Transformative Stories: A Framework for Crafting Stories for Social Impact Organizations

Abstract

This article provides a framework to guide the construction of transformative stories by social impact organizations (SIOs) including nonprofit organizations, public policy entities, and for-profit social benefit enterprises. This framework is built from the integration of the academic literature on narratives and narrative construction relevant to SIO story construction. This transformative story construction framework outlines how SIOs can assemble and craft authentic and effective stories that convey the organization's impact, engage audiences, and call those audiences to action as well as how SIOs can develop and manage a portfolio of such stories. The framework also provides recommendations to guide the marketplace practice of transformative story construction by SIOs. Finally, the authors pose questions to engage SIOs in collaborative research to refine the practice of constructing stories with the power to transform.

Narrative Economics and Neuroeconomics

“…There were stories about stupid investors stupidly engaging in the flipping of houses. I do not know if you know this English term 19 . Around 2005, just before the financial crisis, this new term appeared.…”

“…Do you think that the fear of being vulnerable to viral contagion on financial markets, on the contrary, reinforces the effect of that viral contagion but kills narrative contagion? 19 Flipping is a term used primarily in the United States to describe purchasing a revenue-generating asset and quickly reselling (or "flipping") it for profit. Though flipping can apply to any asset, the term is most often applied to real estate and initial public offerings (IPOs).…”

“…But there are other fields that have shown that narratives do change people's behavior. Jennifer Escalas from Vanderbilt University [16][17][18][19] has done a study of how much different responses are to an advertisement if you have a scientist explaining the product and they have done research and found out that it works, and if someone like your neighbor telling you in a friendly way he uses this product, and he likes this product. She proved basically that the narrative-based advertising works better.…”

Exploring the relations in relational engagement: Addressing barriers to transformative consumer research

“…The first set of interviewees were individuals employed in Social Impact Organizations (SIO). SIOs have important roles as facilitators of transformation; they strive to resolve significant social problems through their links with communities and end users (Bublitz, Escalas, Peracchio, et al, 2016). Although working across a range of sectors, the mission of all of the organizations represented in our sample relates to transformative social impact (details in table 3.1).…”

Telling a different story: How nonprofit organizations reveal strategic purpose through storytelling

“…It reveals which source angle the NPO believes will be most effective at reaching one or more of their stakeholder groups. Bublitz et al (2016) argue that a good story has a character the audience cares about-that they can build a bridge between the cause and the audience in an authentic and motivating way.…”