Storytelling and Social Change

This is a topic that I have about 15 years of experience with. The Tutor/Mentor Connection, http://www.tutormentorconnection.org, was created to raise visibility of volunteer-based tutoring/mentopring, and to draw needed resources to organizations in Chicago who already were doing this work, but were isolated from each other, and inconsistent in how well, and how often, they told their story to potential resource providers. The link below shows a timeline from 1965 that led to where we are today: http://cmapspublic.ihmc.us/servlet/SBReadResourceServlet?rid=1183757961687_847212265_22470&partName=htmltext

You're absolutely correct about how difficult it is to find funding for such a strategy. However, we created the Tutor/Mentor Connection as we also created a site based tutor/mentor program serving innercity teens. We call this program Cabrini Connections (http://www.cabriniconnections.net).

By operating a volunteer-based program helping kids in one neighborhood, we've always had one foot anchored in the daily realities of trying to connect youth and volunteers, while the other has been in an innovation process aimed at building a infrastructure of support that would enable all of the tutor/mentor programs in a geographic area to receive more consistent support, thus be more successful in not only building connections between youth, and adults, but in keeping these connections in place for multiple years, so that over time the adults form a network who not only help kids into careers, but who help raise the resources to sustain the program.

When we started the T/MC, it was just a vision. We had no money, and were also starting the Cabrini Connections program. Howevever, by constantly focusing on actions that would help all tutor/mentor programs grow, not just our own, we've built traction over many years and have been able to raise nearly $5 million, mostly from private donors (individuals, corporations, foundations), to fund this two part strategy.

Over the past five years's we've begun to provide assistance to groups in other cities, with a goal of earning income by sharing what we've learned in Chicago to help similar programs grow elsewhere. While we've been included in several proposals, and have some barter agreements, we've yet to earn revenue from this.

However, a partnership we started in 1994 with lawyers from the Chicago Bar Association, has finally began to result in 2007 funding for the T/MC, and more than $200,000 in funding for 30 other tutor/mentor programs in Chicago .

What I've described is a 15 year history, from 1993 to today, which actually started almost 20 years prior to that when I first began leading a tutor/mentor program as a volunteer.

What this means is that for people to take this intermediary role, they have to be able to stay engaged for a long time. Even if you are lucky enough to get someone like Al Gore to do a movie, this is only one part of the public awareness that needs to continue for many, many more years in order to put programs in place all over the world, then to help those programs be effective at solving the problem they were set up to do.

I would not be doing this, or talking to you, if the Internet had not become available to me. I can now find volunteers, and donors, and share ideas, with people in many parts of the world who share the same concerns as I do. I can also share my thinking on a web site and a blog and anyone can visit that at any time.

For those who are contemplating taking on this role, I encourage you to browse the various sections of the T/MC web sites and borrow any ideas that you think might work for you.

...or are they a naive, silly strategy that we should ignore in favor of harder, more easily measurable interventions? I realized upon re-reading that was the main question which motivated this discussion for me. It is a question I have been grappling with for years

from early work using film as a way of understanding and coming to terms with the genocide in Bosnia to recent work with the International Museum of Women. I would love to hear all of your thoughts.

And Daniel, thank you for your very thoughtful post. I love that you've taken the time to create and post a roadmap of how your organization has developed. Judging by the looks of it, you would not have been able to sit down 15 years ago and map out your future success in a linear fashion-- it seems to have grown very organically and sustainably, in response to genuine community need and interest. Brilliant that you posit developing supportive community and strong networks as an answer to the sustainability quandary.

You are absolutely right about sticking it out for the long-term. They say it usually takes a generation-- the span of an entire adult lifetime-- of concerted, repeated efforts to really turn the needle on complicated issues. And that's for the ones that actually succeed. Some pieces of the puzzle may come around faster than others, but they are all part of a very complex whole.

You're right that this has grown over time, yet, it's still focused on exactly the same goals as when we started. We've just continued to adopt the tools that are available to us.

Finding ways to tell ths story, and to get people to look at what you're doing is one of the key challenges. In the past couple of years we've begun to put youth created videos on YouTube. You can see a few at http://video.google.com/videosearch?q=cabrini+connections

We're using blogs to do this also: http://cabriniblog.blogspot.com

Hi Paula,

Fitting the pieces into the puzzle to show the whole, is exactly why stories can make a difference. It's difficult to generalise about all characters, but the fact that humans arose from a single evolutionary event makes it a safe bet to say, that underneath it all we are all the same. Creating connection is a natural part of the human psyche, so to go to the place that holds meaning together, through the construction of subjectivity, we all learn something. Awareness brings change.

The trick to storytelling is for the teller to be inside the experience while being detached and observing it at the same time. While being in the present moment storytelling is a meeting of minds. And ofcourse that's when the magic happens. Coincidently, or should I say, sychronisticly, its world storytelling day, and the theme this year is dreams....

Thanks for your post, Jo. I had never heard of World Storytelling Day before you mentioned it-- but I did some searching. Unfortunately no events in London, surprisingly, though perhaps I did not look hard enough.

I like what you say about stories allowing the meeting of the minds. I have always found this with my work-- several years back I worked on a pilot project with Active Voice using film to create bridges between Jewish and Muslim groups in San Francisco. The well-told stories provided a powerful point of entry to a conversation that would not otherwise have happened and was sorely needed.

That said, to play devil's advocate, stories alone are but one tool in a changemakers' toolkit. And awareness alone may or may not lead to change.

My next book project is about really delving into this model-- trying to formalize how increased awareness leads to concrete structural change. And it's precisely because I know the value of public education projects for turning the needle on issues... but we don't have the tools right now to really explain how such strategies fit into the overall puzzle.

With the MTV generation and now the Internet generation, we are bombarded with millions of messages and distractions everyday, mainly from advertisers. Storytellers fight with advertisers for the attention of the consumer. Stroytelling must rise above all that noise

Storytelling can play an important role in getting the message out there, including with movies, videos, music, plays, books...etc. The main problem with stroytelling is that it also needs good distribution, which is tied into marketing. If you create the best story in the world, but nobody watches it ("too few distributors"), it will lose money.

Here are some comments for your questions:

1) The profit potential of educational project depends on the project and the subject itself. The increase awareness of social issues needs both philanthropic funding, public funding and investor fuinding because to rise above the media noise, we need to confront social issues with all our arsenals at hand.

Example of a profitable project: if you make a film about organic food, which then you can spin off into a book and a mini-expo on organic foods, with sponsors; it can be extremely profitable.

I am currently developing the Green Stock Exchange (GREENSX), North America's first social stock exchange, to help provide social businesses with additional financing for such project as yours. http://greensx.com

2) Independent "public opinion polls" are the best way to measure impact on awareness. I started painting and talking about climate change and the extinction of species in 2001 via the Thinkism Art Movement ("the first fine art movement of the 21st century" - http://www.thinkism.org), when not many people heard about it. People just did not listen in 2001, but after the Inconvenient Truth came out, art galleries were a bit more receptive to my art about climate change and the extinction of species. However, there are still skeptics about climate change; during my art exhibition in 2007, someone wrote a grafitti on my painting description saying that climate change is bullshit. Therefore, more education is still needed.

3) The most effective media project I can think of is the United States Civil Rights Movement, with Martin Luthur King and the anti-Vietnam war campaigns with Bob Dylan. These campaigns included celebrity endorsements, rallies, music, movies, art, television and more.

Fascinating comments, David, thank you. I was particularly intrigued by your thoughts on profit for public education/media projects. You're right

the profit potential depends on the issue. Eight now, you're a lot more likely to be able to see a return on a film or book about the environment, than say, about questions of maternal health in the developing world.

But such an observation begs the question. When it comes to public education efforts, is profit potential inversely related to need?

The reason you can now start to see profit on media projects about the environment (or for that matter, a whole host of green business products) is because there were years of grassroots public education projects on climate change-- most of which I guarantee struggled heroically for resources. Without that foundation, the concept of environmentalism would not enjoy nearly the same profit potential and mainstream acceptance as it does now.

In some sense, the early adopter funders who gave money to the first environmental awareness projects can be said to have seen a much higher social return on their efforts (building the essential foundation for all that was to come) than those investing now. And yet, it probably wouldn't have seemed that way to them at the time--they probably felt like they weren't making much traction at all. When a social issue is still considered marginal, the gains are incremental and slow... until a tipping point is reached.

Clearly there is tons more to be done on the environment- I'd be the last to claim otherwise. But what about a huge array of issues that are not fashionable currently-- but for which a huge amount of public education is needed, and for which less profit potential exists because the issues aren't yet fashionable?

