Presented by WWCode Hyderabad Speakers: Shalini Chaudhari, Delivery Head and VP - Infosys Business storytelling is a powerful means to get your message across in an effective and authentic way. It also ensures your audience remembers it long after the presentation.
Who Should attend? Anyone who needs to engage with and present to an audience. No prior preparation is needed, just be ready to share and learn.
About The Speaker: Shalini Chaudhari is an experienced business leader, STEM evangelist, and a storyteller. Shalini is currently an AVP and delivery head at Infosys. She leads business strategy, consulting and a delivery portfolio for Infosys Validation Solutions. She is involved in organisation level initiatives on diversity, leadership development and building culture for future.
Shalini has 24 years’ experience in IT industry and has worked extensively with offerings and solutions in Automation, Digital Architecture and technologies, Cloud and Transformation. Shalini has deep expertise in Testing and Quality Engineering covering Service offering design, Sales, Solution design, Innovation and Practice building.
Shalini is passionate about investing in and promoting Leadership Development, Diversity and Life skills learning. Shalini was a leadership development coach and led many diversity initiatives at Accenture. She is currently an active volunteer at AnitaB.org and is also associated with Timeless Lifeskills to facilitate learning of topics related to STEM and life skills for children in rural India.
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Okay team. Welcome everyone to the session today. And today we are going to talk about business storytelling, how to engage audience and win them over with our Speaker, Shalini Jordan. And this has been conducted by women who quote Hyderabad Chapter. Business storytelling is a powerful means to get your message across in an effective and authentic way. It also ensures your audience remembers it long after the presentation. About Shalini, our speaker today. She's an experienced business leader, Stan, evangelist and a storyteller. Shalini is currently an AVP and delivery head at Infosec. She leads the business strategy consulting and the delivery portfolio for Info validation solutions. She's involved in organizational level initiatives on diversity, leadership development and building culture for future. Charlene has 24 years experience in It industry and has worked with various offerings and solutions in automation, digital architecture and technologies, cloud and transformation. A lot more to say about Shalini, but let me get started with our event today. So I will project my screen and get started. Shalini, welcome to the session today. Thanks a lot, Rainy. It's a pleasure to be here. Wonderful. So I will just briefly talk about first about the Women Who Put and especially Heather about Chapter, our accomplishments very, very quickly and then move on to our topic today. So as I introduced, Shalini will be covering business storytelling today. She's an AVP and delivery head with inputs coming to our agenda. Just brief about women who called. Our mission is to inspire women to excel in technology careers. Our vision is a world where diverse women are better represented as engineers and technology leaders. We are a community, very inclusive and we do not tolerate any kind of discrimination or harassment. Any in full version of our code of conduct can be found on the site. Anyone can be part of the community. You can sign up to Women Who Code the way you entered in the event today. So sign up on Womenreport.com, choose the network as Heatherabad and you can see all the events. So you can see another upcoming event for which we have campaign very soon with Sanghita Kumar on March 10, she's from bank of America and today we are having Shelaney Jose. So you can on our portal also see on the past events and I'll talk about what all we did very quickly. So various tracks and communities of Women Who Code. You can see six key tracks, front end mobile, Python, blockchain, cloud and data science and 88 chapters across the world. We do various tech talks, workshops, tutorials, training, livestream events, technical studies, interactive sessions, panel files like chats, networking opportunities, product demos and so much more. So let me talk about some of the things we did last year. So Bmware is the founder sponsor of Women Who Code in India and they run the chapter in Bangladesh. And you can see Nirman conference and some of this can be you can just Google and find details all the resources of Women Who Code are available on the Women Who Code.com. We completed a global virtual event, Connect Reimagine on June 10 11th, November 19, and another 1, June 10 to 11th. So these are the events happening virtually with participants from across the globe. And this was the Connect Reimagine event, Women Who quote connecting the event in which I was one of the keynote as well. Then just quickly talking about what are the key three tracks that we have taken on for Women Who Code. In Heatherbacher, we offer women technology leaders, role models, tech leader talks and opportunities regularly network. This is what we are doing today and we support mentor women and early technology careers. So here basically providing opportunities for scholarships, hackathons and internship related details for entry level careers. And third is getting women with career break back to work. So provide technical mentoring, hands on coding experience upscaling and proscaling. Women Report is over ten year old organization with ADH chapters across geographies in India. We started in April 2021 and we have a membership based Touching 1600. Already last year we carried out 77 events and large part of those events were to run the technology workshops for women who have taken a break to bring them back to work. We have three directors, myself, Sarsati and both of us from bank of America and Bonnie from Salesforce.com in 2021. Leaderboard Women Who Board had Chapter One major ranks in new member category. We were ranked six out of top ten, fastest growing number one, and most events in number nine. These are glimpses of