The Power of Storytelling in Leadership to Foster Employee Loyalty
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Introduction: How Storytelling Enhances Leadership and Employee Engagement in Management
Management is both an art and a science; the principles of management are scientific, which tell the fundamentals of management and help the management to make rational decisions (Daft, 2021). Management varies from person to person, organisation to organisation, and country to country, and how a manager uses these principles of management for the smooth functioning of its day-to-day business operations effectively and efficiently, and this approach is based on the manager’s creativity, which drives from an art (Schermerhorn Jr, Bachrach, and Wright, 2020). In an organisation, management performs five key functions: planning, organising, staffing, directing, and controlling (Tursunov, 2017).
Figure 1: Functions of Management
Contemporary Issues in Management contain problems and opportunities that are relevant to the management (Hussain, Haque, and Baloch, 2019). The issues can be resulting from any sources, issues related to the advancement of new technology, any changes that occur in the surrounding of a business, Government rules and regulations, etc are some examples of contemporary issues in management (Vrontis, and Christofi, 2020). The role of management becomes more tactical to understand and address the issues by taking corrective measures to achieve the sustainability of a business in a foreseeable manner (Griffin, 2021).
Principles of Management help in providing guidelines to the manager to take a rational decision in a tough situation. Contemporary issues in management consist of the following principles:
Innovative: The manager should have a unique approach to handling the situations well.
Sustainability: The manager should act to ensure the sustainability of a business in the long run.
Adaptability: The manager can adapt to the changes and make strategies and policies accordingly.
Inclusivity: The manager should promote an inclusive culture in the workplace. So, the values, beliefs, and social customs of others and feeling them supported by valuing their individuality, helps to promote group harmony among the employees (Morden, 2017).
Ethical Leadership: The role of the manager in prompting ethical behaviour at the workstation, plays a significant role in creating integrity, honesty, and loyalty, and leads to transparency within an organisation.
Decision-making: The manager can take practical decisions derived from the data.
Fulfilment of the statutory requirements of an organisation: The manager must ensure that all the business operations act as per rules and regulations set by the government and that the organisation can fulfil its statutory compliances.
Hence, by implementing the above-mentioned several principles, the manager can easily navigate contemporary issues and achieve the growth and success of a business by ensuring sustainability in the market.
Section One
Critically discuss how storytelling might provide a powerful tool for leaders and/or managers
Storytelling is a very traditional way to express the thoughts of an individual in the form of sharing knowledge, ideas, and information, to educate and entertain the audience. A few decades ago, our insisters used this method for spreading social and cultural awareness among the audience and people enjoyed the performance of a narrator. In the modern era of technology, still, managers and leaders consider storytelling as a powerful and influencing tool for communicating, interacting, and spreading commercial awareness among the target audiences (Dugan, 2017).
Storytelling can be used in many ways; as a result, most of the practitioners in the UK and Canada used the storytelling approach and considered the national storytelling network. It is a wonderful means to express ideas, thoughts, knowledge, and commercial information in the forms of human expressions that can be easily relatable and help in transforming information for others. Storytelling is the art of public speaking that presents human expressions and words by means of educating and making people aware. It is a two-way interaction process that encourages the listeners to listen actively and allows them to provide feedback. Storytelling is a collaborative effort that helps build strong public relations and provoke the audience to do interaction with the speakers and it has its importance in terms of delivering a powerful speech to the audience in the form of Public Speaking (Collins, 2020).
The following ways highlight the importance of storytelling, considered a most powerful tool used by managers and leaders:
Convey the message: Managers and leaders use storytelling techniques to convey their messages effectively and efficiently with a large audience economically.
Build emotional connections: Storytelling has the power to connect the speaker with the audience emotionally. Whenever the narrator shares his own story that relates to others' stories, people can connect well with each other.
Communicate Values and Vision: Managers and leaders use the storytelling technique to communicate values and share the organisational vision with others. So, people are inspired to share common platforms and work towards achieving common goals (Sergeeva and Trifilova, 018).
Promote creativity and lead innovation: Storytelling is an art and how beautifully and innovatively this weapon is used by managers and leaders to interact with their audiences and stresses unique and effective solutions to problems.
Encourage learning and promote the development of knowledge: Storytelling is the sharing of information. Leaders and managers encourage bringing more learning and help to develop others' knowledge well.
Promote diversity: Managers and leaders share their organisational values and visions intending to promote socio-cultural values and beliefs. It helps to create a sense of belongingness among the target audiences (Pote, et.al.2022).
Hence, both managers and leaders adding storytelling techniques to their leadership skills will help to build a strong public relationship, promote diversity, increase learning and development of new knowledge, bring more uniformity, creativity, and innovation in the form of presenting themselves, and support achieving the common goals and objectives of an organisation.
The roles of Story, Audience, and Storyteller
The Role of Story
Telling stories is a creative way to express ideas, thoughts, feelings, emotions, and experiences with others. Stories play a significant role in coping with contemporary situations in management.
