Interview: The Power of Stories

Organizational consultant Katrin Wulf reveals how deeply stories influence the way companies think, act and evolve. In this interview, she explains why narratives have become essential in a world defined by constant change, how they emerge from everyday experiences and why they shape culture, leadership and collaboration more powerfully than many leaders realize.

Her insights show how consciously crafted narratives can align strategy, strengthen learning and create a shared sense of purpose across an organization.

Katrin Wulf holds a PhD in Economics and works as an organizational enabler at “Die Gelben Raben” (The yellow Ravens), a management consultancy that supports transformation processes in organizations. She sees her role as exploring how collaboration and organizational culture can evolve to create future-ready organizations that are able to respond to change. She shares her experience in her book ‘Own the One – Developing Organizational Narratives’, which she co-authored with Maria Spindler.

Bei Bei Yu: What inspired you and your co-author to write this book? Why now? And who are your target audience?

Katrin Wulf: It all started when Maria Spindler invited me to a panel discussion in Berlin, and I missed the appointment because I had written down the wrong date. When she called me and asked where I was, I realized my mistake in the calendar, and we ended up having a deeper conversation about this mix-up. Suddenly, we found ourselves exchanging stories about situations we had experienced while working with our clients as consultants. And we decided to write them down.

When we met, we collected so many stories on Post-it notes that an entire wall was soon covered. We started looking for a common thread and discovered that it was really about the stories that are told within organizations. The question is: Do the different storylines within an organization come together to form a shared narrative? Some stories support organizational development, while others hinder it. This little book emerged from the many practical examples we have collected.

And why now? I believe it is because we are living in a time of constant change, in which many different narratives are emerging. We can see this in the current political disputes as well, where certain narratives become dominant. The same applies to organizations, where certain stories can become particularly influential in shaping how employees perceive the organization.

As for the target audience: Who did we write this book for? It is written by practitioners for practitioners – on the one hand, for leaders who want to consciously shape their organizations through meaningful stories, and on the other hand, for consultants looking for methods to create spaces for development in which a shared narrative can emerge.

Bei Bei: How do you define the term “narrative”?

Katrin: For us, a narrative means consciously shaping the different stories that exist within and around an organization and bringing them together into a connecting story. Stories are told by employees from their individual perspectives or collectively by the workforce. Customers also tell stories, for example about customer service or quality. For us, creating a narrative means consciously shaping and connecting these different stories. The narrative tells us how an organization has developed, where it currently stands and what that means for the future.

Instead of individual stories existing separately, thinking, feeling and acting should be connected through the narrative. Then it will not simply be dismissed as a marketing product. If the narrative feels real to people and they experience it in their everyday work, it becomes a consciously shaped organizational narrative.

Bei Bei: How can you tell whether an organization’s current narrative is working or not?

Katrin: A well-developed narrative gives an organization not only direction but also energy. It makes people say: “Yes, I want to be part of this. We can connect to it, even in times of crisis.” It can certainly be based on a founding story that says something like: “We have always found a way, and we can use that mindset to find a way through this crisis.”

It becomes more difficult when cynicism or blind activism unconsciously becomes embedded in a narrative without anyone reflecting on their own actions. Recently, a client said to me: “The most important thing is that we are doing something, because everything else is dangerous.” This unconscious narrative demands action but leaves no room for reflection. The question then becomes whether the actions being taken are actually leading in the right direction.

A well-designed narrative would take this belief and reframe it in a way that is effective and helpful for the organization. We need to understand the impact of deeply held beliefs, even when they are only implicitly embedded in the stories we tell.

That is why it is important to examine whether a narrative is truly sustainable and meaningful.

For example, a belief such as “We boldly experiment with new things” should be something employees can genuinely experience in their everyday work. In other organizations, there may be a story that good employees work late into the evening. These are the stories told within organizations, and they directly or indirectly shape people's behavior. The question is: How can we, as an organization, shape our actions and our stories in a way that moves us forward? To do that, we first need to recognize what stories are being told.

Bei Bei: What are the most common challenges companies face when they start working on their organizational narrative?

Katrin: Let me go back to the previous example: “The main thing is that we stay active; everything else is dangerous.” First, you need to recognize that this narrative is actually guiding behavior. You have to observe yourselves collectively and ask: How do we approach problems and questions, and what stories do we tell? Looking closely at this requires a great deal of courage and is a major challenge.

Another challenge is that, of course, people would prefer to quickly create a narrative that sounds good. But ultimately, developing a narrative is an open-ended process. Without knowing from the beginning what the outcome will be, you have to have the courage to take an honest look, take ownership and change the narrative.

What we see in many organizations are hero stories – for example, stories about a leader who developed a new product. As a result, the achievements of the team often receive less recognition. There is a significant difference between portraying one individual as the hero and saying: “We achieved something great as a team, and together we made it possible to create something completely new.” The way we tell stories also depends on whether we are looking for the hero or for what was achieved together. Sometimes this affects the entire organization and is reflected, for example, in incentive systems that reward only one leader for something that was actually developed by a team.

Another stumbling block is the tendency to overemphasize harmony in organizational narratives instead of working with differences. What does that mean? If a client tells me that there are no conflicts in their organization, something may not be quite right. Organizations inherently have points of friction, for example because resources are limited. Perhaps conflicts do not immediately escalate, but when there is a limited budget, people have to negotiate who is getting what. Decisions have to be made about projects. Anyone who claims that this is always harmonious is more likely to be sweeping conflicts under the rug. And if a leader keeps telling a story of harmony, it can prevent conflicts from being addressed openly.

