Nick Owen - Professional Development - Leadership Development Framework

"Forget about PowerPoint and statistics.

To involve people at the deepest level, you need stories."

~ Bronwyn Fryer, Senior Editor,

The Harvard Business Review, June 2003

Stories touch everyone, whatever their 'action-logic' or belief system. They resonate through each person's meaning making capacity inviting them to seek out and interpret what the narrative might mean for them personally, and what it's implications might be for the wider contexts in which they operate. Stories are, at one and the same time, both a delightful game and an utterly serious strategic intervention. And because they are non-directive they work naturally and elegantly with each person's own decision making processes. And because they are both logical and emotional they appeal to the sense-making capacities of the whole brain.

It is hardly surprising that many of today's most influential and inspirational leaders are turning to the power of metaphor and narrative to communicate their key organisational messages so that they are remembered, talked about, and acted upon. If you wish to change the 'culture' of an organisation, finding the right guiding metaphor is just about the most powerful, and certainly the cheapest and most elegant way of doing so.

Metaphors can be told as stories or shown as visual representations, or felt as experiences. Or as a combination of all three.

"Nick Owen is a master in metaphor and he effortlessly weaves the elements together." ~ Edge Magazine