------ Also, David, can you tell us more about the Green Stock Exchange and how it works? And also (to ask an impossible question)-- what was the model and trajectory by which growing awareness and acceptance of the concept of civil rights occurred? Can you shed any light on that?

I think we are still in the early adopter stage with the environmental movement, but the Internet has been extremely helpful in the spread of the green message.

We can see this trend by simply following the health food sector because in the me generation, most people think what is in it for me. Actually health food is often the entry point to a green and sustainable lifestyle, so if something is bad for your health, then attitudes change.

If you see a lot of health foods in mainstream stores, then it has reached maturity.

I am a Chinese Born Canadian, so when we greet each other during New Year, we say "wish you good health" to your elders. If we ask people to save the planet, Chinese cannot relate to it, but if you say save the planet for good health, people will look twice. Often people purchase things at ridiculous prices if it is good for health. Just go to a Chinese medicine shop, and you can eaily drop $500.00+ to buy something for good for health.

To answer your impossible question about "what was the model and trajectory by which growing awareness and acceptance of the concept of civil rights occurred? Can you shed any light on that?"

The civil rights was one issue, with a clear agenda, to remove racial legislation. If at the time of the civil rights movement, they had the Internet, cell phones, satellite TV, and faxes, I think it would be much faster.

The environmental issue is made up of so many small and big problems, with multiple jurisdictions. This includes overfishing, GMO, pollution, the extinction of species, mining, CO2...etc. I just feel depress thinking about it. Most of my friends have just given up because they feel the problem is so huge and out of their control. This is environmental apathy.

As for the Green Stock Exchange: ---------------------------------

I am setting up North America's first social stock exchange, called the Green Stock Exchange (http://greensx.com), which will finance and trade shares publicly in social businesses, just like NASDAQ and AIM London Stock Exchange. It is a eBAY.com like system for trading shares in social businesses connected to a green social network, with a triple bottom line (economic + social + environmental). It will be ready about summer 2008. I have not made any press releases yet, so you are the first ones to know about it.

A "social business" as a profit making business that also benefits society. Example like Granneem Bank (Microfinincing), Green Energy...etc.

Since all the listed companies on the exchange are pre-screened, evaluated, and audited according to social and sustainable guidelines set by the exchange, it will make it much easier for green investors to find and support social businesses. The GREENSX provides opportunities for small green Issuers to access public equity capital efficiently, while providing early stage investors, angel investors, and venture capitalists with greater liquidity.

The Green Stock Exchange is only part of a E=MC2 Green Community Platform for social change. Sorry the description is so long below:

: the Green Stock Exchange is North America's first social stock exchange. The eBAY.COM AUCTION STYLED online bulletin board for trading securities empowers social businesses, which are more earth friendly and humanity friendly. The exchange makes it easier for people to invest in green companies ("it is modeled after AIM London Stock Exchange and NASDAQ "). Since all the listed companies on the exchange are pre-screened, evaluated, and audited according to social and sustainable guidelines set by the exchange, it will make it much easier for green investors to find and support social businesses. The GREENSX provides opportunities for small green Issuers to access public equity capital efficiently, while providing early stage investors, angel investors, and venture capitalists with greater liquidity.

green social network: the E=MC² Creative Friends Network is a green social network ("it is modeled after MYSPACE and FACEBOOK") , where people can make friends with other green revolutionaries ("includes blogs, forums, wikis, start-a-business, search engines, classified, personals, photos, jobs,art, music, movies, videos and more"); at our online social network, our goal is to help our members reach their full potential.

green ad network: AdCharity is an ad auction and ad delivery network ("it is modeled after GOOGLE'S ADSENSE"), that allows marketers to reach people interested in green living. Products that can be advertised includes: hybrid and electric cars, organic and natural food, organic and natural personal care products, yoga, tai chi, massage centers, spas and fitness products, green and sustainable building, eco-tours, hiking and wilderness trips, energy efficient electronics/appliances, socially responsible investing, natural household products (paper goods and cleaning products), natural and preventive medicine (naturopathic, Chinese medicine, etc.), fair-trade fashion, and eco-publications;

green business certification program: Green Business Certified Program is a program for certifying and auditing green businesses. Certified companies can use the Green Business Certified Logo to indicate to customers, employees, investors and stakeholders that you are a green company.

community driven brands: a "community driven brand" is a unique concept; it allows millions of members from the E=MC² Creative Friends Network to jointly-participate in the creation, the development, the selection, the marketing, and the promotion of greener products. The best ideas are selected via a democratic voting system, like reality TV show DANCING WITH THE STARS or AMERICAN IDOL, for commercialization.

greener products: from the "community driven brand" concept, the winning designs are manufactured under fair trade conditions and sold / distributed to socially conscious retailers and partners worldwide, such as Whole Foods, Wild Oats Markets, Urban Outfitters, Loblaws...etc We share a portion of the revenue with winners and charities. We make it easier for people to earn extra money or to start their own business, while benefiting society. We have seeded the "community driven brand" with the following products:

green magazine: LOHAS Magazine is an online open source catalogue and magazine created by blog journalists and citizen reporters, for LOHAS (Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability). Citizen journalists, movie-makers and photographers bring the stories and images. Subject include: climate change, news, health, the environment, social issues, conservation, green products reviews, videos, global warming, cooking, gossip, advice and whatever suits your taste. It is a magazine create by the people, for the people.

green charity: Green Charity is "Charity Without Boundaries". The Green Charity program is a non-profit social network that puts you in touch with thousands of non-profit organizations, volunteers, donors, and recipients from all over the world. It makes it easier for people to find and donate to charities.

Thank you so much for initiating this conversation, Paula! Right now I'm working on this very problem with the civil rights organization I helped found, Friends of Justice.

I have one idea about how to get funders and allies to value what we do. We're in the process of developing a training module for other organizations in narrative-based interventions. We want this idea of narrative-based interventions to be a common model of advocacy that provides a common strategic language for people from diverse fields (law, media advocacy, blogging). I’d love to work together with other people who want to create a new paradigm of how to implement—and value—this form of social entrepreneurship.

Friends of Justice is a grassroots organization that works to uphold due process for all Americans. Our goal is to build a public consensus behind equal access to justice and respect for human dignity in our criminal justice system. We've achieved large-scale impact because of our unique model of narrative-based intervention. We were the first organizations to get national media attention for two of the most important civil rights cases of the last decade: an historic scandal over a racially-targetted drug sting in Tulia, Texas in 1999, and a national debate over racial tension in Jena, Louisiana in 2007, after white teenagers hung nooses in the local high school.

Here’s how our model of narrative-based intervention works: Friends of Justice organizes media scandals about cases where vulnerable people are denied due process because of abusive prosecution and corrupt policing. We conduct investigation of these cases as they unfold, craft a clear summary of the facts, and persuade the media to do hard-hitting reporting on the breakdown of due process. We organize affected communities like Tulia and Jena to tell their stories, connecting them to international media and to powerful national allies.

Our strategy shifts the prevailing media and community narratives about criminal justice, flooding the public square with narratives about the need to hold our public officials to a higher standard and defend due process for all Americans.

I resonate with this conversation, because we struggle with this very dilemma of quantifying and valuing our impact to funders, since we specialize in transforming the public conversation rather than delivering a product or service. But I'm not going to give up on this, because I've seen first-hand how much impact our organization can achieve through narrative-based advocacy!

You can read more about Friends of Justice here: http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com

And more about our strategy consulting in narrative-based interventions here: http://friendsofjustice.wordpress.com/our-solution/new-organizing-strategy/

Lydia, thank you for this post. Looks like you are doing some fabulous work.

It is interesting that you say that you struggle with the dilemma of valuing your impact-- as it seems to me that you summarize it quite compellingly. Is the difficulty in quantifying it? In pointing to specifics?

It would be really valuable if you could share with us some lessons learned from previous attempts (successful and not) of sharing and communicating your impact as an organization. What has worked best with which audiences? What hasn't worked? What are the specific major challenges?

Misreading something above, reminds me of a favourite story and the influence that it passed on to those who really did change the world:-

Nikolai solemnly announced to his siblings one day that he possessed a wonderful secret that could make all men happy. If it became generally known, a kind of golden age would exist on earth: there would be no more disease, no human misery, and no anger. All would love one another and become “Ant Brothers.” (Moravskiye bratya - “Moravian Brothers” - of whom young Nikolai had no doubt read, was probably mistakenly transformed by the boys into Muraveinye bratya - “Ant Brothers.”)

The children adopted the idea with enthusiasm and even organized a game of Ant Brothers. Boxes and chairs were converted with shawls, and they all cuddled together in the dark within the shelter.