Ultimately, the hardest thing is to ask ourselves honestly: What stories are we telling here, and what impact do they have on the entire organization? It feels nicer when someone from Marketing tells us that everyone is great. That may feel good at first, but as a narrative, it does not provide meaningful guidance for action.

Bei Bei: You have mentioned leadership several times, and in your book you talk about a “Next Level Culture”. What do you mean by this in regard of leadership?

Katrin: By this, we mean a culture that is capable of learning and dealing with tensions – a culture in which learning takes place, but in which tensions are also actively addressed. The conflicts that naturally exist within organizations should be negotiated in a way that allows differences to be integrated and used in a constructive way. Conflicts can create impulses for development that help organizations move forward.

It also means rethinking the role of leadership in an environment that is changing ever more rapidly. As a leader, do I always want to create certainty? Or can I also admit that I do not know the one right solution and instead look for the right answer together with others?

A Next Level Culture is therefore also about the question of where responsibility is anchored and how this creates impact. It also includes the question of how we deal with uncertainty. Consciously dealing with complexity is part of reflective leadership – and this does not necessarily have to rest solely with formal leaders. A Next Level Organization is characterized by this ability to reflect.

Katrin Wulf's and Maria Spindler's book publication "Own the One" about organizational stories and narratives

Bei Bei: Can you explain what such a process looks like in practice using an example?

Katrin: It is always about looking at every level of the organization and asking how we can establish self-reflection. We ask questions such as: What does our organization stand for? What are our values, principles and beliefs? At the beginning, we develop a realistic picture of the current situation while also considering how we can change existing perceptions and patterns that are no longer functional.

Here is one example:

In one organization, we work with the leadership team. They come together in workshops to reflect on their leadership and analyze what they have been successful with, where they have not been successful and what the best approach might be in each situation.

Before that, there had been very little exchange among the leadership members, partly because the company had previously gone through a merger. As a result, there were two different approaches within the organization that could now be compared. Together with the leadership team, we worked out that it was not about deciding which approach was better or worse. Every approach has its advantages and disadvantages, and the real question is what we need for the future.

The old question – “Which approach is better?” – was replaced by a new one: “What is our target culture? How do we want to deal with challenges?” That is the question we explore together with our clients.

The topic quickly goes beyond leadership, and we begin to rethink processes as well. We also work with senior management to ask: Where do we want to go, and how do we translate that into the organization as a whole? We often find that the strategy is still relatively clear to senior management, but much less clear to employees. Somewhere in between, a lot of the message has been lost.

That is why it is important to ask:

• Where do we reflect on this?

• Where do we discuss it?

Where is the space in which management or employees can say: “I don’t really know how my work contributes to the strategy”? Such statements can trigger a process of reflection. If employees tell the story that they do not know how they contribute to the strategy, that narrative has an impact. Changing the story to: “I know how my contribution supports the bigger picture” helps every employee decide what to do and how to set priorities instead of simply acting out of habit.

Redefining the narrative in areas that are relevant to organizational action and that influence success or failure – that is the most important cultural work. The narratives employees tell are therefore closely connected to how work is done and how people view their own work.

Bei Bei: What is your recommendation for reducing the gap between the defined strategy and employees’ understanding of how their work contributes to that strategy?

Katrin: Again, self-reflection plays a major role. It can take place within teams or among leaders. Ultimately, the entire organization needs to engage in an open-ended process. The important question is how to design that process, and companies can approach this in different ways. In some organizations, there is a transformation team in which selected employees from different parts of the organization come together and ask: What does our current situation look like? How do we want to change? Other companies take a different approach. The method has to fit the organization.

Bei Bei Yu: Can you give us an example of how small stories can shape an organization?

Katrin Wulf: At one client, a leader said: “I have been with the company for 30 years, and 30 years ago the Executive Board made it very clear to me that I was not allowed to take certain decisions on my own. I received such a strong warning back then that I have not take those kind of decisions myself ever since.” This story had taken on a life of its own over three decades. In the meantime, the Executive Board had changed several times, but only now did this person realize that they had never questioned this belief again.

Meanwhile, the current Executive Board is saying: “Goodness, why don’t they finally take decisions?” Only through open dialogue does it become possible to work on the narrative. Small experiences can influence people’s behavior over a very long period of time, even when they are now dealing with completely different people and circumstances. What matters is that the narrative can be reshaped, for example through a new belief such as: “That was the case 30 years ago, but things are different now. Now we are allowed to take these decisions ourselves.” This means that responsibility is placed where it belongs today. The previous behavior was not wrong, but today these decisions belong at the leadership level and no longer solely with the Executive Board.

Bei Bei: What reactions or feedback about your book surprised you the most?

Katrin: We were surprised ourselves when we realized just how much narratives shape an organization. Many people are not aware of this. The small stories people tell each other in the hallway have an impact and reveal a great deal about an organization. For example, new employees hear stories about how things have “always been done around here”. These stories carry a lot of implicit meaning. When people become aware that the stories told in the hallway actually matter, it creates an “aha” moment for many of them. So, yes, many people are surprised.

Becoming more conscious of how and what we tell also determines how well we connect with others – externally with customers and suppliers, and internally across different functions and departments. Many small stories contribute to a larger narrative. It is important to listen carefully in order to actively shape the narrative.

Bei Bei Yu: Thank you very much for the interview.