Stories play an important role in various aspects of human lives.
In personal life: Stories help to connect with others by expressing a sense of belongingness, showing empathy, and building a strong personal relationship with others.
In social life: stories are the tools for communicating well with others; it help to transform social values, beliefs, and norms with others to promote cultural diversity among others.
In professional life: Telling stories to play a tactical role in the field of management. Managers and Leaders use this technique to effectively communicates with a large audience cost-effectively.
Hence, Story facilities in strong communication, builds strong personal as well as public relations with others, develops understanding, and helps to reach a large number of audiences in a cost-efficient manner.
The Role of the Audience
The audience plays a crucial role in the process of storytelling, they are the actual intended recipients of the storytelling process. To make the successful process of storytelling, the speaker needs to understand their target audience well.
In the case of the management industry, the audience is both internal (for example, the board of directors, employees, etc.) as well as external end users (for example, creditors, suppliers, the government, etc.) of the company that are curious to know more about the company’s affairs. To make the storytelling process more effective and successful, the role of an attentive audience is very important in the storytelling process. Hence, to deliver powerful content or message to the set audiences, managers and leaders first identify their audience's needs, expectations, and emotional triggers; later, make effective strategies to reach their target audience and build an emotional connection with them with the use of the company's brand story.
The Role of the Storyteller
The following reasons behind why managers and leaders follow the storytelling approach to handle contemporary situations in their management process are:
It helps the management to communicate the complex message in a very easy and simple way with its target audience to build their conceptual understanding of the organisational objectives (Corvellec, 2018).
It allows the leaders and managers to communicate with a large number of set audiences.
Telling stories improves the creativity to express oneself in front of others.
By considering "Patagonia,” it is the best-fit example of the management industry in terms of the above-mentioned three main elements, that are: the role of story, audience, and storyteller. Patagonia is an outdoor American Clothing Brand, established by Yvon Chouinard in 1973 It has created a strong brand value that aligns with its industry vision and values and inspires others well by making effort for its sustainable growth and development.
Section Two
An evaluation of the use of storytelling practice
Managers and Leaders use storytelling tools to convey with their set audiences, maintain employee engagement throughout the storytelling process, and foster audience trust and loyalty towards their organisational brand values and visions. More content and loyal employees at their workplace will be able to contribute more towards the growth and development of an organisation, which ensures the sustainability of the enterprises in a foreseeable manner (Osborne and Hammoud, 2017).
Loyal employees contribute more towards the rise in the employment retention ratio and they work hard with a total capacity of zeal and zest to achieve the common goals and objectives of an organisation. Storytelling helps the employees to understand well about the organization’s goals, values, vision, and missions and promotes work with harmony to achieve its common organisational goals. Storytelling creates emotional bonding between the speaker and their set audiences, which helps to give others a sense of belongingness towards each other, promotes sociocultural diversity,
The following points highlight the importance of Storytelling practices to maintain employee engagement and loyalty:
Build a sense of Community: Management tries to build a strong sense of community among its employees having a Storytelling approach about the company's history, culture, norms, and values.
Helps in Problem-solving: Storytelling is a way to express one's ideas, thoughts, and experiences with others. This technique is also useful in finding solutions to the same problems.
Increase the creativity and promote innovation: Storytelling is an art, and how beautifully one can express a story in front of a target audience and make a strong public and emotional connection with them.
It will increase the individual’s creativity and encourage them to have an innovative way to express themselves in front of their target audience in the form of the storyteller (Bailey, et. al. 2017).
Improves personal as well as professional relationships with others: Storytelling is a powerful tool to connect well with others.
In the context of contemporary issues in management, this technique is widely used by the company’s managers and leaders to communicate effectively with both internal as well as external end users of the company (Osborne and Hammoud, 2017).
Prompts Culture diversity: Managers and leaders, with the use of the storytelling process, allow their employees to explore more about the various cultures, their values, and beliefs, and edge themselves to learn something new about various socio-cultures (Antony, 2018).
Enhance knowledge: Brand stories always help the organisation's employees to get an insight into the company's profile, work areas, values, and future vision. So that, employees will have a clear idea about their job roles.
Fosters Loyalty: when the employees have an in-depth understanding and knowledge about the company’s future goals, values, and objectives, although the employees are motivated and feel a sense of belongingness to the company.
Hence, personnel become more loyal towards achieving an organisational common goal effectively and efficiently, contributing to the organisation's day-to-day operations.
Loyal employees determine the future growth and success of the company and assure sustainability in the market for the long term.
Tool for motivation: Managers and leaders use a storytelling approach to motivate their employees, and encourage them to work with great harmony, which will lead to the future success of an organisation.
Improve communication skills: Storytelling improves the communication of an individual.
Also, it enhances other skills of the speaker, like:
The speaker will be able to be more aware of their Emotional intelligence.
Improve the skills of public speaking.