some of the mid senior technology track events and all of our events are available on cloud on a YouTube channel of Women Who Code. And these were the events for Early Career Track. And these are the emerging careers that we showcased. So you can see Jenna from talking ask me anything from Google and the way she spoken on computational biology. And same way here you can see a panel where it was for career guidance for the early careers on how to do remote remote internship. Rice is a program reboot invest scale and empower that we did for career returning program for women in technology. And here we took women anywhere from two to five year career break who wanted to return to her. We took about 40 women and finally graduated 18 of them. And seven of them have been able to find jobs with their own efforts after graduating from here. So that's briefly about some of our initiatives. So let me move on and to the topic. So we introduced storytelling is a very popular topic and we'll talk about it more. But what got you into it? Thanks for asking that question. Renew and my story of getting seriously into storytelling. And then it's coming up in 2018. January. I left Accenture and I wanted to take a break and I wanted to say to myself define yourself. Who is it that you are? And that took me back this memory Lane, as you see it on the slide right now, the first picture is my dad holding me up. And I know I used to tell stories, and I wanted to be a person who could fly because I wanted to see far away lands and I would make up stories. So when I was trying to discover myself, I realized that I am a storyteller, and I've always been a storyteller as long as I can remember. So whether I was addressing a team or I was talking individually to a person or I was presenting on a conference, that picture that you see is London Stock Exchange. And I was talking about AI. I've always used storytelling as a means to convey my message. So I said, okay, fine, I do that individually. But am I also able to bring it to my teams? So whether I was meeting with a team, which is cross cultural. So you have people from Japan, Philippines, Italy and Germany on that first picture. And that was my team that I was coaching or whether I was selling a deal or whether I was meeting a client, the bottom picture is a client meet at the Pier in Naples. I realized that I've been able to successfully do that, mentoring, that coaching, selling a deal on meeting a client because I've been able to effectively translate my childhood storytelling into business storytelling. So in last few years, I have really utilized that strength of mine. So whether I'm volunteering with Anita B, which is another organization that really promotes women in technology, that's the top picture, or whether I am traveling to Tamil Nadu and meeting up with rural children underserved children. And that was a class of 60 children from a remote school 75 km outside of Europe. And we were talking about storytelling, telling, and communications or whether I do my bit. And that last picture is actually doing a business storytelling session three years back on Women's Day. I have utilized this strength of mine and applied that. And that's how I know there is a storyteller in me from that little black skirted few year old girl to the woman that I am today. Wonderful. Such as instead of introducing yourself with those text words, this is how I could have introduced you. So I see the point in storytelling. So what pulled you into storytelling is one part. Let's go talk a bit more on what's the need for it. It's very interesting because sometimes we forget where the roots of storytelling are. So I want to show you that. And I've built this light with some animation. Don't click anything more right now, Rachel. So let's stay here. What I've done is I've sort of created a timeline. And the reason I'm saying this is because the need for storytelling is very inherent. It arises because we've been using stories to communicate our message. And on your screen you will see multiple examples of that. The corner most one on the left side is a cave painting. And it's actually, coincidentally one of the oldest cave paintings we have on the planet. And it is in my hometown, Hopa. So two years back when I visited, I wanted to make sure that I go and check it out. And that's a picture that I've taken now from that case painting to Hieroglyphs, that's the bottom one to the verbal story is that we have told over many thousands of years to paintings that happened a few thousand years later than that, books, films and television. Right. I know we have a very small group. I want all of okay, we have the answer. It's okay. Let's get the answers out. I wanted to ask you if you can take a guess how old that painting is. That cave painting. She flashed the answers, but I don't know if the audience got it. Any guesses. Please unmute yourself. We are a very small group. I will be happy to keep it interactive. How old do you think that cave painting is, anybody? Well, at least take a guess. Whether it's hundreds of years old or thousands of years old. Renew, what do you call thousands? It's thousands of years. That's correct. It is thousands of years. Now take a guess. So Yashi, how many thousand years? 2000 or 20,000? I guess 20,000. You're right. Actually, that's a 300 year old painting. It was a cave painting that one generation was trying to tell the next generation by the means of that story that there is a big wild boar. And if you don't avoid it, it can possibly kill you. So our earliest stories were about security. They were about sending a message across generations. And now, of course, we use stories each day, every day. I'm sure in these times in past two years, all of you have binged watch so many series on Netflix, all of you have picked up so many stories from around you, some sad stories as we've gone through difficult times. And that is why we need stories, Reynold. We need stories to pass on messages. We need stories to share information. We need stories to connect with each other. We need stories to empathize. We need stories to feel like we belong. And that is the need of storytelling, because storytelling is