novel wellness
apply to their own life. However, such as a book, hobby, or • https://storynet.org/storytelling-
we often forget that the most music to get in touch with for-wellness/
important audience member to hopelessness, or loneliness. different sides of yourself. • https://info.totalwellnesshealth.co
consider when sharing a story is Storytelling is even finding its way • Write in a journal: “Dear m/blog/bid/302935/Using-
Storytelling-to-Drive-Wellness-in-
our own self. into the medical community as a journal…” is just storytelling the-Workplace
healing method taught in classes in the written form. • https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ
How you view your and programs that focus on how • Meditate: Learn how to 1253509.pdf
thoughts/feelings significantly storytelling can (i) help those separate your thoughts and • https://www.shondaland.com/live/
impacts not only your inner well- suffering from medical feelings from your self- body/a27820724/storytelling-
mental-health/
being, but it also impacts your illnesses/conditions and (ii) esteem.
relationships with others. Your improve interaction between • Adopt a positive mantra: • https://www.headspace.com/artic
les/how-to-improve-self-esteem
inner story can form the medical professionals and their When thoughts turn dark,
foundation for a confident voice patients. remember to repeat this • https://www.headspace.com/med
itation/self-esteem
to share stories that can mantra. •
empower and uplift those feeling The story begins with your • Meet with a Life Coach or https://self-compassion.org/wp-
content/uploads/publications/Ber
pain, inner voice and that voice can then Therapist: Why reinvent the gen-Cico.pdf
broadcast a fantastic narrative that wheel when there are SMEs • https://www.psychologytoday.co
will help others, both personally in this stuff? m/us/blog/turning-straw-
gold/201502/how-talk-yourself
and professionally. So, for the
purposes of CommEx, speaking Check out additional wellness • https://www.healthline.com/healt
h/positive-self-talk#takeaway
confidently about your legal work resources in our “Further Reading”
starts with the internal narrative section, and go out there and be
you tell yourself. that “crazy” person talking to
yourself.

Storytelling starts very early on in everyone’s life. You are still a child when you need to come up with a good story to explain to your teacher why you did not
do your homework. Then you grow up and find yourself telling a story to explain to your fiancée that your date needs to be canceled, because there is an
important meeting … at the bar with your college friends. And then you - almost a professional storyteller - eventually end up in law school or a professional
legal training program, where you spend years learning how to nicely put your clients’ stories together with sound legal arguments.
But here is what no law school or training program prepares you for: a data-driven world full of quantitative analytics, which is used by data scientists to aid
corporate leaders in their decision-making processes. How can your storytelling achieve its objectives in this data-driven era?
You need metrics that support the facts you are defending. For example:

• Can you measure the cost avoidance resulting from implementation of your legal advice?
• Can you inform the GM how many of your contracts better-positioned the division to improve its cash conversion cycle?
• How much better-equipped are your procurement colleagues for contract negotiations after your legal training that they attended?
If you want to learn how to build solid metrics that can help tell your story of success, we invite you to watch the two training sessions prepared by the
CommEx Metrics that Matter team available on at the links below:
• Understanding Metrics: Session 1
• Understanding Metrics: Session 2