Storytelling Gets the Harvard Business School Seal of Approval

Anyone making a living in PR ought to know this, but it always bears repeating: a good story is the best way to convey information. Dry facts = boring. Good story = interesting. And interested people are much more valuable than bored ones.

But if you're the type who needs academic facts to back up your business theories, then here's an article from Harvard Business Review: "To Boost Knowledge Transfer, Tell Me a Story."

Here's the summary of the article:

We studied a particularly successful program of the World Bank Group’s International Finance Corporation called SmartLessons. Started in 2005 in response to a push from managers in the field, the voluntary program teaches employees how to deliver information through human stories that people can connect with. It offers a simple guide for writing narratives to post online, as well as the services of an editor, who ensures that the articles and multimedia presentations posted on the SmartLessons site really are in story form. We found that storytelling dramatically increased IFC employees’ ability to absorb information.