For what?
Story mapping follows on from story sourcing in terms of content. While in story sourcing you have used lively discussions with employees and other stakeholders to identify the stories with which your organization describes its emotions, its impact and its principles of success, the next step is to analyze and bundle these stories and transfer them into a map of your organization.
As the prompts used in story sourcing are taken from the social-emotional development profile, they are ideal for assigning the collected stories to one of the development stages described (red, amber, green, orange, petrol).
At the same time, stories about the two prompts cover the four quadrants in total, so that they allow an integral view of the organization:
- Purpose prompt stories provide insights into emotions, the contribution your organization makes and the impact it has on stakeholders...
- ... while success prompt stories allow us to derive success principles that can be further developed and strengthened in the future.
Example
Together with the software development team of a technology company, we have
As part of a cultural transformation project, a story sourcing exercise was carried out with peers from the Group environment as well as internal and external customers.
In addition, all 200 employees were involved in story sourcing as part of a virtual meeting in which the ambassadors acted as moderators. The resulting stories were structured on a virtual whiteboard in order to develop both development principles for successful collaboration and a connectable narrative to describe the future potential of the organization as part of a management workshop.
What matters
- A reflection on the four-quadrant model is suitable as an introduction to mapping. Familiarize yourself with the development stages and visualize them on a virtual whiteboard, for example.
- In the story mapping process, it is important to recognize the patterns that emerge from the multitude of stories collected. What is the common thread? This is most easily achieved by briefly summarizing the stories in statements or metaphors and assigning them to one of the four quadrants on the whiteboard.
- For mapping, it is important to adopt an appreciative attitude and to refrain from any judgment - for all participants in the mapping process. For this reason, it is advisable to involve a neutral facilitator who is trained in social-emotional development work.
- In the process of mapping, it is important to look at the collected stories from multiple perspectives, such as:
- What experiences from the past are useful and helpful for further development?
- Which future potentials are recognizable and connectable?
- Which metaphors are suitable as principles that enable further development?
- Which down-to-earth experiences continue the founding history of the organization and should be further strengthened?
Step by step
Step 1
Listen to the ideally recorded stories from the story sourcing process and create transcripts of the most important passages.
Step 2
Convert the original sounds into coherent text passages that contain metaphors or other linguistic stylistic devices wherever possible.
Step 3
If possible, collect these text passages on a board as a team -
as shown above - and try to make an initial classification according to development stages.
Step 4
Group the stories on the board by looking at them quadrant by quadrant in isolation.
Step 5
Summarize the inner stories in quadrants 1 and 4 in a
Future narrative together: This works very well by focusing on stories in the highest development stage of your organization and updating these stories. The key question is: Which stories in these two quadrants have the potential to reach the outer stage - and what does the future look like there?
Step 6
On the right-hand side of the board you will find stories that are based on visible
The stories should point out (success) principles that are important for further development - both individually and collectively. Proceed similarly to the left half and focus on stories from the highest development stage of your organization.
Step 7
Summarize both - the future narrative and the development principles - and use interactive communication formats to enter into a dialogue.
Resonate with your stakeholders!
Framework
Duration: 3 - 5 hours (plus the time for preparing the stories)
Format: virtual (e.g. video conference accompanied by virtual whiteboard) or face-to-face workshop
Participants: Management team (with subsequent involvement of the entire organization and/or customers)
You can find more information on this and other tools for overcoming business challenges with communicative means in the book