Nikolai had disclosed the Ant Brotherhood to them but not the chief secret - the means by which all men would become everlastingly happy. He had written this secret, he said, on a green stick buried by the road at the edge of a ravine in the Zakaz forest.

The other children soon forgot about the green stick. Tolstoy, however, traced to the Ant Brotherhood under the shawl-covered chairs his first childhood experience of love, not love of some one person, but love of love. Huddled together under the chairs, the Ant Brothers felt a particular tenderness for each other, and they talked of what was necessary for happiness and how they would love everybody. When he was over seventy, he recalled the incident in his Recollections:

“The ideal of Ant Brothers clinging lovingly to one another, only not under two armchairs curtained by shawls, but of all the people of the world under the wide dome of heaven, has remained unaltered for me. As I then believed that there was a little green stick whereon was written something which would destroy all evil in men and give them great blessings, so I now believe that such truth exists among people and will be revealed to them and will give them what it promises.”

Two years before his death, Tolstoy dictated to his secretary, N.N. Gusev, the following: “Although it is a trifling matter, yet I wish to say something that I should like done after my death. Even though it is a trifle of trifles: let no ceremonies be performed in putting my body into the earth. A wooden coffin, and whoever wishes, carry it or cart it to Zakaz, opposite the ravine at the place of the green stick. At least, there's a reason for selecting that and no other place.” When he mentioned the green stick, Gusev observed, tears filled his eyes. ……………………………………………

In his last years, Tolstoy reached what could be considered his final conclusion, that the Law of Love outweighed the Law of Violence and overruled all mans laws. His green stick remaining a consistent metaphor.

In Letter to a Hindu Tolstoy relates the principles of passive non-violence to a young lawyer, Mahatma Gandhi who in turn goes on to influence Martin Luther King.

Malcolm Muggeridge, upon whom the green stick has a powerful influence which led in the end to discover Mother Teresa of Calcutta, described him thus:

"Tolstoy wrote. Everything Tolstoy wrote is precious, but I found this final statement of the truth about life as he had come to understand it particularly beautiful and moving. That is what I have wanted to say to you, my brothers. Before I died. So he concludes, giving one a vivid sense of the old man, pen in hand and bent over the paper, his forehead wrinkled into a look of puzzlement very characteristic of him, as though he were perpetually wondering how others could fail to see what was to him so clear - that the law of love explained all mysteries and invalidated all other laws."

"Tolstoy writes somewhere about a peasant belief that a green stick had been buried in the earth and would one day be found, and then all our troubles would come to an end. I think he half believed it himself, and was always on the look out for the green stick, until at last he grew tired of looking. Never mind. The fact that a man like Tolstoy could exist amounts in itself to a green stick. It is true that today his hopes seem more remote even than when he entertained them. Yet underlying the disappointed hopes was his faith in a single infallible guide, a Universal Spirit that lives in men as a whole, and in each one of us . . . that commands the tree to grow towards the sun, the flower to throw off its seed in autumn, and us to reach out towards God and by so doing become united to each other. Such was his last word, delivered to us, his brothers, who come after him"

Jeff, your post reminded me a very common-sense piece of knowledge but one that is very often forgotten.

Awareness of social problems, and willingness to solve them, doesn't arise suddenly and out of thin air. There is a lineage which is built over time through many small (and some large) contributions. It shouldn't be surprising at all that Tolstoy influenced Gandhi, who in turn influenced King.

But we forget these things. We forget that the ideas which Gandhi made popular, ideas like non-violence, were being developed and cultivated in an Indian context by many public figures and thinkers that came before him, and some of whom were his contemporaries-- people he borrowed heavily from, ideas he re-branded as his own. We forget that blockbuster speeches like MLK's "I have a dream" were built on the foundation of thousands of smaller attempts by lesser-known civil rights leaders to place the issue on the agenda.

Very academic sounding, I know.

How does this apply to social enterprise? It means that in terms of public awareness/education/media projects, it may not always be realistic to look for the "big bang" project that will put a cause past a tipping point. When we can do that, that is excellent. But sometimes it may be more realistic to assess where the issue is in terms of public acceptance and start to build from there.

Before we begin the holiday weekend, I thought I'd throw out a few more questions for discussion. 1. Personal reflections? Can any of you think of a film you saw, a news story you heard, perhaps a book or article you read-- which really changed the way you thought about a social issue and led to action on your part? Tracing this relationship between awareness and action is the million-dollar question for many of us- and it's very tricky.

1. Best practices on impact Can any of you who are in the public education/media business share an example of a successful project, how you measured its impact, and any reflections on what made it successful?
2. Profitable social media projects? Can you help me generate a list of media/storytelling projects on social issues (present or past) that have actually made money?

First, a quick response to Paula's second question asking for specific examples of profitable social media projects. One category to consider, though it's probably a bit outside the kinds of projects thought of as "social media," is children's educational television. Adults may view a polemical message directed at them with suspicion or indifference, and the comments above suggest the kinds of static such messages need to cut through to be effective and profitable. All the same, every parent wants their child to learn not only the practicalities of literacy or math, but also social and ethical development ... and parents are willing to pay for it so long as social, ethical, and pragmatic instruction are integrated. Whether it's Mr. Rogers or Sesame Street, children's educational television has proved to be profitable in both direct media sales and spinoff products; such programs also have global reach. Children's television has done this while being one of the first mass mediums to tangle with thorny social issues. To be more concrete: Sesame Street was one of the first ( and certainly one of the most-watched and longest-lived ) television programs to feature a racially-diverse cast, and it has continued to be on the forefront ( as far as mass-media are concerned ) of broad issues like environmentalism or peace. And having children ask questions about social issues often forces adults to confront those issues themselves.

I wonder whether this combination of practical learning and consciousness-raising gives cues for campaigns aimed primarily at adults. (As an interesting aside, many proselytizing religious orders do their best to combine practical education and entertainment with social causes. From the Jesuits to the Jehovah's Witnesses, the material they produce and the institutions they found do a surprisingly good job of integrating these two.) Only a small demographic consciously wants to discover more about a social cause. Almost everyone wants to be entertained and learn new skills. It's not inconceivable to leverage one to achieve the other.

Returning to questions 1 and 2 from the opening posting of this discussion, I'd posit that a partial answer to 1 may lie in 2, in the sense that there's nothing preventing a social-impact-oriented version of Nielsen, DoubleClick, etc. from being a profitable undertaking. That rating agency can be run as a for-profit business, and the objective ratings it provides could provide those public education projects that do rely on philanthropic or taxpayer funding with tools to go back to their funders and show measurable impact. I don't know if there have already been attempts to start such an independent agency or what the outcome of such a venture was, but it seems like the measurement aspect of social media is something that could be successfully cleaved from any given organization's core focus.

I also found Friends of Justice inspiring. Lydia, to followup on Paula's question, were you able to use any technological tools to track media impact? One possibility you may have considered was using something like Google or Lexis-Nexis Alerts to track the number and placement of stories written about Jena and Tulia immediately before and after a FoJ campaign, or to look for mentions of quotes by FoJ members or linkbacks to FoJ blogs or webpages in online media to generate a before / after comparison. Those sorts of tools could provide an immediately-quantifiable number or chart to rally the organization itself and attract outside funding. I know such services exist in the purely-commercial sector

just curious if you were able to find similar tools to help you out.

I also think that predicting and measuring impact is much easier in online than in offline media, particularly if the result you are trying to measure as a result of the awareness campaign is itself a purely online action. Certainly the massive shift in private-sector advertising from offline to online media suggests so. If the goal of an online awareness campaign is to get people to sign up for a email list, subscribe to an online petition, or even buy Fair Trade coffee from one of many online retailers, then thanks to the innovations demanded by commerically-oriented marketers, it's easy enough to track the trail from first impression to action. I fully admit that there are many limitations to such purely-virtual campaigns. Online media don't make sense in places without electricity, computers, and network connections; and the ultimate real-world impact of online petitions is questionable.

At the same time, it's possible to bridge offline and online media. If the goal of an online campaign is to get people to attend a political rally or organize their own local meeting, there are many well-proven techniques from the private sector to figure out exactly who arrived as a result of what campaign. You may, for example, offer some extra benefit to those who show up to a real-world event bearing one of several coupon codes disseminated via an online campaign.

It becomes more difficult for either purely-commercial or socially-oriented media to measure impact as the message becomes more abstract; continuing to leverage the innovations driven by the commercial sector may provide additional opportunities for social media.

