Storytelling as “The Fabric of Society”
I had the privilege last night of attending a talk given by Hollywood veteran and long-time Seattle resident Tom Skerritt (Profile, Filmography) at a monthly meeting of The Executive Network of Seattle (see TENS). The theme of his talk was about “storytelling”, and during the evening he had some very relevant lessons to share.
To clarify though, this was not one of those manufactured paid events where someone who has made a success of themselves, though with no apparent connection to the business world, is the pitchman for an event that sells itself on their “lessons for business” (as in “Leadership Lessons I Learned From Ballet” or “How My Pre-School Teaching Career Prepared Me For Business”). Tom was not billed as someone with a magic bullet for business. However, much of what he had to say had a lot of relevance in both the personal and business realm and did leave me thinking on the way home last night. He was very real, and very authentic.
Tom’s main premise was around his passion for “storytelling”. Within his expressed disdain for what he considers a broken model in Hollywood and a genuine concern for the impact technology has on our “storytelling culture”, there were a few tidbits that I took away that were good lessons for those of us who are always looking for ways to improve – either personally or professionally.
- “Whatever you put out there (of yourself) will come back to you…whether that’s luck, or fear or whatever else it is”. I’ve always felt strongly about being a “giving” person with the belief that it will always come back to you, but I was struck by the more universal nature of this version…where “luck” can be replaced by “fear”. “If you put your fear out there, everything you see will feed that fear”. How many people do you know like that? In this statement I suddenly recognized a number of colleagues and friends I know and now know better what they need and what I can do for them. What side of yourself are you putting out there for the world to see?
- “Life is supposed to be a challenge…I’ve never felt comfortable with safe.” This may not sound very original or profound as it echoes a lot of business and self-help books that have always been out there. But when it comes from someone who started in a blue-collar neighborhood in Detroit and has then had enough success to last fifty years in Hollywood, it makes me realize this is more about our daily challenge to continuously innovate – for ourselves and for our business. Success is something we need to treat not as an end-goal, but as a marker that points to our next challenge.
- “Everyone can be a storyteller”. Tom’s main message last night, it is eerily reminiscent of much of the monotonous advice we always get that originally led me to create this blog (“Everyone can blog! Everyone should blog!”). But what Tom was getting at was much deeper than that. It is the truth that in some ways, we are all the embodiment of our own stories, collected and assembled from the odds and ends of our lives and careers, the experiences we’ve had and the events we have seen and heard. And without a willingness to tell stories and learn how to craft them well, how can we “put ourselves out there”? How will we be able to connect with other people in meaningful ways if we are perceived as “playing it safe”? And when it comes to your business, does that have a real, authentic story to tell as well?
Finally, there’s another side of the coin that also struck me last night. With the lightning-quick speed of our high-tech information-absorbing culture, fueled by things like social media and 300 cable channels, how well do we actual listen to good stories anymore? While thinking through all the ways you might be able to start telling your story better, take another moment to think about how well you listen when someone else is telling theirs. In a world where everyone can be perceived as an expert on something, real value might come from demonstrating an appreciation for a good story just as much as telling one. Do your clients think you are listening to their story? Do they know yours? Step away for a moment from your twitter feed and your daily planning of Facebook updates, and do spend a bit of quiet time thinking about the story you have to tell.
For those interested in local efforts to maintain storytelling as “the fabric of our society”, Tom also walks the walk with his passion for The Film School he started in 2004. With 500 graduates already among us, Tom is dedicated to improving the art of storytelling through ” a unique, visionary school that could develop Seattle’s great wealth of young, creative filmmakers.” Learn more about them here: TheFilmSchool.org
Tom Skerritt spinning a great fish story...
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- “The Fabric of Society” Part II – Don’t Forget the Humor! | Fennec Consulting - [...] having the privilege of hearing Tom Skerritt discuss his views on the importance of Storytelling (Part I here), I ...
Great comments on a very powerful evening David. I appreciate the thoughts you captured. Mr. Skerritt certainly gave us some things to think about, if not incorporate into our daily lives. Thanks for sharing them!
Thank you, Rick for lining up a great evening. Powerful, indeed!
Great summary and comments about Tom Skerritt’s talk at TENS last night!!! I appreciate the time that Tom took to answer our audience’s questions and respond to their thoughts about issues that they’re concerned about, such as young people spending so much time staring at screens and multiplex their communications with multiple people at the same time. The world has always been changing, and it’s our choice whether to live in the present or the past. Storytelling has evolved from an oral tradition 4,000+ years ago through many different media from cave painting to drawing lines on clay tablets, printing books, telegraph, telephone, TV, Internet, mobile devices and new things we’ll see soon. But it’s all storytelling. Thanks again for your post, David.