much older than you or I and it dates way back to 300 years. So if you look at it, you will see the story of storytelling does not stop. It goes from 30,000 years to today. And I've just put in the age of each of those. If you just click Next Renew, you will get those number of years as well. So, Yeshi, you were right. It's 20,000 years or more. And I would have asked you, how old is television? And sometimes we think it's 200 years old because we've seen television all our lives. That's why we need stories, Reynold, because they allow us to be ourselves and connect to everybody around us. Okay. Thank you so much, Charlie. You said stories you need, but why in business? So it's a very interesting point. And when I started researching about it, I realized that there are six reasons why we need stories in business. We need stories in business because one, it's the oldest method of communication. And we've seen that. I just talked about it. Right. Greek dramas were happening in 700 BC, which is like almost 3000 years ago. And they were using stories to communicate stories of war. And if you remember some of those Greek structures that you would see in paint things or postcards or maybe some of you have gone to Greece, you will see those big Amphi theaters. So they didn't have television, they didn't have video recording and stuff like that. But they were using stories and drama to communicate the wars. In fact, they even had so many things that were about real life. The second reason that you need stories in business is because each person that you meet now, whether they are from Japan or India, whether they follow one religion or the other, if you ask them, each person would have a childhood memory of a story being told. So we associate stories very deeply in our heart with a very warm feeling. And that's why it's a great way to get attention. Now, the remaining four reasons are very scientific because I know in terms of people on this call, they are probably also looking for scientific reasons. So the sinking brain pattern, this was an experiment. And I'm going to use my notes to make sure I give you the right piece of information. So Uri Harrington and he conducted this experiment in a Princeton lab and where he got a master storyteller called Jim O'Grady. And he put a few people under scanners and he put Jim also under scanner. And initially, when they were just lying there, everybody's brain pattern was different. And then Jim started telling a story. And as Jim progressed with his story, everybody was listening to it. Their brain pattern starts sinking. Now, imagine if you're presenting something and you were asking your boss for that little piece of funding that you need for your next initiative. And your boss had five other peers. And if you start asking just for money, they might all have different questions or reasons. But if you ask that money using a story, you can imagine that their brain patterns are sinking and they would start collectively thinking about saying yes to you. So it has been proven that brain pattern starts thinking when we start listening to a story. Now, neuron mirroring is another similar thing. So, you know, this morning when I woke up, my apartment faces east. So there was this nice bright Orange light. The sun was coming up and I was making my tea and I typically drink flavored green tea. So today I decided to drink ginger tea and the aroma of ginger was really nice and it just woke me up. You know what just happened? I am sure all of you in some form or fashion have either smelt ginger or thought about ginger or thought about Orange color or thought about a tea cup depending on your experiences. And that's what stories do. So if I was trying to sell you a good ginger tea to tell you this story will make you think about ginger or tea. And that's what happens. My neuron that's firing in my mind is firing in your mind as well. And that's what is called neuron mirror. And this was done by a bunch of Italian scientists and that's what stories do. The fifth one is chemical reminders. So what happens is that happy day. Think of your last birthday. I'm sure you will remember where you went and what you ate and what you wore. But you might forget what you wore on January just this year few days back. And the reason is that when you have a happy memory, there is additional dopamine that gets released in your system. And that extra chemical almost serves as a posted note to make you remember that. So now again, imagine you're addressing your team and you are asking all of them to come to office. If you just ask them, it will be a forceful thing. But if you remind them of that nice conversation on the water cooler or the cup of tea that they always had at 03:00 P.m. With their friends, they will remember that association. And because they remember and it is a happy memory and there is a chemical reminder to it, you will be able to get your message across. And the final one. And I'm sure you've all heard this. Right side brain. Left side brain. A story brain is a brain that has been proven scientifically is more energized than when you present just hard data. So I rest my case. Reno this is why we need stories in business because it allows you to communicate your message. It is something that's global and brings people together. If you are able to tell the right kind of story, somebody will have a chemical reminder. They will associate with it. They are listening to your message. And a story brain is bigger than just data brain. So those are the reasons why we need it in business. Something as simple as a story can make you a more effective presenter and enable you to connect with your audience. Great examples, great examples. Shalini I was just thinking, how about without any sensitive data, how about narrating a business situation where story helped you make or break your case? I will tell you a story actually, or a scenario. This is when I was at Accenture and I was part of a leadership development program and we were all in Chicago and we were all staying at Hilton. And when I got to my room, I got this little envelope, the way they slide it under the door, and it was a special invite to meet the CEO and