The use of stories in Directive Communication training
(by: Nick NG)
( DC practitioner )

Introduction

Good stories have a way of capturing the attention of an audience. Interesting stories will stick in the minds of listeners for a long time. Ordinary stories are not worth remembering and can switch listeners off. The quality of story-telling can make the difference between a normal training session and a memorable training session. The use of Directive Communication concepts in telling stories will enhance the any training session.

The use of postures in story-telling will ‘flesh out' the story by giving it variety, character and pace. Consider this story below:

I used to travel a lot and one of the places I traveled to for business was Surabaya in east Java. Being away from home a lot of the time, I preferred not to stay on at any location once my business transaction was completed. There was this one time when I had checked in at Surabaya Airport and was looking forward to getting on to the plane. Surabaya Airport is small and you can see the planes on the tarmac from the international departure lounge, which is on ground level. I was happy to see that my MH flight had arrived and the ground crew was busy getting the plane ready for the flight to KL. After watching the ground crew clear the area, I was expecting the announcement to board. But nothing happened for what seemed a long time. I asked the people on duty and they said the flight was delayed but gave no further details. This is quite normal. However, when I saw the maintenance crew gathering around the plane and inspecting the wheels, I figured something was not right. By now, those of us who asked for information were informed that there was a technical problem. I figured this ‘technical' problem was not going to go away any time soon. I went to the check-in counters to see if I could catch another MH flight. I was told mine was the last for that day. I tried Garuda which has a code share with MH. The flight was not open yet.

I tried SQ so that I could get to Singapore , then catch a shuttle flight to KL. The SQ flight was full. No amount of persuasion or ranting could get me a seat. I got back to the departure lounge to plan my next move. In the meantime, we were informed that a replacement plane was on the way but it would take two hours to reach us. I had to amuse myself by watching people repair the plane's wheels. When we finally got on the replacement plane, I made my unhappiness known to all the flight attendants. They were either apologetic or gave no response. When we arrived at KLIA and I was getting off the plane, I made it a point to express my opinion to the chief flight attendant. His reply to me was that at least we arrived home safely. His reply took me by surprise because it was valid, made sense and it shut me up.

Telling the story the way it was written above will hardly capture anyone's attention. However, using different postures like the Warrior, the Child and the Lover to illustrate my interactions with the various ground and ticketing staff and flight crew will make the story lively. My attempts at pleading and persuasion to secure another flight out of Surabaya would illustrate the Lover Posture. I would adopt the Child Posture while looking at the maintenance crew change the tires or repair the wheels or fix the landing gear. The Warrior Posture would be my stance towards the innocent flight attendants. In this particular story, the Warrior Posture either was not effective or met its match when faced with the Emperor Posture towards the end.

There is a moral to the story in the last two sentences. It could be something along the lines of ‘better safe than sorry'. Or we can use the story to illustrate the DC concept of Circle of Tolerance. Now, the story becomes a teaching tool plus it illustrates Postures. The story is a personal account of learning to increase my Circle of Tolerance. The final sentence of the story can be expanded to illustrate the point. When the story sticks in peoples' minds and they associate it with an actual example of Circle of Tolerance, the training has been imparted.

The same storyline above can also be used to teach the concept of emotional drivers. It can also be used to teach the concept of the colored brain.

To impart training on emotional drivers, the audience will have to identify with the ticketing staff, the ground crew and the flight attendants. These people have their top three emotional drivers for that particular day. I know what my top three emotional drivers were on that day and finite needs were being sucked away from them. The involvement of the audience for this story will make the lesson stick.

Training on the colored brain using the same story will also involve the audience. The audience takes on the roles of the ticketing staff, ground crew and flight attendants based on their actual brain processing color. In order for me to succeed on that particular day, I would have to illustrate how I should have interacted with them on that day based on my brain color as well as each individual's brain color. As the story stands, I had my red glasses on and I assumed everyone else was wearing red glasses.

Contributed by Nick NG
( DC Trainer )