Sally Osman, a consultant with MakeBelieve UK, leaders in brand and organisational storytelling, wonders what comes next in the Northern Rock story
Were my ears deceiving me? Did the correspondent really say that Northern Rock was now a good news story? That after three years as a byword for financial instability, they had a positive story to tell?
Latest year-end figures revealed losses in 2009 were a lot less than the year before (£383m against £1.3bn in 2008), Customer confidence has stabilised, costs are down, the bank has been split into ‘good’ and ‘bad’ and it looks like humble tax payers stand a chance of getting some return on the Government’s investment.
Fairytale or reality? Another twist in the plot of a long running saga or the start of a new story for Northern Rock?
The news wasn’t all good. Arrears were up, more money was owed to Government and the emotive issue of nearly £15m in staff bonuses hovered even if CEO Gary Hoffman declined his £700k.
Turning round a story like Northern Rock’s doesn’t happen overnight. But applying some of the key principles of storytelling can help businesses think differently. It acts as a guide to shaping and articulating strategy to change their story in an effective and authentic way, which is credible with the public.
The biggest hurdle is understanding that the story the management may want to tell isn’t necessarily what the world is ready to hear, let alone believe.
Take GENRE, the type of story Northern Rock’s story is and could be. It was, at worst, a financial disaster movie that unfolded before our eyes or, at best, a cautionary tale of our times — an apparent catalyst to the economic crisis and closer to home than the subsequent Lehman Bros collapse.
Management will want to turn disaster to success but, in storytelling terms, applying a different lens and genre may engage people better. Moving from a story of competition and rapid growth to one of endeavour and customer service impacts tone, language, character and action.
Looking at their story’s PREMISE can also throw a new focus on it.
The question what’s really at stake? takes communications to a different level, because it demands an answer to what change in values is going on.
When the company was split into two — a conventional bank and a legacy bank - the media inevitably hardwired ‘good’ and ‘bad’ into the Northern Rock vernacular, reinforcing a success or failure story to a sceptical public.
Arguably the premise of their story, the ‘what’s at stake?’ question, would go far deeper if it were more explicitly answered through words like trust, humility and integrity — not just for the company but for the financial sector itself.
Great storytellers use BACKSTORY as a powerful technique to reinforce the future story. Northern Rock’s backstory is rich. Going back beyond recent events, before it became a bank, it was a mutual, rooted in the North East community. It still sponsors Newcastle United and has continued to give £15m a year to disadvantaged groups locally throughout nationalisation. It’s real evidence that could reinforce a new story premise.
SHOWING as well as telling defines great storytelling — a picture paints a thousand words. In business, this means actions as well as words, visible behaviours as well as results. For Northern Rock it also means finding a new image to displace the default pictures of anxious customers queuing outside branches.
Finally, memorable, engaging stories always have an INCITING INCIDENT which forces people to reappraise the plot, the characters, the direction.
Northern Rock suffered a major inciting incident of the wrong kind.
To truly engage people in their new story, they could create one — M&S’s Plan A is a good example — that leaves no room for doubt and is totally believable.
To find out more about brand and organisational storytelling visit makebelieveuk.com
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