Really important points all around, Josh. Thanks for your post. I found particularly valuable your thoughts on leveraging commercial innovations as well as the idea of a nielsen like rating agency, which echoes David's earlier comments. (Anyone know what already exists like this? )

On the rating agency (or any other move which would help in some sense to move towards a more cross-cutting way of measurement)- it strikes me this would be really great for measuring short-term impact. Long term impact on social change is something we really need better models for, across the industry (and particularly with funders involved). Otherwise, causes that are already fashionable will show better results simply because they're already fashionable.

On leveraging commercial innovation-- absolutely. My experience developing the online museum with the International Museum of Women (in which we did just that) echoes that thrust. I started out the Imagining Ourselves project (http://imaginingourselves.imow.org) thinking it would be just a book. However, leveraging the internet helped us reach huge numbers of people, and in countries we'd never dreamed of reaching. It was also very easy for us to measure that reach. Measuring page views and time on the site, however, is only a proxy for the question of changing hearts and minds

and causing changes in behavior. (Incidentally, you're right that the more specific and short-term the campaign, the easier to measure.)

I've asked some people representing a few of my favorite social media projects to post their thoughts on effective impact definition and measurement- so hopefully we might get more perspectives on this.

In the meanwhile, welcoming more suggestions for the list of profitable social media projects-- like Josh's one on children's media/Sesame Street. To add to that list, I'd suggest that Participant Productions is today's most high-profile example of effectively making social media for profit (and no, the Skoll folks did not pay me to say that). (http://www.realscreen.com/articles/magazine/20060301/page33.html?page=1)

I agree that measures of online behavior can only serve as proxies for changes of heart and mind. However, there are a few ways to make these more accurate proxies. Several companies, of which Meetup is the most prominent, have a goal of linking online and offline behavior. Although Meetup doesn't currently do this, I'd be curious to see if there's any way they can implement something like the "coupon code" idea in so you can see who comes to the meetup as a result of what online channels.

On the short-term / long-term measurement, I wouldn't discount the effects of cheap storage and processing power. While it's true that individual websites typically have a short-term focus in terms of tracking users, ad networks like DoubleClick / AdSense have a much longer memory and broader reach. DC has been around now over a decade, and if you've got the same cookie on your machine that you had when you first viewed one of their banner ads, they

at least in theory -- can track your movements online over that entire period. So lets say that today someone views a video produced by a social media house on refugees from Africa seeking political asylum in Europe. They take no obvious action on it for three years. But three years on, they perhaps see a news program on refugees from Africa, and soon after that, they sign up for a mailing list from an organization that tries to help these refugees. An ad network or Nielsen-like agency may well be able to track path this individual has taken -- as well as seeing all the paths people have taken to sign up for the mailing list -- and provide feedback to the original social media house three years later of how their impact has spread. This sort of cross-domain long-term tracking and behavioral profiling is what networks like DC / AdSense sell as their competitive advantage -- and what has privacy advocates dogging them.

"I wouldn't discount the effects of cheap storage and processing power."

Well said, and very true-- though privacy, as you mention, will be a paramount issue in your suggestions.

This is where we came in. A decade ago there were few who fully appreciated the central role of information toward innovation in the developing world and new ways of doing business empowered by web technology. A narrative that would eventually grasp Bill Gates in his creative capitalism just recently.

http://www.p-ced.com/History/tabid/57/Default.aspx

These were early days for spreading the word via the web. Instead, it was distributed open source on paper like the pamphlets of Tom Payne.

By 2004 having introduced P-CED in the UK, we used the same kind of leverage to form Friends of Beslan and deliver minor comforts while appeal funds were tangled in banking bureaucracy. As Facebook was being conceived to monetise and profit, conversely impromptu social networking took on a lesser known compassionate form.

Profit for purpose was our aim, social return on investment perhaps the measure.

Paula, thank you so much for drawing attention to these very important topics and highlighting PMC’s work. Population Media Center (PMC) strives to improve the health and well-being of people around the world through the use of entertainment-education strategies, like serialized dramas on radio and television, in which characters evolve into role models for the audience for positive behavior change.

One of the advantages of using serial dramas, as opposed to documentaries or single-episode dramas, is that they allow time for the audience to form bonds with the characters and allow characters to evolve in their thinking and behavior with regard to various issues at a gradual and believable pace in response to problems that have been well illustrated in the story line.

Just as important, entertainment programs forge emotional ties to audience members that influence values and behaviors more forcefully than the purely cognitive information provided in documentaries. As described in the social learning theory of Stanford University psychologist Albert Bandura, vicarious learning from others is a powerful teacher of attitudes and behavior. Next to peer and parental role models, role models from the mass media are of particular importance in shaping cultural attitudes and behavior.

Serial dramas to promote reproductive health have been remarkable in that they have attracted no serious opposition in any country. This stems, in part, from the thorough research that has been done prior to the development of the programs to measure audience attitudes and norms with regard to these issues. Characters for the serial dramas can then be developed who are very much like audience members, so that the show is in harmony with the culture. Through the gradual evolution of characters in response to problems that many in the audience also are facing, serial dramas can show adoption of new, non-traditional behaviors in a way that generates no negative response from the audience.

Because of the bonds that are formed over time between audience members and characters, and because of the commonality of problems between characters and the audience, audience members tend to accept these changes, even though they may challenge cultural traditions. Because they deal with issues that are as sensitive as sexual relationships and reproduction, it is especially important that such programs are designed not to build opposition or cause a backlash.

Throughout the course of projects implemented in each country, PMC systematically collects information that allows us to monitor and evaluate the progress of each program with a particular focus on the intended audience.

PMC uses a variety of methods to monitor and evaluate its programs. To monitor programs, PMC will often create listening groups. The listening groups are asked to keep diaries recording their reactions to the characters and storylines in the program. These diaries are collected and shared with the creative teams on an ongoing basis, to ensure that the program remains engaging, relevant, and comprehensible for listeners.

Listeners are also asked to write, call, or make visits to the radio stations that broadcast the dramas to convey their reactions to the programs and how the programs have affected them. PMC asks the radio stations to document this feedback from listeners and periodically collects the feedback to monitor the effects of the programs. Since one of the goals of our programs is to motivate listeners to seek reproductive health services, we often engage with service providers to document any increases in demand for health services that they experience in conjunction with the programs. We will also ask providers to ask new reproductive health clients about their reasons for seeking services and to document the number of clients reporting the serial dramas by name. If clients do not spontaneously mention that they were motivated to come to the clinic by the program, then they will be asked if they have ever heard of the program and whether they have been listening to it. We typically collect these service statistics throughout the broadcast period, in order to track the progress of the programs in creating behavior change. PMC also conducts periodic in-depth interviews and focus groups with audience members in order to directly gather their feedback. This feedback is not only used to monitor the success of the program, but is also given to the creative teams so they can make the programs more successful.

In addition to monitoring, PMC conducts a baseline survey prior to broadcast and an endline survey post-broadcast to evaluate program effects. The impact evaluation quantitatively measures changes in knowledge, attitudes, beliefs, and behaviors with regard to the issues addressed in the program.

The results from these evaluations have shown that PMC’s programs have created dramatic behavior change with regard to issues related to reproductive health and family planning, in a number of different countries.

In Ethiopia, 63% percent of new clients seeking reproductive health services at 48 clinics reported that they were listening to one of PMC’s serial dramas. In Nigeria, PMC’s program Gugar Goge was reported as the primary motivation to seek health care services by 33% of family planning/reproductive health clients and 54% of obstetric fistula clients. In Rwanda, 57% of new family planning adopters reported that their decision to visit the clinic was motivated by PMC’s program, Umurage Urukwiye; similarly, 59% of people seeking HIV tests indicated that they were motivated to seek testing from listening to Umurage Urukwiye. In Brazil, where PMC acts as an advisor to TV Globo, among viewers interviewed at family planning clinics, just over a third of clients age 18-24 said that scenes in Paginas da Vida served as a stimulus for them to seek a health service.

The serialized dramas that PMC is using to improve people’s lives are highly cost-effective because of the huge audiences they attract and the strong impact they have on the public. In Ethiopia, PMC’s first long-running radio serial drama cost just 4 U.S. cents to reach each listener.

I don't know about you all but I find these results extremely striking and impressive, hence why I invited Bill to tell us a little about his work. 59% of people getting HIV tests in Rwanda because they listened to a PMC radio drama, and with no serious opposition even though these are culturally fraught issues... This is the kind of documentable change that entire government agencies and UN bodies have dreamed of for decades.

Culling from Bill's comment, I take away the following lessons for those wishing to use storytelling for social change:

1) Repeat exposure

It is a basic tenet of marketing that people need to hear about an idea or product many multiple times before they actually take action on it (or buy the product). So no surprise here that a serial soap opera would stand more of a chance of driving the message home than a one-off movie for example.

