Storytelling and Mental Models

Back to Storytelling ... I had been blogging about this some time back, and have been hopping topics (hey, this is not a book, so I can do that, cant I?). But coming to the topic of mental models, storytelling cant be far behind, or can it?

Two points to note:

1. Stories are easier to understand and appreciate by the listener, because a good story leverages the mental models of the listener to make the point, and to enable to listener to understand the point behind the story easily.
2. Stories build a shared mental model between the storyteller, and the listener. At the end of the story, there is a moral, and this moral is what builds the shared mental model.

What this means is that the major value of storytelling in management is to create mental models, or images and assumptions about concepts, among managers of the organization, and this is the starting point for creating an organization where managers are not pulling in different directions (which is a great thing!).

More on this as we go along ...