Thank you Peter. I think your observation here about our “choice” is thoughtful. As someone commented, the medium will always evolve…so how will we adapt and choose to use it?
Darwin figured out that the species that survive are the ones that adapt to their environment. It’s clear to me that many homo sapiens are not only surviving but thriving in the Internet age. I believe that Tom Skerritt is right that storytelling will not only survive the evolution of communications and media, but that storytelling is really the heart and essence of communications and media. So I’m telling my stories in as many Internet-based and new media ways, and on as many screens, as possible. Because I know that this is how to thrive today and going into the future.
Great summary about a very fun evening with Tom Skerritt. I particularly enjoyed Tom’s story about how the “Last Supper” scene in MASH came together. Ideas and their stories are everywhere…look, listen and share them.
Good point Steve. You point out an element that was something of a bonus – the inside stories on scenes like that which we all remember and now have a story we can share as well. He made it sound all so accessible…
What a wonderful summary of our special evening with Mr. Skerritt. I liked two other comments Tom made. The first was how he painted the picture of the sound stage in his first movie experiences: it was “huge, the smell was like a cedar chest in an attic”. He’s encouraging us to use our senses …. the mark of an excellent writer and communicator.
The other comment Tom made: “take the work seriously, not the business seriously”. Welcome to TENS, David. And thank you!
Thank you Janine! I loved the comment on the “cedar chest” as well…at that moment we all got a much better visual of the whole scene simply by the suggestion of a familiar smell. Great element in the storytelling!
Thanks so much for the great writeup David! I indeed took notes and some of Tom’s quotes were definitely worth hanging onto, pondering, and applying to my sphere of influence and realm of leadership.
Indeed after last night’s discussion, where the great execs of TENS were diving into the discussion/debate with Tom, I was inspired for action. Like Tom prodded us, we do have a civic, corporate, and *life* responsibility to continue to drive vision and do good in the world. It was evident in the room amongst our members who wield considerable influence.
I found myself wanting to attend the “after-show” function (that doesn’t yet exist) to continue the conversation.
Thanks Brett, I appreciate the feedback. And I do think you may have stumbled upon a hugely viable new element in the TENS experience – the “apres-TENS” event? Something to think about for those who wished for more networking time.
Great comments David; I have been an admirer of Tom’s for sometime, but I did not know he had the philosopher gene. I love the fact someone can take a “common sense” quote and show how life may not be as complex as we like to think it is from time to time.
Keep writing and sharing, I enjoy your work.
Thanks Bob. I too had no idea he was a local as well…quite the gift of a neighbor to have in the area indeed!
I have heard great things about the program – sorry I wasn’t able to be there. The story-telling theme brought to mind some work we did a couple of years ago in the Personal Development Roundtable on story telling for career and business purposes. In that project, we dug into a book called ‘Tell Me About Yourself’ by Katherine Hansen, who earned her PhD with research and a thesis on the topic of personal and business story telling. That project spilled over into the Career Intelligence Roundtable, where we defined one of the eight key dimensions of Career Intelligence as “Ability to Tell Compelling Stories”, and put it into the TENS Career Intelligence Assessment.
Interesting to see there is so much work on this specific topic out there Chuck. I was surprised to see there are entire sites dedicated to this topic too, as I discovered a blog dedicated to the story of “storytelling” picked up this write-up today and has already shared it with their readers too. Quite the collection found here: http://www.greggmorris.com/
Stories are so powerful and I’m grateful you told this one.
My favorite part about what you wrote was your thoughts on fear, and not how it relates to you – but how it can help you communicate better and help fulfill the needs of your clients. You are truly a man who practices what he preaches and that is inspiring.
Thank you for sharing your experience.
Thanks Tracey. Your favorite part was mine as well…when he included “fear” in another version of that line about “putting yourself out there”, it really struck me as very insightful – and immediately put images in my head of a few people I know who fit that description. The awareness of that pitfall is a great motivator for avoiding it. Thank you for kind words!
Very nice write-up of a really enjoyable evening. The most memorable quote for me was Tom’s response to a question about what spurs him on – “the possibility of risks and the audacity of hope”.
Thank you Mala, I appreciate the feedback and loved that quote too….there were so many!
what I found most memorable was what Tom said keeps him going – “the possibilities of risk and the audacity of hope”.