Bernadette Jiwa - Story Driven: You Don’t Need to Compete When You Know Who You Are

For Adam, Kieran and Matthewthe making of me.

And for Aimee and Leanne.
Your Dad would be so proud of who you are.

Contents

PREFACE

To know who you are is the greatest power of all.
Sherrilyn Kenyon and Dianna Love

E very one of usregardless of where we were born, how we were brought up, how many setbacks weve endured or privileges weve been affordedhas been conditioned to compete to win. Ironically, the people who create fulfilling lives and careersthe ones we respect, admire and try to emulatechoose an alternative path to success. They have a powerful sense of identity. They dont worry about differentiating themselves from the competition or obsess about telling the right story. They tell the real story instead. Successful organisations and the people who create, build and lead them dont feel the need to compete, because they know who they are and theyre not afraid to show us. How about you?

What do you stand for?

Where are you headed and why?

Whats been the making of you?

What will make your career or company great?

You must be able to answer these questions if you want to build a great company, thriving entrepreneurial venture or fulfilling career. Whether youre an individual or youre representing an organisation or a movement, a city or a country, Story Driven gives you a framework to help you consistently articulate, live and lead with your story. This book is about how to stop competing and start succeeding by being who you are, so you can do work youre proud of and create the future you want to see.

Who Are YouAnd Why Do You Need to Know?

Who are you? In a connected world of less-linear career paths and more opportunities to influence change, this is the big question of our timethe most important question anyone starting a career or a company, and building a life and a legacy, can ask. Our answers can help us to consistently act with integrity and to differentiate ourselves or our organisations by being more, not less, of who we are. But its a question we have stopped asking in the age of comparison.

Sure, we may have done a bit of personality profiling here and there or had an offsite retreat to work on our branding and external messaging, but these attempts to label ourselves dont often get to the heart of what makes us unique. In a digital world, as the village becomes global, its never been more important to have a powerful sense of identity and to avoid the temptation of just competing to win.

When I was a kid, and maybe when you were, too, every professional or craftsperson in the village, from the doctor to the baker, knew the particular role he or she played in the community. The people who ran businesses did so with pride. They had a purpose. They were clear about their values and the difference they made. In a globalised world, without the grounding of the village, we dont always have that sense of being visible, contributing members of tight-knit groups or local neighbourhoods. So, in a commercial environment, we have tried instead to understand our competitive advantage. We have become reactive to the competitive landscape, rather than responsive to the needs of our communitiesthose people we hope to serve. We are so focused on the competition, or even the threat of it, that weve forgotten to double down on what makes us and our work unique and valuable.

Its hard to figure out how to be great at what you do, in the way only you can do it, by focussing on what everyone else is doing. My goal is to give you an alternativea way to discover (or rediscover) and stay true to who you are and to remain conscious of how your contribution can impact the world.

We Are More Powerful Than We Think

The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller.
Steve Jobs

Stories create change. Thats why weve been telling them for generationsto motivate and protect our tribes, to connect and warn each other, to stir hate or spread love. Without stories, we are rudderless.

We like to believe that change happens at the centre, that it begins at the seat of power. Were wrong. All change happens at the edges. It starts with the first person who decides to expose a truth. In doing so, they rewrite the story.

You have an important role to play in shaping tomorrows world. As an individual, you might not have the resources of a Fortune 500 company, and as an employee, you might not have complete autonomy, but each of us gets to decide what we have to say and how were going to go about it. The ingenuity and ideas, sweat and skills of individuals are the engines of our corporations and communities. Our collective prosperity depends on each of us taking that first small step toward owning our story and the unique contribution we can make.

Australian airline Qantas employs 30,000 people, and every one of those people is a representative of the companys story. The woman clearing tables in the Qantas airport lounge is almost invisible to the preoccupied travellers that she cleans up after. People are anxious to charge their devices, grab a bite to eat and catch their flights. The lounge attendant scrapes plates of half-eaten food and piles them on a trolley to take back to the kitchen. Sometimes people stop to ask her where they can get a drink or an extra spoon, but they dont really see her because shes on the periphery. As far from the centre as its possible to be.

She spots a man waiting for his flight, his feet awkwardly resting on a table, balancing a MacBook on his knee. Its a bad angle to work at, but at least hes got a power outlet and WiFi. The attendant stops what shes doing to bring a low stool for the man to rest his feet on. She helps to turn his chair so he wont strain his back while he works. Then she silently returns to wiping tables and clearing plates as the travellers busy themselves all around her. She may not always get to choose the work, but how she does it is a choice. Her decisions and actions reflect the truth about the company story.

Ten years ago I lived at the edge of the worldas far away from another city as its possible to bein beautiful Perth, Western Australia. It was there that I started my writing career. I was frustrated when one friend after another who wanted business advice failed to take the next step. They loved talking about their ideas for changing the world, but they stalled at the place where they had to decide to grasp the opportunity that was theirs for the taking. So, I decided to stop telling and start showing. I began blogging about those ideas and putting them out into the world for free. My intention was to find the people like you who were ready to run with them.

When I began writing, I had no idea if anyone would want to read what I wrote or how much it was possible to contribute from a distance, but I decided to try. Several books and a community of loyal readers and doers later, Im glad I did. I hope that by the end of this book, you will be ready to go from understanding your value to deciding to tell and live your story, so that you can look back in two years or ten years time and be glad you did.