What do stories do for brands and what is the impact of storytelling in decision making? Craig Wortmann shares his take on storytelling and entrepreneurial selling.

Craig Wortmann is a Clinical Professor of Entrepreneurship at the University of Chicago’s Booth School of Business.  Craig designed, developed and teaches the award-winning course called “Entrepreneurial Selling,” recently ranked by Inc. Magazine as one of the “Top Ten” courses in the country.  Craig also won the Faculty Excellence Award at Chicago Booth, given to the professor who has had the most positive impact on the students.

Craig is also the author of “What’s Your Story?”, a book that looks at how leaders and sales professionals use stories to connect, engage and inspire.

Over the last twenty years, Craig has developed a set of sales and leadership tools critical to delivering results.  This became the cornerstone of his company Sales Engine Inc.  By teaching and coaching leaders on how to build a ‘high-performance engine,’ Sales Engine has put companies large and small, global and local, on the path to tremendous and measurable growth.Podcast Theme & Synopsis

Icebreaker

I grew up on a farm and saved a racoon.

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Think Like A Journalist Quote

“Whenever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.” ―Peter F. Drucker

Success Quote

How do we push ourselves to take risk? As you look out over a year, what’s one thing you can do to get out of your comfort zone? Every single day do two or three critical things critical and uncomfortable things to challenge yourself.  As Tim Ferriss says, We need to be risk takers but not gamblers.

Career Highlight

Craig’s first business was part of a startup at Indiana University. It was a software company that he became the CEO. They created stories for large companies with employees all over the world. He saw how powerful stories are and why they work.

When It Didn’t Work!

Hear the classic error Craig made with a company that he’d raised a lot of money to get off the ground. Find out what happened when it didn’t work and what Craig learned.

The Impact Of Storytelling In Decision Making

1. Why are stories powerful?
2. Stories connect to emotion and create context.
3. We are all storytellers.
4. Get tactical about stories.
5. Story Matrix:  capture. distill. tell.
6. Four types: success, failure, fun, legends.
7. Where do listeners need stories? Ask, how did a solution impact your client?
8. Most people read the fact sheet on a car after they’ve bought the car. Facts are not as influential as stories.
9. Capture. Distill the story. Tell the story.

Multimedia Resource

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Book

Presence, Amy Cuddy

Contact

Sales Engine website

Twitter @CraigWortmann

Twitter @SalesEngine

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