Storytelling In Organizations

Business/ Management

Storytelling in Organizations: Why Storytelling Is Transforming 21st Century Organizations and Management

John Seely Brown, Stephen Denning, Katalina Groh, Laurence Prusak

"… Storytelling in general- and the authors in this book in particular- offer inspiring insights into the art and rewards of telling a story."
— Mats Lederhausen, Managing Director, McDonald's Ventures, McDonald's Corporation

"…This book provides wonderful tools to spark and leverage storytelling functionally and organizationally to create collaborative work environments and authentic visions of what's possible."
— Dr. Jamesina A. Fitzgerald, VP Global Oral Care, Manager & Scientist, Procter & Gamble

"The authors weave a fascinating tale… I would highly recommend this to anyone dealing with the issue of organizational change."
— Bruno Laporte, Manager, Knowledge and Learning, World Bank

"Storytelling in Organizations is brain food for managers who want to ascend to leadership positions…the authors make a compelling case for becoming a more relevant, powerful, and memorable communicator."
— Jim Hatherley, author of Daring To Be Different, A Manager's Ascent to Leadership

"…Storytelling in Organizations is a must read for those looking for more effective approaches to knowledge sharing and transfer, large-scale change, employee socialization and leadership."
— Rob Cross, Assistant Professor of Management, University of Virginia, and Author of The Hidden Power of Social Networks: Understanding How Work Really Gets Done in Organizations

Storytelling in Organizations lays out for the first time why narrative and storytelling should be part of the mainstream of organizational and management thinking. This case has not been made before. The engagingly personal and idiosyncratic tone of the book comes from a set of presentations made at a Smithsonian symposium on storytelling in April 2001. Reading it is as stimulating as spending an evening chatting with one of the authors. The prose is probing, playful, provocative, insightful and sometime profound. It combines the liveliness and freshness of spoken English with the legibility of a reader-friendly text. Interviews with all the authors done in 2004 add a new dimension to the material, allowing the authors to reflect on their ideas and clarify points or highlight ideas that may have changed or deepened over time.

John Seely Brown, formerly Director of Xerox PARC, is an independent consultant. He was recently awarded the Industrial Research Institute Medal for outstanding accomplishments in technological innovation and is the co-author of the highly acclaimed book, The Social Life of Information.
Stephen Denning, formerly Program Director for Knowledge Management at the World Bank, is an independent management consultant, and the author of The Springboard and Squirrel Inc.
Katalina Groh is a writer, producer, and director of independent films and documentaries.
Laurence Prusak, formerly with IBM Global Services, is an independent consultant. He is author of Knowledge in Organizations.

John Seely Brown divides his time between being the Chief Innovation Officer of 12 Entrepreneuring, an entrepreneurial operating company in San Francisco and the Chief Scientist of Xerox Corporation. In June of this year he stepped down from being the director of the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), a position he held for the last ten years. While head of PARC, Brown expanded the role of corporate research to include such topics as organizational learning, sociological studies of the workplace, complex adaptive systems and micro electrical mechanical system (MEMS). His personal research interests include digital culture, ubiquitous computing, design and organizational and individual learning. He was recently awarded the Industrial Research Institute Medal for outstanding accomplishments in technological innovation and is the co-author of a highly acclaimed book "The Social Life of Information," published by Harvard Business School Press. In November 1996, he was selected as one of the world’s ten Most Admired Knowledge Leaders (Teleos). John, or as he is often called-JSB-sits on numerous boards of directors and advisory boards, is a member of the National Academy of Education and a Fellow of the American Association of Artificial Intelligence. He received an A.B. degree from Brown University in math and physics and a Ph.D. from University of Michigan in computer science. John is an avid reader, traveler and motorcyclist. Part scientist, part artist and part strategist, JSB’s views are unique and distinguished by a broad view of the human contexts in which technologies operate and a healthy skepticism about whether or not change always represents genuine progress.

Program director for knowledge management at the World Bank, the massive international financial organization (it lends approximately $30 billion each year). He contributes to knowledge management and organizational learning publications and presents very frequently at leading professional management conferences.

In November 2000, Katalina Groh launched a new educational series specifically designed to explore the power and practice of storytelling. Global reactions have been overwhelming. The first programs, An Art of Possibility and Radiating Possibility have been released to more than seventy-five countries in thirty-five languages. Katalina is working with organizations to explore and share the impact of storytelling. Her films and presentations create learning experiences which inspire transformation, behavioral change and new kinds of conversations which continue long after the sessions have ended. She focuses on practical tools and results as well as narrative transitions which inspire knowledge sharing, training and communication. Katalina Groh has written, produced, and directed documentaries and independent feature films for the past ten years. She helped launch New World Entertainment's educational division, New World Knowledge, where she wrote and produced award-winning educational programming. Her work is focused on new narrative structures for educational programs, communication, and the development of new models for content structure that would create new conversations and experiences. At college, Katalina studied finance and economics. Before becoming a filmmaker, she was a trader in bonds and currencies at the Chicago Board of Trade.