Chapter 1. The Story of Stories

Successful companies know that more often than not in business, it really is the same old story.

Or, to be a bit more accurate, it's all about understanding how to use the elements of stories and storytelling to drive business improvement. There isn't a business in the world today—large or small, high or low tech, public or private—that cannot improve performance, internally and externally, through the study and mastery of the basic element of storytelling. One of the most basic applications of this principle is borrowing characters from well-known stories and naming your products or services after them. It works for Paul Bunyan breakfasts in diners across America. It worked for the Atlas missile and Hercules Powder. And, once upon a time, it also worked for a struggling runningshoe company in Eugene, Oregon.