This I'd posit as a general truth-- but there is certainly room for the tipping point model of opinion changing that

2) Role models

Just as people need to hear a message multiple times before they take action, every marketeer also knows that people are more likely to use information they get from people they trust. Best then, coming from friends and families-- but before you can generally reach deep penetration into social networks across a whole country, you have to use proxies to get the message inserted into these networks. This is the role of the characters of PMC's serial dramas- people that audiences grow a bond with over time, and come to have a (removed) form of trust with, such that they'll pay more attention to the ideas promulgated by these characters. The use of celebrities in campaigning or as spokespeople on behalf of various causes plays a similar (though possibly less trusted) role.

Given the Skoll Forum this week on "Culture, Context, and Social Change," I've been doing a lot of thinking on the relationship between cultural change and social enterprise.

I just re-read Roger Martin and Sally Osberg's highly insightful and provocative article giving their definition of social enterprise (thanks in part to the link to it from Jeff's website): http://www.ssireview.org/articles/entry/social_entrepreneurship_the_case_for_definition/

Martin and Osberg stress that equilibrium change is the sine-qua-non of social entrepreneurship. They write, "The social entrepreneur should be understood as someone who targets an unfortunate but stable equilibrium that causes the neglect, marginalization, or suffering of a segment of humanity; who brings to bear on this situation his or her inspiration, direct action, creativity, courage, and fortitude; and who aims for and ultimately affects the establishment of a new stable equilibrium that secures permanent benefit for the targeted group and society at large."

The question I would pose is whether we can think of projects aiming at cultural change as falling under the rubric of social enterprise.

My answer is yes, but it would require taking a more nuanced view of what it takes to create equilibrium shift in the cultural sector. Specifically, we need to recognize that when it comes to cultural change, equilibrium shifts are usually the result of MULTIPLE INTERVENTIONS from multiple actors. Very rarely do we get big cultural shifts from one actor, project, or entrepreneur alone. Instead, the interventions of multiple actors build on each other in often very constructive ways.

The kind of work Bill does stands out because the change it is causing (arguably is creating new, sustainable equilibriums in the demand for and provision of reproductive health services across many countries) can be directly traced to PMC's programs.

More often than not, however, we'd have to take a longer term approach, and a wider-angle lens, to assessing whether and how new cultural equilibriums are reached-- whether it's the question of environmentalism finally reaching a major tipping point, or any issues which may been seen as causing suffering and requiring (in part) a cultural shift in beliefs or attitudes as part of its systemic solution.

This is precisely why we need better ways of understanding what it takes to shift beliefs and attitudes on a cause or issue: how long it takes, how many interventions over how much time, how these interventions build on each other, etc.

I should note that this is also often the case in the for-profit sector as well. Commercial innovations feed off each other. Some innovative new businesses fail, some succeed in very small ways, and others are hugely successful. But we get the massive rise and spread of things like the internet because of the totality of these innovations feeding off of each other. Without the failures and the moderate successes, the big ones wouldn't be possible. Such is also true in the cultural change sector. As already mentioned, without the years of interventions on environmental issues, tipping points in awareness/behavior (like what we have seen in the last few years) would not be possible.

This is obviously an extremely complicated topic. I put this post up more to open up conversation than to pose definitive answers.

What do you think? Do you disagree? Points to add or correct?

It's great to see Bill's work doing so well, it gives us a clue on how to shift attitudes and beliefs. Along with serialized dramas, the use of humour can help shift cultural barriers to affect change over contentious issues, people relax if they can laugh at themselves.

Like the use of stories about sweatshop children in mobilising ethical consumerism in developed nations, it was images of starving children in developing nations that had an impact on me. Stories through the radio or images through the television can show how multiple interventions and use of repetitions can effect awareness of an issue or cause so that people can take action to change it. I also think networks of coordinated responses is the best strategy for culture change. By using stories to turn people into networks and communities, imagine what creative media could do with creative capitalism....anyway I wanted to find out more about what you did with Active Voice? How were you able to trace the awareness between awareness and action? What kind of concrete structural changes can you track for your book?

Thanks, Jo, for posting these ideas and questions. In terms of tracing the link between awareness and action in my own work-- the most concrete example is actually what we did for assessment on the Imagining Ourselves project. The goal was to connect and inspire young women globally to contribute leadership on issues facing their communities and their families, etc. We not only traced our audience (through visits and returns to the website, page views, on the ground events, media hits, etc.). We also did an independent qualitative and quantitative survey in which we looked at questions of attitudinal change in terms of these young women's views of themselves as agents of change-- as well as what actions they had already taken (getting involved, for example with a partner organization, starting one of their own) or were planning to take. The true test of impact, however would be to trace our participants five, ten, and fifteen years down the line

as that's sometimes how long it may take to activate people on certain issues.

In terms of concrete structural changes and the book I'm working on... without giving away too many secrets :), there are literally tons of structural changes that have been made to society that we today take as normal. An easy, well-known example: we take it as normal that slavery is wrong and shouldn't exist, which wasn't always the case. Some of the stories are widely known, some not so well known-- but there are some fairly important, universal lessons to be had about cultural change and social enterprise to draw from them.

i keep forgetting that double dashes cause highlighting!

Do you think if more women were on more board of directors and upper management, traditional businesses would be more sustainable?

On the Green Stock Exchange we support companies with a:

demonstrated record of women & minorities serving on their boards/management

I was wondering if it would speed up social change? Any examples?

Thanks for hosting this conversation, Paula. I'd like to contribute some thoughts about assessing impact, which is something I've been involved in with non-profits for a number of years. My approach is always a mixed-methods approach, i.e., a combination of qualitative and quantitative data provide the basis for understanding impact. Because social change is generally (though not always) something that occurs slowly, over a long period of time, it can be very difficult to relate a particular action/input to a final result. Causality is very hard to establish, especially since change is a constant, and that final result we're trying to pin down is never really final. That being said, it is very important for anyone who is trying to change the world through their work to at least attempt to capture the impact of their contributions. And yet, evaluators are often faced with macro-level success indicators that smaller organizations can not hope to influence within the time span a typical evaluation examines. I'd like to share an example of a program evaluation that offered both unique challenges and incredible opportunities for pushing the field of impact assessment. The International Museum of Women offers its exhibition visitors opportunities to both engage with its collections in an online environment, and to participate in a global virtual community that interacts about both specific pieces in the collection and the larger issue areas around which the collections are developed. The evaluation had to be constructed in a way that took into account the blurring of boundaries between exhibit contributor and visitor, because in many cases, they were the same. Additionally, the contributors and visitors who participated in the evaluation did so virtually or electronically, since they resided all over the world. Using a virtual survey to gather data enabled the museum to reach a statistically significant sample of its visitors, and the survey included opportunities for respondents to speak in their own voices and tell their own stories. A separate sample was constructed of the more actively involved contributors and visitors, and individual, in-depth, qualitative interviews were conducted among this group. Both samples responded to an extensive array of questions about (a) the meaning of their interaction with the exhibition in their own lives, (b) the kinds of change in their own lives they attributed to being part of the exhibition, and (c) the kinds of proactive steps they had taken in relation to an issue they learned about in the exhibition, such as learning more about the issue or getting involved with a group working on the issue. By tracking impact in individual lives in this way, the museum was able to both increase its understanding of how to create impact in a virtual world, and to claim a considerable impact among the people it reached through the exhibit. I'd love to be able to provide a brilliant answer to your question about tipping points, and of course I cannot. But I do know that through evaluation the museum continues to expand a body of data and knowledge that may well contribute one day to answering this question.

Hi Paula, great topic. We are launching an initiative at the Jackson Hole film Festival with the United Nations that deals with this. Basically we are bringing writers, directors and actors with senior UN officials to collaborate on story telling initiatives (film, tv, new media) on critical global issues.

The more aware people are of the good humanitarian work the UN does the more successful it will be in meeting its purposes.

We believe this is the best medium to educate the mass public and that education leads to compassion which leads to action.

I believe hybrid models will be the answer as well as in kind sponsor support. Invisible Children's Project is a wonderful example of a hybrid model. For foundations that support films with profits their investments can go back into supporting other causes. We are just touching the surface on hybrid models and many more initiatives will mature with maturity of technology. For instance online media and wireless companies can a component of a hybrid model through inkind services.

Best practices for predicting impact is more tricky than figuring out new business models. tracking the financial support is obviously the traditional way, but there may be ways of gaging increase in awareness and the point to which mass awareness leads to change.

