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Afterthoughts: Rance Green's Storytelling Session

"You're the one. Prepare a 10-minute talk that shows our department's impact." Then you open a blank PowerPoint… and freeze.


When Rance Greene told that story at our CCCE session last week, the chat lit up in seconds: "Overwhelmed." "Confused." "Frozen." "In the dark." Every L&D professional who attended had lived it.


That's exactly the trap Rance came to break in Raising Our Storytelling Sights — and the reframe hit hard: storytelling isn't just a training technique. It's how we move the people we influence every single day.


His Story Design framework is deceptively simple. Before you build a single slide, answer four questions:

→ What's the purpose of my message?

 → What should change as a result?

 → What do I want my audience to do?

 → How do I want them to feel?

That last one — feeling — Rance says almost nobody asks. It might be the most important.


And every message, he argues, is really one of four moves that build on each other:

Connect (change a relationship) → Inspire (change a perspective) → Guide (change how we operate) → Persuade (change a commitment).


Tanya Heritage captured the lesson perfectly in the chat: "I tried to jump right to persuade and struggled. Now I know why."


The two non-negotiables of any business story? Relatable characters and strong conflict. No conflict, no story and no reason for anyone to lean in.

Then we went to our breakout rooms where Miriam said she worked the framework backwards — starting from how she wanted her audience to feel, then reverse-engineering her purpose and coined a phrase "we weaponize nostalgia." D reframed conflict itself: "Could conflict be a failure to act?" For every consultant nudging a client off the status quo, yes!


The best sign this activity worked? As Miriam put it when the breakout timer cut her off: "You know it's a good breakout when you're cut off mid-sentence."


Huge thanks to Rance Greene for handing our CCCE community a tool they can use Monday morning and to everyone who showed up ready to raise their sights.


What's the last message you delivered that actually changed what someone did?


And now a message from Rance Greene

Hello CCCE! Thank you for our time together on Wednesday. I appreciate your active participation and hearing your insights throughout the session. If you find yourself in need of coaching as you are preparing for an important message or there’s a team in your company that would appreciate a workshop on how to communicate more clearly with their audience, please contact me at rance@needastory.com. I’d love to partner with you. Also, I forgot to mention the QR code on the handout. Here is a quick video that summarizes much of what we discussed. Grab some popcorn and enjoy! https://needastory.com/lead-with-stories


 
 
 

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