Once Upon a Time

“The two skills of modern business: Storytelling and spreadsheets.

Know the numbers. Craft the narrative.”

The truth that applies to many fields, which can frustrate some as much as it energizes others, is that the person who tells the most compelling story wins. Not who has the best idea, or the right answer. Just whoever tells a story that catches people’s attention and gets them to nod their heads.Harari recently said about writing Sapiens:I thought,... See more

I spend 90% of my time thinking about stories and narratives, and like so many other things, narrative formation is getting decentralized. This is my attempt to figure out what’s happening and where it’s heading.Crafting and telling stories is part of what makes humans humans. Stories let us coordinate across time and space. Stories are undeniably ... See more

“GOOD STORIES ALWAYS BEAT GOOD SPREADSHEETS” “Whether you are raising money, pitching your product to customers, selling the company, or recruiting employees, never forget that underneath all the math and the MBA bullshit talk, we are all still emotionally driven human beings. We want to attach ourselves to narratives. We don’t act because of equat

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storytelling has come to the fore. At Zuora, we use the Three Rooms mental model of storytelling. You need the story of your product—the how. You need the story of your market—the who. But most important, you need an overarching story that puts your service and your users within a broader social narrative—the why. Most companies (especially ones he

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