1132: Ask Questions

Business storytelling techniques: 6/30

ASK QUESTIONS

Friends begins when a woman in a wedding dress stumbles into a Greenwich Village coffee shop...

The huge bestselling novel, The Lovely Bones, begins with the line:

"My name was Salmon, like the fish; first name Susie. I was fourteen when I was murdered on December 6, 1973."

Killing Floor, the first Jack Reacher novel, begins:

"I was arrested in Eno's diner. At twelve o'clock. I was eating eggs and drinking coffee. A late breakfast, not lunch. I was wet and tired after a long walk in heavy rain. All the way from the highway to the edge of town."

In each case the writers – David Crane & Marta Kauffman, Alice Sebold and Lee Child – are toying with us.

From the first moment, they want us asking questions.

In the Jack Reacher opener, Child is making us wait. Building the suspense while our questions get louder.

WHY were you arrested?
WHY the long walk in heavy rain?
WHO are you, anyway?

There's a foundational insight here. In his best-selling book, Pre-Suasion, psychologist Robert Cialdini highlights the reason we struggle to resist a mystery.

"That desire—which also pushes us to return to incomplete narratives, unresolved problems, unanswered questions, and unachieved goals—reflects a craving for cognitive closure."

Questions trigger TENSION. Tension triggers attention and action.

But there's a second, more powerful way to create tension in a business audience ... and we'll reveal that tomorrow.

(See what I did there?)

This is Business Storytelling Technique 6/30. Please SHARE this post and follow me to get the whole series.

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