not just me. I think they were doing something special for women leaders. So I realized that even before our training, our leadership development program began, we had this invite to meet the CEO for breakfast. As you would imagine, all of us wanted to meet him and meet him individually. And when we went to that room, we were about 60 women, and we had our name Ten, and we had to go sit on the specific tables and our CEO's name Ten for somewhere else. I was also thinking, how do I get to meet him and how do I get to get meeting with him? Well, throughout the breakfast, I didn't get to talk to him. And as we all got up and we started walking out, I suddenly realized he was next to me. And he turned around and he said, Hi, I don't think I visited your table. Who are you? And you are kind of his talk. Now. I had a split second decision to make. I could have started by I'm Shalomi Joshua. I'm from Hyderabad, India. I worked at Accenture for so many years, and by that time, we would have walked to the elevator and it would all be gone. I mean, of course, this is Hindsight. So I decided to tell him a story and see, this is where a business story comes in. I said, Hi, Pierre. I'm Shalomi, and I work out of her India office. And three days back, I met our clients on XYZ and I gave him the name of the client. I said, they were asking me how can they solve their problem on automation? And I told them about these automation frameworks that we have and that will cut their costs by 39% in just one month. So he said, oh, really? How cool is that? So when did this happen? I said, Three days back, the client was XYZ, and we are going to get a $20 million deal based on that description. Have you seen that asset that we have? And he said, I don't think so. I said, here, when are you in India? Next, I would like to show it to you. And he turned around to his EA and he said, why don't you take the lady's email and let's make sure that when we are in India next, we go meet her and see this great tool that she's talking about. And guess what? Renew because of that business story about that client, about that 39% benefit, about the particular tool that I have. When Pierre did come to India, I did get to present that tool to him. He kept his promise. And not only did I get that deal, but I got to meet individually the CEO of my company. And it was a great day. That's so wonderful. Really like that story. Thank you so much, Shalini. Let's move on. And you just built a story, right? You did have a choice whether to introduce in a traditional manner or to convey a story. You build a story on your feet, really? Right in front of peer and not in front of me, because in front of me, that story already exists. Right. So how do we step by step, build a story? I know sometimes we are given very fraction of seconds to craft a story on our feet. So how do you build a story? So I want to say two things to that. One, I would suggest this to people that please don't think that you are an introvert. So you can't build a story. Everybody can build a story. I really believe that each one of us has it in us to build a story. We have to just find the right type of story, and we have to have the right ingredients, just like a good dish. And these are those three ever been components. Remember I was telling you Greeks used drama almost 3000 years back to convey these stories. Well, Aristotle came up with this specific dimensions of a good story. And I want to share that with you because these are the three components. Ethos means credibility. It's ethics. It's your credibility today. Why do you want to hear from me about storytelling? I built my credibility by telling you. I've been telling stories right from your childhood, and I've used it in a certain way. There is a component of building credibility. The second component of a good story is low cost or logic. All of us are logical people. And that's why I'm saying data driven stories are the best stories. You give a logic. You build a story based on hard facts and how these things progress. In my previous story, I told you about the breakfast breakfast. I told you where I was. I built a logic that I wanted to meet Pierre, but I did not know how to. And that is where the logic of my story came into play. So if you have to think about what will appeal to your audience. I had to decide, right? I had stories about my luggage being lost. I had stories about a travel. But in that business situation for the CEO of a company, what logical element would he like? What data point would he like is what I thought about. And finally, and one of the most important ingredients of a story is path horse, which is care and empathy and feeling. If a person who's listening to your story thinks that you're not passionate about what you're talking or you're not authentic, they will turn off no matter how much credibility you have, no matter how much data you have. So these are the three evergreen components and my only suggestion is decide the percentage of each component in your story based on your audience. So if you're talking to your team and again the previous example, you want them to come to work, but it's not mandatory. Maybe you want to talk more about path, maybe you want to have more emotion and less data. But if you are presenting at a conference like I was at the London Stock Exchange on AI there, while they wanted to see my passion, they also wanted to hear content and how much information I had. Could I distinguish between deep learning and machine learning? Did I know the difference between training data and testing data? Do I know what AI means and what are the different things you can use AI for? So a lot of logic was needed and 80% of my stories there were heavy on logic. And then same thing. If you're going to a board, you might have a more of a credibility building. You have to establish yourself before you make a presentation to a board. So what I'm saying is these are my three evergreen components. But how much you mix in with story can always keep changing based on your audience and based on the situation. Does that help? Right? Yeah. Am just thinking that in this case of you're dealing with that CEO on spot like elevator