Develop more creativity.
Allows speakers to become active listener first because active listener become good communicator.
To develop a sense of empathy and sense of belongingness among the employees.
Hence, Storytelling can be considered a powerful tool for maintaining effective employee engagement and loyalty within an organisation. Managers and Leaders use this tool to connect with their Customers, Stakeholders, and employees (Adom, Nyarko, and Som, 2016). Storytelling can also be useful in Employee engagement, creating brand value, enhancing leadership skills, providing customer feedback, and influencing the marketing of a business.
Section Three
Critically reflect on the learning journey
Based on the above analytical, in-depth understanding of the role of managers and leaders in context with “storytelling,”.
The following points highlight key insight into the study:
Traditionally, storytelling was used to spread social and cultural awareness among the people, and this tool was considered just for entraining the people.
Over time, this tool plays an important role in the field of management and leadership.
It will be used by commercial leaders and managers to talk about the brand values of the company.
Storytelling helps in communicating with a large audience in a cost-efficient manner.
Storytelling can be considered an effective technique to inspire, motivate, and communicate with employees in a significant manner.
The role of the manager is not limited only to telling brand stories to its employees but also to sharing the organisational goals, values, and vision for the future success of an organisation (O’Neill, 2016).
Storytelling helps the management to communicate well with its employees, stakeholders, and other end users of the company.
Having storytelling skills is equally important for both managers and their employees.
Storytelling is an art and it requires continued practice and innovation.
Storytelling is an effective way to communicate well with its set audience.
Identify the milestones within the learning journey
The following points highlight the milestones during my learning journey:
The increases of agile management: In the Morden era of Management, systematic ways to organise business operations are more demanded, which improves the efficiency and productivity of an organisation.
Book Title: The Lean Start-up: How Today’s Entrepreneurs Use Continuous Innovation to Create Radically Successful Businesses.
Author: Eric Ries.
The importance of Emotional Intelligence at the workplace: Managers and Leaders have good knowledge about Emotional Intelligence as well as having good IQ levels. It helps to build a strong emotional connection with its employees and feel them a sense of belongingness.
Book Title: Working with Emotional Intelligence
Author : Daniel Goleman.
The importance of technology in management: Technology plays an important role in improving the overall performance of management. It helps managers to transform their ideas into reality efficiently and cost-effectively.
Article Title: The Role of Leadership in a Digitalised World
Author(s) :Laura Cortellazzo, Elena Bruni, and Rita Zampieri
Emphasis more on Remote work: After the impact of Covid-19, the demand for more remote work has been increasing day by day and the task of managers become more vibrant and complex to handle their remote team effectively and will achieve common goals and objectives of the organisation (Foster, 2022).
Book Title: Working Remotely: Secrets to Success for Employees on Distributed Teams
Author(s) : Teresa Douglas, Holly Gordon, and Mike Webber.
To Promote inclusion and diversity at the workplace: Managers and leaders face diversity in social cultures among their employees. Thus, Managers and Leaders have a complete and in-depth understanding of the various social cultures and promote social harmony in their workplace.
Book Title: Belonging at Work: Everyday Actions you can take to Cultivate an Inclusive Organisation
Author Name: Rhodes Perry
A reflexive critique to identify storytelling may influence future managerial practice
The art of storytelling holds significant importance in modern-day management and leadership. The establishment of robust emotional connections with the audience can enhance the efficacy of managers' communication of their ideas and objectives. Comprehending the potential disadvantages and constraints of storytelling is crucial in shaping future managerial practices.
Narrative-based communication, while potentially beneficial, may oversimplify intricate matters and lead to misinterpretation. Professionals in management are required to possess the ability to conduct comprehensive research and analysis to effectively manage current situations and arrive at well-informed decisions. The utilisation of narrative should not supersede the application of critical thinking and data-driven analysis in managerial practices.
Narrative can potentially foster empathy and trust towards a business entity. However, it may also result in a dearth of accountability and transparency. In order to uphold the integrity of an organisation, managers must strive to achieve a harmonious equilibrium between ethical responsibility, transparency, and storytelling.
Thirdly, the act of narrating a story may result in the storyteller's personal experiences and perspectives receiving undivided attention, potentially hindering the promotion of inclusive and diverse management practices. In the process of decision-making, it is imperative for managers to acknowledge their inherent biases and recognise the value of alternative perspectives.
Finally, it is worth noting that narratives may place greater emphasis on generating immediate emotional resonance, potentially at the expense of longer-term strategic objectives. Effective time management skills are essential for managers to strike a balance between addressing the immediate emotional needs of their audience and achieving the long term objectives of the company.
It is crucial to acknowledge the limitations and potential drawbacks of storytelling, despite its potential to improve administrative processes. In order to optimise the benefits of storytelling, it is imperative for managers to engage in critical thinking, uphold ethical responsibility, prioritise diversity and inclusivity, and exhibit strong time management skills.
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