With so many skills to master to improve your professional standing, clients often ask me what one single skill would be most helpful in improving their career and their future. My answer is always the same: Your verbal skill, especially your story-telling skill is the most valuable.
Why?
Just go back to your childhood. What was the highlight of the day as you were growing up? It is the story time that adults spent with you when you were with them. Bedtimes were the most precious moments for reading to you your favorite stories. Then there were those aunts and uncles whom you loved and remembered throughout your adult life, mostly because they told you such gripping stories of heroes and villains that you could not wait for them to come back for their next visit, or for you to visit them.
Somehow, as we become adults, we lose our touch with story telling. Although we still like to hear, watch, and pay for great stories—especially good movies—and listen to news reports that are built around great stories, good and bad, we lose our own sense of being able to tell our own stories.
Now, why is that?
I think that as adults we tend to focus more on getting ahead. That applies to our careers, our personal lives, and our standing in the community. To achieve this objective we work hard, find avenues to grow, and differentiate ourselves from others to be seen as leaders and achievers. But, to achieve this status, no other skill serves you better than your ability to tell your story in ways that inspires people and that attracts attention from others.
In my career coaching the centerpiece of my practice is getting to the nub of the client’s stories: Their stories of achievement, leadership, and inspiration. When we start working on their résumé I provide them with a structured approach with my own recipe for them to tell their stories of achievement—not just experience—that define who they are, and not merely catalog what they have done in their jobs. In doing this exercise most clients barely get a passing grade. This applies to the whole cross section of my clients that spans from fresh graduates to seasoned CEOs.
Now, why is THAT?
I think that there are two reasons why this happens: First, when we take on a work assignment we focus on dealing with it transactionally; second, when we reflect on our past assignments and successes, we do not make an effort to extract from those experiences story themes that define who we are. Let me explain:
Looking at the first element of viewing your work assignment as something transactional that must be done to get to your next assignment results in your applying your talents to the task at hand without fully addressing and understanding the context in which the assignment is meaningful. So, instead of focusing on what the story is—or can be—we focus more on what we must do to get to the end point and to complete the assignment. Focusing on the bigger context of the assignment gives you the basis on which you can construct your story—complete with heroes and villains—when the assignment succeeds.
Now, for the second element of looking back on our past assignments, we dismiss our successes as something inevitable rather than something that required special talent you injected into the effort for it to succeed. I call this flair your genius, which we all have. Our ability to objectify this genius and to verbalize it is what my résumé writing process gets at. No matter how my clients insists that there is no story in what they did in their past role, I require them to write their stories and help them to see the value they added to make their project or task successful. Once they see what emerges from that effort, they own their contribution and their “genius,” which made them successful.
Let us take an example to illustrate this point:
A typical bulleted résumé entry may read: Took charge of a troubled project and then released it on time.
Instead, if you write: A critical project was rapidly falling behind schedule and the release date was in jeopardy. Offered to take project’s charge and quickly identified four factors that were causing delays. First, negotiated with the customer revised requirements and reorganized the team. Provided hands-on leadership to bring project back on track, and, then, using a new approach met the original schedule, delighting the customer.
This second story now has a hero, villain, intrigue (what four factors?), and a happy ending!
Having now worked with nearly 6,000 clients I can say with some confidence that people’s abilities to tell their story is what separates them from the rest in how they are seen in the crowded marketplace of job seekers. Those who are able to articulate their stories with confidence and flair often surprise themselves with the results they create in landing their dream job.
So, if you now want to focus on one skill that you want to master, learn how to tell YOUR story!
Good luck!