conversation. So what was it? How would you define percentages of these three elements in your story there? I think it was a lot of logos because I had no credibility with him and it was very short time for me to establish credibility. In fact my credibility was the fact that I was invited to that breakfast and he knew I was one of these 60 women who are successful. So my story had to be both on the lower two elements. And that's why I chose a client story. I chose a story about meeting a client, selling a deal, creating client value and also a passion of my side. And that's when I said this is a great tool that helped me sell this deal. Would you like to come and see it? So I use the locals. The thing that the logic, the data that he would like and path was in my passion that I do get a second meeting with him. So in that story I think I would say credibility of 10% was already there. I utilize 50 50 between logos and passwords. So I'm just thinking aloud. Shalini at one time before the CEO knocked at you and saying hey, hello. And he was wanting to be nice to you, striking conversation and not appeared rude. But on your hand, on your side, you are literally worrying how to get this half a minute with this guy. Can I shake hands, say hello. And you were thinking stories but you didn't crack story at that time, right? So when you were telling how you would get time with them. I was thinking maybe you could have just flicked that name plate and somebody must have come to you. I was just being funny. So the point I'm making is suppose he had not come to you, saying hello, how you could have still fetched attention. And so, Reynold, I would just take myself out of this specific scenario. You're absolutely right. Now, had he not come to me or had I not bumped into him, had we not been walking out together, he was there for the whole day. Now, if I was really interested and bent upon meeting him, I should have walked over to him. I could have walked over to him because this is one story. But there are places where I have walked over to senior leadership and I have seen people walking over to me. So it's not just a one way thing. I have seen people walking to me. I have seen people engaging in a conversation and just starting to introduce yourself or tell us story. And sometimes what I would say is you have to look for these opportunities and that's where your fear factor comes in. If you are confident that you can tell a good business story, if you're confident that you are able to get that person's attention, then half the battle is won. Because then all you have to do is walk over to them. So I am certain that I wanted to make sure that he sees that tool because my team and I were really proud of it and otherwise I would have never gotten on the CEO's agenda to come and see something. So I had made up my mind that in some form or fashion I'm going to try and say Hi to him. And the chance presented itself. So my suggestion to everybody would be keep some of these stories ready, these elevator pictures about who you are, what you are passionate about. But also sometimes you do get a lot of time to prepare for a presentation and go somewhere. Keep this in mind that you might have a 30 minutes presentation. But if you pick any one of those elements and articulate that with a story that is much more powerful, take my example. I could have also done my introduction as what my resume or what my LinkedIn reads. But I decided to do my introduction in the form of a story. So in your interactions, you can decide which part of your business interaction you will translate or turn into a story. In my case, I was determined to meet him. I was sure I was going to try and catch him somewhere on a tea break or a coffee break or dinner and do this. But which story I would have used. Now it's a what if scenario. I don't know. I like your idea. Actually, Charlie, I was just thinking. The point you made about having stories ready, right. Is very important. Let me just extend that conversation. Suppose this guy knocks into you and you're caught unattended. You were literally not ready, and you didn't have a story then even the opportunity presented in front of you renders itself worthless. On the other hand, there are opportunities all around us, right? And many people are not good at using those opportunities. And they keep saying, I wish I had opportunities so and so got the opportunity. Right. But the fact is, opportunities are all around us, and some make the best of them and some don't. So I hope you agree with that. No, absolutely. And that's why I'm saying I almost tell people when I do the session in a broader audience, and we do an activity that build a repository of stories. And in fact, I would even say that it doesn't even have to be your story, because sometimes you think, well, I've just started my career. How can I have so many stories? You've been working for so many years. What I have felt is you can make someone else's story your own if you know their story, and if you are connected to them, you can talk about their story with the same amount of energy and same amount of passion. I'll give you an example. One of my favorite bands is YouTube, and I was reading about them, and I read a story about them. So they were performing in us, and they were performing a song that is all about rights for LGBTI community and different colored people and all of that. And they were performing in a place in a state and us, which is very conservative. So they got death threats before their performance. And the lead singer of you to Bono, he got a death thread. And so his manager and his producers asked him, do you want to cancel the show? And he said, no, I will sing, and I will go for it. And he went and he sang, and nothing happened. When he was observing the recording, when they were looking at the recording, they realized their lead guitarist, Edge, he was behaving rather weird. And when they said, what were you doing? You did not let the camera come on Bono at all. You realize that edge was actually all the time standing in front of Bono so that if somebody was going to hurt him or throw something at him or, God forbid, tried to shoot him, he