An effective example of using video for me is the Invisible Children's Project as well as the initiative we are working on at the Festival.

Hello again, and apologies for my delayed posting-- I've been at Oxford the past few days attending the Skoll World Forum and generally digesting all the very inspirational ideas and people here. (And it is, unbelievably, sunny today, imagine!)

Deborah, thanks for your post-- and very helpful description. On linking to longer-term pictures of change that are not just specific to one social enterprise, I wonder if you could share a little bit about your work with the Women Donors Network, as I know they've come up with a very compelling holistic framework for that kind of assessment.

David, your project sounds fascinating and there have been many resonances with what you are doing here at the Forum. It would be really great if you coudl tell us more about where you are wtih it. In terms of your question about including diversity on boards and in the workforce of companies and how this impacts social change and the sustainability of companies-- I would like to open this up to all the readers as I'm certain there are people out there who know the answer to this better (and with more data to back them up) than I do. Can anyone help us out?

Todd, can you tell us more about the Invisible Childrens Project? It sounds fascinating. How did it make money? What was/is its impact? Is there a link?

Paula - the invisible children project can be found at www.invisiblechildren.com. I believe the filmmakers documented the plight of children in northern uganda trying to evade the LRA and becoming soldiers by trekking miles to a shelter at the end of each work day. the video was originally marketed with a bracelet made by villagers in the regions affected. All proceeds went back to the village to create more jobs making bracelets and to create more shelters. it has grown since then. the website has the full story.

Inspiring project... I wish we knew more about how it has grown and how they measure impact as it was a bit difficult to find on the site. But thank you very much for sharing it!

Hi Paula,

We are in the beta stage testing of the Green Stock Exchange and is schedule for launch in the Summer 2008. We are still seeking strategic partners for the initiative; if you know of any, please fo not hesitate to introduce them to me.

In my guidelines for listing on the Green Stock Exchange (http://greensx.com/info/listing_social_guidelines.php) includes the following policy:

• demonstrated record of women & minorities serving on their boards/management

Sadly, in 2005 women held 12.0 percent of board seats in the FP500, up from 11.2 percent in 2003, indicating little progress has been made in adding women to the boardroom.

In 2005, only 5 women chaired the 244 publicly traded companies on the FP500, up from 3 companies in 2003.

This show little progress. It is even lower for minorities...

Thank you all for your recent posts.

I want to pick up on one of David's latest posts that I missed as it was up in the middle of the conversation. Comparing civil rights and the environment he got to a few really key points. One is KEEP THINGS CLEAR AND AS FOCUSED AS REASONABLY POSSIBLE. The more complex the target of social change is, the more difficult to use marketing and storytelling to change people's minds. David thinks civil rights was a bit easier in that regard as the goal was tightly focused: change legislation against discrimination. Whereas the environment has so many different issues and offshoots, making it more complicated.

My take away: In reality, all social problems are messy and have multiple causes, environment and civil rights/racial discrimination alike. In order to make any progress you have to focus your messaging on one key chunk of the overall picture and not try to solve the problem all at once. For better or for worse, people have short attention spans and do not want complex treatises on issues.

The second is that NEW MEDIA gives us more chances to broadcast our message and reach new audiences than was possible before. Even as problems today get increasingly complicated, we also have increasingly more complicated and powerful tools to address them, the internet being one of them.

What do you all think? Agree? Disagree?

Hello all... I'm new to these discussions but this one caught my eye as I'm undertaking doctoral research in Digital Storytelling, based in Human Computer Interaction at Swansea University. Some of the points here raise interesting questions for me, and my research and I'm keen to get some feedback on my thoughts, and hopefully contribute to this discussion too

Firstly, following on from Paula's last post, I would agree that for messages to be effective, they need to focus on a key issue rather than the whole problem and that the message needs to be kept short (As the attention span of even those who are interested may be short, let alone those who deem the message to be unimportant in the first place). An area of storytelling that I am looking at fits this paradigm of getting the message across; the Berkeley format (from the Berkeley Digital Storytelling Center). This format has been championed by the likes of Daniel Meadows, and is being used successfully to inspire social change, as well as visual arts groups using it for various purposes including therapy, memory aid and community history projects (for example, http://www.bbc.co.uk/wales/audiovideo/sites/galleries/rhonddalives/). The format is simply a series of (normally still) images with transformations between and within them, with a voiceover on top. The script is kept short (normally about 3 minutes) and the message is focussed. This format of story has been used in projects such as the Storybank in Budikote, India, where appropriate technology has been used to aid illiterate members of the community share information that is used to educate; I simplify somewhat, but take a look at http://www.cs.swan.ac.uk/storybank/ for a better insight. Stories in this sense are well used to aid social change (be it only to share knowledge of hygeine or farming methods).

My focus (and indeed, my passion) is the environment, and I believe that there is scope to use storytelling to inspire change in the way people interact with their environment - I find that sometimes the problem is people are always told this is right, this is wrong without seeing the full effects of why, and thus ignoring it or becoming irritated by being told how to live: For example, why is littering such a problem? Apart from untidyness, if people actually --see-- the affects it has on say, sealife, instead of just being told its bad, dont do it then they are more likely to think twice before ditching their plastics in the winds.

I agree with what is said above, in that the issues are incredibly complex, and should be kept focussed for the messages to be successfully delivered, and I hope that the storytelling methods I'm working on can achieve that - Using modern technology (for example, the stories in StoryBank are made on mobile phones) messages can be quickly constructed and delivered, which is surely a fantastic vehicle for social change.

A question that throws doubt into the usefulness of my research for me is, as Paula mentions at the start of this discussion, is storytelling an effective method? Do they make a difference? I can pinpoint some exact examples where they have done. However I can't help but wonder if it is only really the people who are interested in them that will listen: Imagine the stereotypical person who does not consider the environment twice at any point throughout their daily routine (or worse, someone that likes to rebel against the current green wave by actively seeking out damaging products/choices - such people exist), are they going to be interested in watching/listening to a story that is basically telling them/showing them why they should consider it? Is it not those of us who care in the first place that are the ones who see such media and think about trying to change something?

Perhaps storytelling from the people the issues directly affect are a better way to inspire change to those who don't already care - as it was mentioned, we are all human and connect on some level. A personal plea will beat a general one. A project of this nature is one involving Fairtrade products, delivering the stories of the farmers/producers to the consumers, and cycling that story back to the producers... as yet it is only academic but hopefully here is one case when storytelling will aid both Average Joe in seeing and reinforcing the difference he is making, and giving that positive feedback to the people it will ultimately affect.

I'm working on a repository for stories of the nature I describe at the moment, and some software to create them... I'd like to share this with you when it is complete (or near completion) and feedback would be gratefully accepted. Again; I'm unsure of its potential reach for the reason above - if only the interested are affected, then message progression and reach are stagnant?

Sorry this post is a little bitty - my thoughts on this topic fluctuate from positive to negative quite regularly as I try and rationalise and realise its usefulness.

Steve - your research sounds invaluable and a needed contribution to the field of applied storytelling. I really appreciate a lot of the other comments shared here as well.

Personallym I've been working in the world of strategic and organizational storytelling for almost six years, and a social entrepreneur for ten. I came to storytelling and narrative very much in reaction to my frustrations with the world of social enterprise - which in the late 90s became over-run by way too much business school lingo and "over-rationalization". Storytelling is more than just once upon a time fables, but rather its about learning how to "think in stories" - and using the proven principles of narrative to help demystify what you do. Since the world of social enterprise, is really about world-views and value systems colliding, storytelling is so far one of the few approaches I've come across for making sense and meaning of this cross-cultural mash-up.

If you are in the business of communicating ideas – whether that be to donors, employees, members, customers, policy-makers or any key audience – storytelling is the single most important tool at your disposal. There is extensive research that proves: the human brain is hard-wired to learn new information and make meaningful connections through stories. Contrast this with the presiding corporate (and nonprofit) culture of communications: jargon, statistics, and death by powerpoint. People are thirsty for more authentic communications. In an age of information-overload and attention-deficit, stories can help cut through the noise.

Stories are the ultimate “activator”. A good story paints a picture and demystifies what you are you trying to convey. A good story is propelled by emotion, and if the audience identifies with your message, then you’ve established an emotional connection. This is the key to motivating people into action. They have to care. You better have something worth saying. Otherwise, even the most well-crafted story will disappoint. But if you do have something important to communicate – stories are the secret ingredient to bring your message to life. Remember, “profit”

“growth” -- these are measures of something. Storytelling is an essential tool to activate and accelerate your efforts, whether they are related to branding, fundraising, advocacy, or internal change. In the end, stories will allow you to succeed faster and in a manner that has people invested in a collective future.

