The Commons

In a downturn, it’s a bit daunting trying to create new marketing and fundraising messages. But it’s possible, especially when you harvest the stories that are already living in your organization. You can find these stories just by taking the time to engage your constituents and dig a little deeper into what they see as “the how and the why” of your organization. An added bonus: you’ll likely build community at a time when the community may feel under assault.

With those objectives in mind, we conducted a storytelling workshop on the McNichols Campus of the University of Detroit Mercy last week. Our goal was to identify the stories that bring to life the brand promise, “We want great things for you.” About one hundred faculty and administration members crowded into the Student Center ballroom for a half-day’s work. To give them a creative jump-start, we divided the “great things” promise into five more specific promises that we hoped would spark ideas for stories.  Our goal:s to transform the “org speak” into a true narrative that brought to life the benefits and message the promise was trying to convey.

The promises at the heart of UDM turned out to be fertile starting points; after a one-hour writing session, we read our stories to each other and it was clear that we had unearthed literally dozens of stories that had been circulating around the campus but that had never been formally captured before.

We also pointed out that starting points for stories are everywhere, if you know what to look for. On the school’s website, for example, there is a section entitled “Meet Our Students and Alumni.” Drill down into these pages a bit, and you’ll read testimonials such as this one from current student Ronald Reeves: “The biggest surprise is how great the faculty is and how much they are willing to help and work with you.” As I told workshop participants that morning, there is a story behind that testimonial. You just need to interview Ronald to get it and bring it to life.

UDM is now sorting through all the pieces written at the workshop. They’ll use these stories in a number of ways—community- and culture-building emails to  faculty and staff and website profiles and content features for prospective students and alumni.

The end of this particular story is still being written, but UDM has taken a major step forward in making its promise come alive for the people it wants to reach.

- Andy Goodman, Co-founder of The Goodman Center

Tags: andy goodman, higher education, nonprofit communications, resources