Story-Modeling™
not creative writing — is how you tell Useful Stories.
Your story doesn’t work because it’s not a novel — it’s a Story-Model™.
Most stories that we read are written for the enjoyment of reading — especially the novel. We love the feeling of being transported to another world and experiencing something we could never experience in our own lives; our brains love novelty.
Other stories are told to be useful: to create a better understanding of something in the real world, to predict a future or inspire action. We enjoy these stories too — not because they offer a novel experience, but because we love to discover new possibilities and imagine possible futures.
These useful stories are Story-Models™.
A Story-Model™ is a model created to better understand something about the real world.
When a story is a model its success is measured by its usefulness, not the enjoyment experienced by its readers. One example is Stories About What We Do: the stories we tell about our work when we are fundraising, hiring, building awareness or aligning the team.
When a story is a model its success is measured by its usefulness, not the enjoyment experienced by its readers. If your story doesn’t work — it’s not useful.
Story-Modeling™ produces stories that work using a modeling process to build a useful model — not literary techniques that produce a novel.
How does it work?
Story-Modeling™ is a method that uses a scientific modeling process to build a useful model — and narrative theory for representation.
Evaluate your current model. What works about the current story you’re telling? What isn’t working?
Update the model. What adjustments increase the usefulness of the story?
Represent the updated model. You’re representing your own experience, so the more you sound like yourself the more effective your representation will be.
Validate your new model. If the new model is more useful, your audience will react differently.
This method focuses on how you decide what is included in your story — not on how you say it — and takes around 3-4 weeks.
FAQs
How can a story be a model?
Lots of things are models — a model is anything that represents something else, like a drawing that represents a place (map) or a spreadsheet that represents financial transactions (economic model).
A story that represents relationships between actions that took place in the real world is a model of what happened.
Every model is both a model — because that’s how it’s being used — and the thing being used for representation (e.g. a spreadsheet or a drawing). A story is both a piece of literature and a model of events.
Isn’t this just writing creative nonfiction?
No. Creative nonfiction is a literary genre defined as real events written in a creative style: creative nonfiction does not need to be useful.
Story-Models™ can fit within other genres, including creative nonfiction, but many creative nonfiction stories would not be Story-Models™.
Is this strategic storytelling?
No.
Strategic storytelling is about telling stories (vs other types of communication) as part of an organizational strategy, such as a PR strategy or a campaign strategy. Strategic storytelling is successful when the strategy succeeds.
Story-Modeling™ is a method to creating stories that work and is successful when you’ve created a story that is useful.
Why haven’t I heard of this before?
Storytelling became an important professional communication skill after Web 2.0 made it easier to publish and distribute stories, giving rise to the “story economy”. Over time, Stories About What We Do emerged as a distinct type of story found across the internet, however most education or coaching in storytelling is designed for professional writers — novelists or screenwriters.
Story-Modeling™ approaches storytelling from the post-Web 2.0 focus on telling useful stories.