A lot more organizations are embracing storytelling than we may realize. In 2006, I contributed to research and a compendium book published by Jossey-Bass that explored this question (Wake Me Up When the Data is Over: How Organizations Use Stories to Drive Results

available on amazon). We found more than seventy leading organizations using stories to drive organizational results – in areas such as branding, sales, strategy, change, and turnarounds. We’re talking respected players like AARP, CityYear, Motorola, Microsoft, NASA, Procter & Gamble, and Saatchi & Saatchi to name a handful. The key factor was leaders didn’t lead with “Let’s do storytelling”. Instead, they were driven by a specific business challenge, and storytelling became a tool, technique, or approach that led to a breakthrough solution.

Cheers,

Michael http://www.thirsty-fish.com/bookshelf/ http://www.popanthropology.com

Steve and Mike, thank you for your posts.

Steve, I agree with Mike completely. Your research is valuable. Listen, if you already knew the answer before you started, the research wouldn't be worth doing. Follow the intuition and see where it leads.

Indeed, from my perspective I would say that this is an area of inquiry and applied work where social entrepreneurship (and the social change sector in general) currently has a bit of a blind spot, so the more we can do to document how and why people change their minds about social issues (via storytelling or other approaches), the more useful it will be to all of us, and the less doubt you will have...

A few thoughts: Yes, most stories and marketing (commercial or not) projects never cross the chasm so to speak, preaching only to the already converted. That is true in the commercial and non-commercial sector. But it's one thing to throw up your hands and decide such strategies don't make a difference, and another to walk away with the useful learning that if you want to expand your audience, you need to be strategic and map out the next few audience segments you can reach and how you need to change your message (and possibly even your platform) to reach them.

Also, keep in mind that people have to hear a message over and over and over and over before they take note. This again is true whether you're marketing a commercial product or a social cause. So every time they hear it it does generally make a difference. Not all storytelling projects are going to reach a tipping point, but collectively, they do usually add up to building a greater awareness. ...So again, yes, be strategic, try to be as smart as possible about how broad an audience you wish to reach, the timing and shape with which you deliver the message etc. But don't beat yourself up if one storytelling/marketing project doesn't tip an issue; most don't. Collectively, though, they still make a difference. And you, my friend, can help build the body of knowledge that helps us clarify exactly how that difference is made!

Michael, not Mike! I couldn't see your post when I was writing that response...

Hi Paula,

As for technology, can you get a better forum software installed like vBulletin board; this is one way to simplify posting here and keeping track of our post.

Once again about keeping storytelling simple. I heard a story about Alfred Hitchcock. He keeps a pad and pen besides his bed so he can put down ideas, in the middle of the night. This is what I do also.

Alfred was very excited in the morning when he woke up becuase he thought he had put down what he felt was a great idea at night. He forgot what was the idea he wrote down, but it would be a sensatioal idea. He picked up his pad and it was written "boy meets girl"; that was his brilliant idea.

Keep the theme simple and focused to get the story out there.

As for negative people who do the opposite for the environment, yes they exist. As you know, I am an artist and founder of the Thinkism Art Movement.

I had an art exhibition about Climate Change and the Extinction of Species. Somebody put grafitti on the explanation of my painting; the grafitti read "Climate Change is Bullshit"!

1. April 2008

Hi Paula,

From Katha we are happy to share with you our experience, spanning two decades.

The beginning Ms Geeta Dharmarajan, our Executive Director, twenty years ago went to one of New Delhi's new slums and started teaching children there with stories. Soon some volunteers joined. Municipal Corporation of Delhi allotted a piece of land to construct a building. Donors came in and gave grants. A formal society was registered as a Non profit. Geeta was also interested in developing the story as a medium of cross cultural linkage in a heterogenic Indian society with multiplicity of languages, cultures, traditions, and of cource heritage. A typical short story in the native language would convey the authentic flavour touching all mentioned above. She used the story as a medium of communicating with the underprivilged child, ravaged by malnutrition, and all types of ills common to the lowest strata of sciety. She felt that with proper education a child can grow up to be a responsive and responsible adult - the future citizen. The state spent and spends a lot of money constructing schools in cities to educate the burgeoning child population swelling every day, due to constant influx of migration from rural to urban areas like New Delhi.However the childern do not attend due to various reasons or do not get enough time and quality attention to help them study. Many of their parents force them to work in occupations like household help, restaurant server, restaurant help in washing dishes, as cycle, scooter/car mechanics in surrounding residential and commercial areas. Katha school accordingly offered tutorials in staggered batches to such children in the 0-17 agre group. It is also affiliated with National Open School to conduct Board exams and teach their curriculum.

Katha today: Katha, set up in 1988 and formally registered on September 8, 1989, is a “profit for all” non profit organization that keeps itself in the tradition of storytelling. We work in the areas of education, publishing and community development. Katha has developed solutions for poverty alleviation through development of creativity in children, burdened by problems of poverty, enabling them to create a sustainable future for themselves as future citizens. Katha understands the needs of the mother as well and has set up income generation programmes, which has turned the women into successful entrepreneurs who earn more than 100 times what they used to, when the programme started!

Features of a Katha school A special curriculum and syllabus; a story pedagogy patented to Katha. A way of classroom learning that we call Vidduniya has brought students of 0-17 ages, who stay with us till school leaving certificate exams. Performance, Attendance, Retention [PAR at Katha] has all crossed 92%, putting our children on par with the world!

Many of them are college graduates, supporting their families in ways they could never have dreamt of!

Katha’s Educational Model and Philosophy: Katha’s model brings the community into classrooms, encouraging students to work cooperatively so as to become contributing members of their families and communities; responsible, responsive citizens. Our students learn traditional and non traditional subjects like genetics and nano technology, often through what is relevant to their present and future lives. Katha believes that if children are to be happy in school, they need a driver that they can make sense of and from which their families and communities can benefit.

Katha schools in remote, rural areas The Katha-Lisu schools benefit marginalised Lisu community that in lives in remote villages of Arunachal Pradesh. The Katha-Lisu schools at Gandhigram, 38 mile settlement (Ngwazakha), Hazulu village, Sidikhu village, benefit 245 children.

External Evaluation results, 2007 Educational Initiatives which conducted the SLIM 2006 study in five metro cities among 142 top schools did an external evaluation in Kathashala on 100 randomly picked students, 50 in class 4 and 50 in class 6. They say: The overall performance in Maths is very good, with students in class 4 scoring 96.9% and class 6 students scoring 94.9%.In language, class 4 students scored 87% and class 6 students scored 82%.The quality of writing far exceeds what we find in municipal schools and seems comparable to what we find in private schools. An examination of answer scripts showed that our children have performed very well in dictation tests.84% to 100% students got these class works correct and were able to write words and sentences without making a single spelling mistake in language paper in class4. In Maths, students seem to be able to handle questions that municipal school children usually find difficult.

Eradicating Poverty Katha addresses many types of hunger and poverty. Katha believes that the poverty of creativity and compassion, of culture and family bonds are as bad as economic poverty. The C9s, a special idea at Katha since 1993,, brings our teachers and children out of the many perceived poverties. The Me/We Ideology works in tandem, with the invisible curriculum for LIFE for a greater impact.

Katha addresses the poverty of creativity that assails us, through education and whole city/community initiatives and through student activism that is centred in our schools – The Kathashala at Govindpuri. The 10 Katha Swarnashalas or Community schools. The 20 pavement schools, serviced by the 3 Schools on Wheels (mini buses). And the 22 slum clusters where we take our Books on Wheels, Workshops on Wheels.

Katha believes in quality education as a powerful strategy for poverty alleviation. When children are schooling, their mothers listen to them. And communication – child to child, as well as child to family and community – are ideas that have powered Katha’s work since the beginning.

This has made us take the 2010 Challenge that "No Child who has ever been in touch with Katha will ever live in poverty again." Katha believes that children can help their communities get out of poverty. Hence by building such children into future citizens with set of positive values built in, using stories as medium of communication, Katha enables every one to profit.

Katha’s LIFE knowledge emphasizes: Literacy to lifelong learning, Income-generation, Family well being, Empowerment. To achieve LIFE education for all, in Katha we work through the 9C values and skill set: Curiosity – Creativity – Critical Thinking – Competence – Confidence – Commitment – Concern – Cooperation – Citizenship.

Katha’s success with underprivileged children in Delhi slums has led to partnerships with Delhi government to extend the joy of reading to 2.4 million children, 60,000 teachers and 3,000 librarians over the next four years. I LOVE READING CAMPAIGN links across the many divides of India – the social, economic, cultural and gender and to make living, a process of seeing and knowing.

