“Great stories happen to those who can tell them”
- Ira Glass
The Story Rules Content Hub
Welcome to the Story Rules Content Hub – the best place on the web to learn all about storytelling techniques for work. Here’s where you get rich storytelling examples, analyses, viewpoints, interview nuggets, visuals, quotes, and much, much more. To find out how you can make the most of this resource, please watch this 12-minute video.
You can explore this (for now free!) resource in four ways:
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E08: Aravind SA – Standup comedian and Storyteller extraordinaire
‘I don’t make jokes, I tell stories’ When I started the Story Rules podcast, I wanted to interview all types of storytellers. Among practitioners of this craft, I find standup comedians perhaps the most talented. Let’s step back and acknowledge the sheer craziness of their mission: – Just one person – Entertaining hundreds of people at a time – Holding their attention at high levels of energy – For more than an hour – Armed with nothing else but some content and a mic. Standup comedy is a serious skill. Aravind SA (aka SA) is among the foremost standup comics in …
Brent Dykes wrote THE book on Data Storytelling
There’s a new book on data storytelling, and it’s incredibly good. Welcome to my content recommendations and reviews for Sep-21: a couple of books, a podcast, articles and a couple of videos. Let’s get started. 1. Books a. ‘Effective Data Storytelling: How to drive change with data, narrative and visuals’ by Brent Dykes I’ve been studying the craft of data storytelling for more than 15 years now and have been deeply influenced by several books. Allow me to take you through a brief history of my learning, in the order in which I read the books (The years in the brackets …
Celebrate memories as stories
Last week, our IIMA WhatsApp group shared a shocking news – one of our batch-mates (let me call him Samir) had suddenly passed away due to a cardiac arrest. We were struggling to process our emotions and come to terms with the event. Samir was only in his early forties. As a means to share our grief, the batch decided to have a call with Samir’s family, comprising his elderly mom, his wife and a 9-year-old-son. During the call, one by one several folks shared memories of their time with Samir… and it was all about his …
Decoding the skills of Shekhar Gupta: India’s best news storyteller
When did you start following the Indian journalist Shekhar Gupta? Hopefully your answer isn’t – “Who Shekhar Gupta?”. If so, then let me introduce you to India’s finest news storyteller. On the other hand, if you, like many others, have started following him through his incredibly popular ‘Cut the Clutter‘ series on YouTube, you might be thinking… “Man, this guy has become an overnight success!” Like most other ‘overnight successes’, however, it’s been one that’s 40+ years in the making. Shekhar Gupta began reporting in 1977… and is rightfully one of the foremost journalists of our …
E07: Praveen Gopal Krishnan: Writer of India’s largest paid newsletter
The one email I look forward to reading every week During the pandemic, my daily newspaper reading habit was replaced by India’s finest business-news subscription product: The Ken. Very soon, The Ken became a habit. Every weekday morning at 7 am, I look forward to their daily newsletter, ‘Beyond the First Order’. Then at 8 am is the email introducing their long-form article of the day. But there’s one write-up by The Ken that I look forward to the most – a weekly newsletter called The Nutgraf written by the maverick Praveen Gopal Krishnan (a.k.a. PGK), COO at the Ken. If you’ve been a regular …
The seminal book on the history of innovation
Matt Ridley likes to mention an old joke: He adds to this: “All too often discoverers and inventors feel short-changed that they get too little credit or profit from a good idea, perhaps forgetting or overlooking just how much effort had to go into turning that idea or invention into a workable, affordable innovation that actually delivered benefits to people” This is a quote from a fascinating book that I’m reviewing this week. Welcome to my content recommendations and reviews for Aug-21: a book, a podcast, articles and a couple of videos. Let’s get started. 1. Booka. ‘How Innovation …
The ‘Game’ of Storytelling
I often think of storytelling as a game. Like every game, it has: – Two or more players, – An objective, – Barriers, and – Tools/techniques/hacks that you can use to tackle the barriers and win We are all playing this game in various capacities and contexts all the time. Wouldn’t it be nice to really understand these barriers and tools, so that we can play better and win more often? And wouldn’t it be nice if the story of the game is told in the form of, well, a story? Welcome to today’s blog: The Game of …
Five story lessons from an 800-year old tradition
On the 20th of July, a striking temple on the banks of a crescent-shaped river in a small town in southern Maharashtra saw an interesting event play out. The Chief Minister of the state (along with his wife) did the ritual puja at the temple to mark a special occasion. In a normal year, this temple would see several hundred-thousand devotees (4-500,000 as per an old estimate) make an arduous 250-km, 21-day journey on foot to visit it on this auspicious day to pray to their favourite God. But this year, because of Covid restrictions, only a handful were allowed to be present. …