was in front. And that's the kind of friendship that the band has. Those are the kind of people that they work with. And I was thinking, how many of us have those kinds of friendships that we would be ready to risk our lives? I just gave you an example of a story that's not mine, but I've read it, and I really like it. And I've wondered about that story in context of my teams. Now, I don't want my teams to take a bullet for me, but will they take an escalation for me if I want to take a two day break, will they take my tasks? And I think I have great teams who will do that. But I just gave you an example of having these stories ready to articulate your point. So build your story repository and don't hesitate to walk over and introduce yourself using the story and not just your years of experience and your title and where you work. Excellent point. Thanks Shalini. And I think yes, she has a question if you can. Yeah. As I am set to graduate, this may so my experience with senior leadership, like in my previous internship when offices were offline open, I remember walking up to the CIO of the company. That was like a very bold move for me because I was very unsure how that would turn out. So at times I do find myself taking up such bold steps and like walking up right up to the senior leadership director. But sometimes I do not. So I just wanted to know on what basis should I analyze the situation of? Is it good for me to right walk up to them and talk to them, introduce myself since I'm so very early in my career, I will be starting my first job this August. So now the offices are online. So now I find myself pinging them on Zoom. So few of them reply. However, some of them do not. But yeah, what would your advice be on this? I would say two things. Yashi. And the first one is you have to first ask yourself why they would talk to you. Okay, I have to say this. It's not about you being an intern or you coming into a new organization. I asked that question to myself after so many years of working and I'm sure Reynold does that too. So the idea is you have to first ask yourself, do you have something of value to offer to that person? And frankly, not just a senior person, a person who's your age and your peer group. So answer that question. And if the answer is yes, then that should be your first courage giving element. Anybody who you have a value add for would want to talk to you irrespective of your level and then who you are. And the second thing you have to also ask yourself or remember or decide is whether this is the right time, whether they will want to talk to you or not, because as you can imagine, people are busy and are you becoming a nuisance? So sometimes when you are reaching out to somebody, you don't know what their scenario is. So get a sense of what they are working on, what frame of mind they would be in. Because it's not just your value ad, it has to be offered at the right time. And that's why in terms of your example that you gave me and you're right online is very difficult because you Ping somebody and they might really be busy. Like right now while I'm doing this session. So many people have pinged me and they might think, oh my goodness, she's ignoring us. But I am sure when I go back to them and I'll tell them that I was in a video and I was doing a session, they will understand. So as a person who's asking to meet answer two questions. What is the value you can offer them and is this the right time? If the answer is yes to both of them, then make sure that you are prepared for that conversation. And whenever you get that chance, I'm sure you will shine. Does that help Yashi? Yeah, definitely. Thank you so much for answering this, Sharon. I would add a bit more whether the person is internal in my organization or external, or whether they have seen my face and know my name or not. And let's say if I'm trying to make my first move, the question I asked myself the same thing that you said, do I have my stories? Right. So how does one build story? What I do is generally I do a bit of research about the person. So first of all, am I interested in that person? What interest do I carry? What am I going to talk about? Suppose I get a nice meeting with the person. Am I going to have lunch or breakfast or whatever or a cup of coffee? What are the topics will I discuss? Is it the cricket or is it the kids or is it my last project or is it my passion and interests? What am I going to discuss? Do I have my stories and how do you align the stories? I need to know what this person likes, right. What they put on social media last what project they worked on last, what are the current priorities they are carrying? So I kind of study that person and literally you can say virtually date the person. So basically figure out what all this person wants and what will kind of create the hook. And then I see, oh, this person has put this post internally or externally and I comment on that. And just first of all, let my name be noticed. If this person is interested in something, then drop them a note. Look, I have this interest. I appreciated what you did and the project initiative you're working on. If my interest suit you, can we meet? Right. So that way you create a hook and then you meet. And it should not be like you rightly said, Shalini, that while we want to do those stories and we want to build the right networks and leverage our stories, we don't want to become the nuisance either. Right. So it has to be done with all the right intent and right content. So thanks so much, Shalini. Let's move on further in our discussion. So we were talking all these stories, and I think we took some great examples already. So what is the secret sauce? What makes a great story? So this is my personal secret sauce. And you have to remember this is specifically for business stories. And then we've talked about it. Right. Keep your audience in mind. Whether it's one person or 1000 people that you're addressing, it has to be relevant. You can't go into and I'll take the same example. You can't go into London Stock Exchange where they've invited you to talk about AI. You can't tell them about coffee beans or green tea. So your business story