International recognition achieved: Our educational initiatives have received international recognition and received the following four awards:

• The Social Enterprise Laboratory award by Digital Partners. The Stockholm Challenge Award 2002 finalist. Tech laureate for the year 2002, the “NASDAQ Stock Market Education Award” 2002 from the Tech Museum of innovation * Global Junior Challenge 2002 – Global Youth Incubator Award.

Tracking Tools for Bringing our Children on PAR with the World! PAR stands for Performance – Attendance – Retention. Student academic performance and retention are important. However in Katha, tracking does not judge children in competitive ways; nor push them into undesirable competition. The tests are continuous, sensitive to the needs of children. So, we encourage our teachers to ask – Is the learning relevant, remembrable? How can we improve pedagogy and classroom practices, so the child benefits?

Publication Division Our publishing division focuses on quality English translations of writings from 21 Indian languages, including some oral languages, and work closely with 300 writers from various bhashas. Our non-fiction titles culture-link people and ideas in a pluralistic milieu by facilitating critical understanding of various facets of culture, life and literature. Katha has published over a hundred books, including novels, short stories collections, poetry, screenplays, biographies, and travel literature. Latest additions include a film appreciation club.

Ten percent of the proceeds from all book sales go towards supporting our education division.

To inculcate the reading habit, Katha collaborates for international partnerships with financial support for specific programmes.

Some possibilities:

• Add Katha books as prescribed text books in English language and other departments such as culture, foreign languages, India.
• Story reading sessions among children of Indian origin as well as of local communities, to create awareness among them of the rich repertoire of Indian culture through the powerful medium of story.
• Publish fiction by Indian origin authors living abroad. Here again Katha offers its successful expertise of three decades to applaud quality fiction by organising competitive selection of the best.
• Launch a book series using the backdrop of the experience and the living conditions of the Indian Diaspora in different countries. Titles can be brought out in fiction, short fiction, novellas, travelogues, anecdotes and biographies.
• Katha can help bridge the geographical and cultural divide between the global citizens of the future: Children in India and among the Diasporas by making use of the story to show case the life and times of Indian children living abroad and in India. Here again the story can help bridge the economic divide - the living conditions of children of underprivileged/ middle class/affluent families in India and abroad and their experience. The story helps to understand different perspectives.

Distribution of Katha Books Katha is looking for region wise stockists for the global market, who can invest and physically stock Katha's publications and actively market through book shops, E-Commerce web sites. Katha is building up its web site to facilitate direct marketing. Given the fact that quality publishing offers slim margins, we also welcome partnerships as a non profit venture but sustainable on such margins as possible. The benefits would be the "profit for all" motive which has enabled Katha to grow organically and attain standards of excellence!

Collaborative publishing: Katha has actively collaborated with several reputed publishers and with our expertise in translations; we help widen the audience to quality fiction and children’s books.

Contributions for our educational projects: Katha is authorised to accept contributions as donations in foreign currency under FCRA regulations of Government of India and is also recognised as a non profit qualifying for benefits to the donor, under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act.

David, many thanks for the reminders on keeping stories simple and accessible. Katha, many thanks for posting information about the good work your organization is doing. Great to read about.

And to all, thanks for a very thought-provoking conversation and, keep up your good work, respectively!!

Paula - please take a look at www.Journeysinfilm.org. We develop Middle School curriculum based on Foreign language feature films with storylines that draw the students into wanting to learn more about the culture. We sell the guides to educators and also charge for Teacher Training/ Professional Development Workshops.

This is a wonderful topic of discussion and one I am passionate about.

In order for a public awareness/education project to be successful and sustainable, I believe the following needs to occur:

1) Attach for profit products to the social awareness issues, where a percentage of the profits goes towards specific causes a,b, or c. 2) I also feel there should be social sustainability consultants in place to educate the Corporate Responsibilities Departments through what specific causes their shareholders are drawn towards. The consultants will assist in creating an entire strategy plan to help alleviate the social issue(s), along with how they will measure impact. Deloitte and Touche has done a fine job with this. For example, Deloitte and Touche has partnered with the organization I work with called College Summit www.collegesummit.org in all of our 9+ regions, and is providing us a tremendous amount of resources in such areas as: professional services for pro-bono, skills based volunteerism, and funding. Deloitte also funded a documentary to create awareness for both our companies and programs, and as we move forward, we will work together with our PR expertise to help pitch the media and press on the work our organizations are doing together to increase college enrollment amongst low income communities. College Summit and Deloitte and Touche is a prime example of how the Corporate and Social Enterprise Unions can work together to create systematic change through the use of strategic storytelling. 3) With this strategic partnership there should also be a collaborative effort with a Global PR Firm and the Marketing departments of the NGO, Corporation and solid Media Contacts with the major networks. With enough PR expertise, and brilliant marketing talent behind a well thought through campaign, I believe a tipping point in public awareness, inspiration, acceptance and change is highly possible. 4) A corporation that believes in or is sold on a cause/social issue as well as the use of film, advanced media, or music/docu-clips as a method to educate, inspire and create systematic change is apt to make an investment to create the messaging. The larger corporations could potentially start a Corporate Responsibility Program that includes outsourcing to smaller production companies to create low-mid budget documentaries, short films and even feature films where there is social cause highlighted. Thus making this apart of the business model. 5) As a follow-up it is necessary to create technology tools to measure each showing, download or click. Attach a survey to each link or viewing- if online. Configure a method for text massagers’ to answer survey questions immediately after watching a film for example. Each time a ticket is purchased a person has an option to answer a survey right after the film through text. Test your audience for knowledge about the docu-mercial, film, documentary, short film, etc. Create a contest and as a result of filling out the survey form, this could yield positive outcomes like providing: A microloan, a waterpump, a scholarship, thus right there and then, the audience or participants can feel good about educating themselves and answering the survey questions that yields positive outcomes! Some may be further inspired by the process to investigate, change jobs, start up a CRP in their company, volunteer, donate, start a social business, go abroad, etc.

My story of change started a few years ago while working for a very large successful Japanese Corporation, I was soaring within my 8 year technology career and was fully immersed in it. However, deep down below in my gut, I always felt that I could use my talents and skills to create double bottom line result that had positive social outcomes. However, at the time, I was too comfortable and as silly as it may sound too scared to cross over. Eventually, the universe conspired, the stars started to align and they wouldn’t have it any other way. It all started from listening to stories about social entreprenuers on NPR, which lead to reading more information online, and in the news, then reading books pertaining to social issues, watching more documentaries and films regarding causes. Eventually I was very inspired, but my career turned into a job, like the way the carriage in Cinderella story turned into a pumpkin patch, and it was rather fascinating how the events at the time had a domino affect. So, the job became intolerable, and thus began my journey of internal change, which lead to external change. Now I feel like I am steering a jet that will propel not only those we help but also my peers to live more fruitful and happier lives through achieving dreams we once thought were impossible. Those students we help have said, “College Summit, helped me find myself and when I’m done with school I want to give back.” Wow, now that’s powerful! If we can capture that in a story that’s inspiring, and one that we can share with potential funders, I think it would help us serve more students and create sustainable change at a faster rate.

Great discussion. I am currently printing the word copy I made of this discussion since there is so much information here valuable to me. My theory is that social enterprise and voluntary action can build as a tradition through the use of digital storytelling, documentary filmmaking and journalism as an tools of exploration, empowerment and recognition of active participants therein, especially young participants. What I guess is rapidly turning into a PhD mission for me is to research the subject through a SCAN analysis of the latter utilizing the former. My work is, at best, in it's infantile stages but I feel very positive about it. I believe that, because of the research facet regarding of the impact of the work on youth and their continuing service, that it will be easier to attract funding and it will get the same done in terms of increasing the level of public awareness of any of a number of given subject matters. My idea is similar to the show "New Heroes" on PBS only on slightly different level. Thanks for all the information from all of you that participated in this discussion, I'm going to go read it now!

In Africa, storytelling is the first literature, and there are many examples (category 3) to share:

I was involved in a digital storytelling development experience, run by APC and Women's Net www.apc.org / http://www.takebackthetech.net/ in 2007.

WENT Africa digital storytelling workshop was hosted in Durban, South Africa from 25-29 August 2007. Organised and facilitated by APC-Africa-Women in partnership with Women'sNet, thirteen women spent 5 days sharing, planning, developing, and making their digital stories on their experiences or their witness to violence against women.

We developed our stories into digital and permanent versions using digital cameras and Adobe premier and photoshop.

Go and see what happends when we make our stories.