has to be relevant. Second thing I also always find and it goes back to all the reasons we respond to stories is because we have a fond memory, we respond to it without explicitly thinking about it. And that is where authenticity comes in, because human beings are very smart. They've been listening to stories for 30,000 years, reading them, looking at them. So if your story is not authentic, they will know and they will tune off. All that neuron mirroring, all that brain syncing will not happen. So the second element of my secret sauce, or ingredient of my secret sauce is authenticity. And then finally, in a business scenario, it has to be precise because business conversations are unlike friend conversations where if you meet a friend for a coffee, you can take 20 minutes to tell him or her on how your yesterday was, but in a business context and take again my chance meeting with the CEO. I literally had like a minute walk from that breakfast hall to the elevator while he was waiting for the elevator. So it has to be precise. You have to very quickly talk about what you want to talk about and end it and make your point. So make sure it's relevant, make sure it's authentic and make sure it's precise. Wrap on that's. What I say is my secret sauce. Excellent. If you may want to wrap up. Wrap up like this is with a W. Right? See, this is what I read, and I thought this was a good way of putting everything that I'm sharing together, that people that you meet, they will forget what you said. They might not remember the exact words of your story. They might forget what you did for them, whether you got them a glass of water or whether you offer them a chair. But all put together, how you made them feel is what they never forget. And that's where I think when you tell stories and you're authentic and you're relevant, there is an emotion that you create. And I believe that is what keeps it sticky. That is what makes them remember you, think of you and stay connected with you. So that is why I think business storytelling is very important in today's world where we meet so many people, where attention spans are so limited where we get thousands of messages and we get so many emails every day. I think making sure that you take time out and make people feel good is the most important thing you can do. And I truly believe you can do that with stories in your portfolio. So want to end with that and back. Turing. I'm curious. I'm sure there are some tech people in our session who will say, oh yeah, business story, understood. But how do technical architects, tech leads make a story? So having been in this delivery role that I and you have done right, we do a lot of pre sales solutioning, client contacts. And I'm sure stories are very relevant. And when somebody is covering a technical portfolio, walk through again, is there a story relevant there or not? I'll give you another personal example. I was presenting to the head of technology and I had to present to them this very complex validation tool that we had built, which had automation, which was going across multiple browsers and everything. And my slides had all that data, how many scenarios we ran, how many browsers we compared, how many bugs we found, what did we fix, et cetera. And I could have just gone with that. But I started my presentation and I said, Steve, imagine you were the CEO of this company and imagine that your website went down for like ten minutes or words. Imagine that your website is up, but suddenly your customer service is getting thousands of calls because people are saying, I'm not able to place my order, your web page is not working. I'm not able to pay my card, use my card to pay because your payment screen is not working. Because do you know 44% of people drop a brand or don't go back to a website if their friends post it on Facebook? So Steve, how would you feel about that? Do you not think that you want to make sure that your customer service is not inundated with those calls and your customers are happy? And his answer was yes. So let me then tell you about this technology that we have built so a story doesn't have to span the whole 30 minutes presentation. You want to do a technical architecture conversation. You can begin with what that technical architecture would impact, where it would benefit. And should that benefit not happen in a previous scenario, what was the downside of it? So you could start with that precise two minute story and then present your technical architecture. But with that two minute story, you have a brain sync. You have Steve's full attention. He is now eager and hooked on to listening to the rest of your presentation. And that's why I think even more in a technical scenario, even more when we are architects, we need a business story and we need a story because otherwise it will be so dry. And Steve would just be checking his emails and he would have never listened to me. Absolutely got the point. And somebody here had raised a similar question. That is the thrill more important in the story because there is some surprise element. What do you have to say about that? So traditionally, you're right. Traditionally, the way the story is, you introduce a protagonist, they are in a difficult scenario. They come back and rise above the other and then they are victorious. So there is some amount of trail that always catches attention. But you remember Pathos, which was one of the evergreen components, still is not just one feeling. You could have sadness. In fact, Greek dramas, the original ones were all tragedies. The humor came in a few hundred years later. So Path was the whole emotion thing. You could have thrill, you could have sadness, you could have excitement, you could have happiness. You could have difficulty overcoming bunch of those things beyond the Pathful element of it. But some of that has to be there. Otherwise your story would fall flat. True. Have you ever had a very suppose you tried to use that story? How about the site going down or whatever? Right. And I'm sure it is based on your research. If you just made it up, suppose, right? And he comes back and says no, Charlie, we are such a wonderful company. Our site never goes down. I hope you studied about it. So those situations happen. What do you have to say about those? So that's where the authenticity aspect comes in. Renew. I would never use a data point or never use a story that is not authentic. So when I was saying authentic, it doesn't just mean you have to be authentic. It also means your story has to be authentic. Yeah. I would discourage, strongly discourage anybody who tries to make up a story or make up a scenario that is not valid because there was this beautiful thing I had read some time back that I am not mad that you lied to me. I am sad that I will never be able to trust you again. So basically, don't make that mistake. It's always okay. In fact, I have done client conversations where I've gone in and said we are targeting an improvement percentage. And then I've forgotten. And I've said, you know what? I don't remember. I know it is in the range of this and this, but why don't I get back to you with the exact number? And actually, my clients have appreciated that much more than me giving them a made up number because sooner or later they would find out. So yes, please don't make up data. Please don't make up incorrect information because they will never be able to trust you again. Okay. Those who have questions, can you put it in the chat window? Meanwhile, because I've covered most of the questions you got, let me ask another question. How often do the stories in case of business, situations have to be based on data. And what do you think of data, stories, storytelling based on data. What's the story telling based on? Situations and narrations, which is a better style? Well, in business, I think every story needs to have logic. So I will take a step back, Reno. And I would say it's not your data, but it's logic. It has to be logical. And that's where I go back to my evergreen component. And mostly when you try to build a logical argument, you will need data. Because without data, if I just say, I think it might rain today is worse than saying, Renu, please carry an umbrella. I read it on the Weather Channel that there are 90% chances of rain. So you established credibility by saying it's not just Shalomi thinking about it, it's Weather Channel and you're giving them a percentage. So that it's correct, right. So I think you have to have a logic, but without data, logic will probably not be very effective. Sometimes you could have a logical argument without data. So my answer to that, Reno, is data with stories is a very, very powerful medium in business, pretty much every business story would have logic and hence data as well. Thank you. Any more questions, team, all those present, you can ask one or two questions before we wrap up. You can ask questions live as well. It doesn't have to be on chat. I did ask a number of questions on your behalf. Please go ahead. Ma'Am. I have one question. Can I ask? Yeah, please. When we are telling the stories, there are two different environments, like when we are meeting with someone one on one, and then we are having conversations and we are telling the story. And second is a very impersonal way of like when I'm launching my product, I'm launching my logo, or when I'm doing some branding. So what is the major difference between the touch points, how stories differ and effectiveness of stories? So, Angam, it's a very good question. And going back to what I was saying, you have to keep your audience in mind. Now, when you're meeting a friend, you know everything about them, pretty much a lot about them. So your stories can be crafted. And let's assume that this is a business friend. So I'm taking that out because if you're meeting a personal friend, you can even rumble on. And that decision does not matter. So let's assume you're meeting a business friend one on one. There you know so much about them, you can be very precise. But say when you're launching something, you might not know one person. That's where you can still look at the demographics that you're trying to reach. Are you trying to appeal to teenagers in India or you're trying to appeal to people beyond 60 senior citizens in Europe? Your stories will have to be very different. Now you can't pick up Angam from India and compare it with, say, Angela from London and have the same story that appeals to both of them and maybe you can find that story because if you are trying to ask for donations for children who are in a desert and there is a drought, maybe both of those will need a path for Sladen story. Keeping your audience in mind is very important and in my mind what I've experienced is that you can make your stories very specific and really manage those components if you're doing one on one. But if you're looking at a broader audience you have to keep in mind what will appeal and you have to tweak your story accordingly. Does that help on them? Yes, ma'am. The other thing is that while we are doing one on one there will be many nonverbal queues while on the second thing there won't be much. Absolutely. You're absolutely right because your feedback from the audience will be very different. So when you're doing one on one you can tweak your story. But when you do this sending out a message to the whole wide world, your story has to be so effective and the only way you will know is either by the likes or dislikes or by hits on your website or just by the sales of whatever you are selling, you'll have to wait a long time before you know whether your story was effective or not. Thank you. Great point. Thanks for adding that dimension. Team Shalini is happy to connect on LinkedIn on several queries be reachable. I really appreciate her time for being a speaker at woman who could HeadA bar. Thank you so much, Shalini really appreciate and I really enjoyed the session. Conversing with you. Didn't feel like formal talk but we talked so much. Thank you, Reyno. Thank you for having me and I look forward to connecting with you all. Stay happy, stay healthy and keep telling stories. Yeah. And those of you who want to check on this conversation later, we'll be hosting it on women who could Heather YouTube channel. Thank you so much, Shalini. Thank you. Bye bye, everyone. Bye, everyone. Bye.