Product Management Storytelling Workshop Booklet for Client, Windchill Product Management

Prepared for PTC by

Storytelling Is The Product Manager’s Superpower Developing & Delivering Well-Crafted Stories Along the Product Journey

May 3, 2023

Liana Henry, Instructor Principal: Black Dog Marcom/CEO: The Black Dog Group

blackdogmarcom.com liana@blackdogmarcom.com 508.250.0241

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Workshop Agenda & Objectives Morning Session

Afternoon Session

Foundations of Storytelling • All About Storytelling and Why it Matters • Elements of the Complete Narrative • Tools: Storytelling Frameworks • Different Types of Storytelling: B2B vs. Product vs. Brand

Creating a Well-Crafted Product Story • Product Storytelling in Product Development • Expanding the User Story

P TC: Company Brand and Product Story

Breakout Activity - Split into Teams (60 mins) • Choose your captain and your prompt • Choose your framework • Craft your story Breakout team presentations and discussion

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Delivering Compelling Product Stories • Delivery Tips and Tricks P TC Storytellers

Do you know the P TC, Windchill, and Windchill + Brand Story?

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Communicating with Your Diverse Audiences

Product Strategy and Storytelling • Storytelling in the Roadmap Presentation • Storytelling in Development and Sprint Meetings • Storytelling in Product Demos • Product Marketing Stories Break for Lunch

Review, Wrap-Up and Evaluation

Objective #1

Objective #2

Objective #3

PM Team will be able to understand and clearly verbalize the corporate brand story and Windchill value proposition.

PM Team will learn the foundations of B2B storytelling and how they align with Product Management and their roles.

PM Team will be able to write and deliver a compelling product story using storytelling foundations and story structure.

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Allow Me to Introduce Myself In addition to running this agency and my half of the parent company, I also teach Storytelling in the community and corporately. I believe my calling is raise up the next generation of storytellers. You will hear my story in more detail during the presentation.

I’m a former P TC PLM Product Marketer and passionate Storyteller.

I come to the table with almost two decades of storytelling experience in marketing, communications, PR, and journalism. I’ve mentored other journalists and storytellers, launched a magazine where I told an entire town’s stories, developed enterprise product stories that got an entire segment reading, and conveyed the voice of tech start-up executives in such magazines as Forbes and Manufacturing.net. I’m looking forward to sharing some storytelling tips in hopes that you can use them in your daily work in product management.

Hi! My name is Liana Henry and I’m your instructor for today’s workshop. I’m as excited that you are here as I am to be leading this storytelling class. I know how busy you are, with Liveworx right around the corner so I hope you will find value in our time together today.

I am the owner of Black Dog Marcom, a Marketing/Comms Agency focused on Storytelling. Black Dog Marcom is a pillar brand of The Black Dog Group, a Professional Services Company. Our other pillar brand is Black Dog Management, a Project Management Consultancy.

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Foundations of Storytelling: What is a Story?

The Evolution of Storytelling Merriam-Webster defines a story as “an account of incidents or events; a statement regarding the facts pertinent to a situation in question; an anecdote.”

Dictionary.com defines it as “a narrative designed to instruct.”

A good story simplifies our world into something we can understand. When you want to influence others, there is no tool more powerful than a story.

Therefore, storytelling is the activity of sharing stories by employing crucial elements as plots, characters and surprising angles. In a broader sense as related to today, it’s employing the tactics and techniques to tell the company or product story in order to gain insights into users, build empathy, gain emotional access, and increase the attractiveness of an offer or feature.

Storytelling is the oldest form of knowledge transfer. People have been telling stories ever since they gained the ability to speak, initially telling stories to mark danger, set an example, or relate an event. It also lead to attempts to explain the unexplainable through a fairytale or tall tale.

The Chauvet cave in France is the oldest representation of stories found thus far, dating back to approximately 36,000 years ago. Later forms of visual stories can be found in Egyptian hieroglyphics of about 3,000 years B.C.E. 3

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Elements of a Complete Narrative

Everyone enjoys a good story. Telling a good story, however, isn’t as easy at it seems. Regardless of genre or style, all good stories have five common elements.

Setting: A well-established setting creates an intended mood and provides the backdrop and environment for your story. This is your context. So, in a product story, your setting is the user’s experience.

Characters: You will have a Protagonist and an Antagonist. The Protagonist is the main character of a story and most times, the hero. In a product story, your protagonist is the user. Your antagonist opposes the protagonist, standing between them and their ultimate goals. In the product story, the antagonist is the user’s challenge and obstacles.

Plot: This is the sequence of events that connect the audience to the protagonist and their ultimate goal. In the product story, the plot is the user journey to solving their problem.

Conflict: This drives the story by creating tension and building suspense, keeping the audience on the edge of their seats. In the product story, the conflict is the user’s obstacles which got them to you.

Theme: What the story is really about and the main idea or underlying meaning In the product story, the theme is how the user meets time, cost, and quality demands.

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Story Frameworks

It demonstrates the fears, challenges and desires of your customers.

It helps you position your messaging and brand to achieve clarity and success.

Remember... your customer is the true hero of the story. Your brand is the mentor, and you are there to help your customers achieve their goals

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Story Frameworks

It helps to achieve instant understanding and emotional connection.

It engages the people in your brand’s story and solutions

This framework is used in countless brand videos, stories and social media. It helps guide the audience through your content. It shows that customer has a chance to reflect on their own reactions and take opportunities.

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Story Frameworks

The brand is the mentor to the customer. It expands customer engagement.

It helps to create a message of providing empathy. It clarifies your story to grow revenue and increase your impact.

Set-Up

Confrontation

Resolution

Your customer should immediately identify with your character and want to see what happens to them and how they prevail. We see the three-act structure used widely in short content like social media posts. It will bring the customer’s transformation alive. It is a helpful way for strategizing the goals of your content.

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Story Frameworks

It helps you create that sense of empathy with the audience. It makes your target customer feels understood and acknowledged. It helps your customer avoid the pain of their problem with the solution you offer.

The CAR framework works for any narrative providing a consistent blueprint for any material. It helps audiences connect with you so they trust you.

Using a Story Framework to organize all of these elements helps you map out the storyline. There is more than one way to present a single piece of information.

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Corporate Storytelling: B2B, Brand, and Product Storytelling B2B Storytelling

Place P TC Brand Message Here

B2B storytelling is the use of narrative to illustrate new opportunities or business transformation in our audience’s minds. Storytelling can lead people to get excited about new ideas or spurn them on to take an action.

Brand vs. Product Storytelling Brand storytelling involves telling the story of the brand itself, humanizing the story and explaining why the company was made and how it is differentiated from other businesses out there.

Product storytelling involves telling the story of a product – and can include why the company made it, some of the unique struggles they faced in doing so, and the changes it has made to their customer’s lives. This is generally much more tempting to potential customers than a list of features and facts as it provides an inspirational outlook.

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Place WC & WC+ Brand Message Here

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Product Storytelling in Product Development Every deliverable a product manager creates is a storytelling opportunity.

Every problem statement, competitive analysis, market sizing exercise, OKR, and even user stories, hypotheses and (yep) JIRA tickets are storytelling opportunities.

They must be compelling, communicating the value by focusing on the user’s problem vs. the features. They need to take your audience on a journey in a way that is meaningful to them. It has to make them want to care about your idea.

Communicating to the Diverse Audience with a Strong Product Narrative Here are four key roles great product narratives can serve for different audiences: 1. Attract users Tell strong stories to draw users into engaging with the product. Product teams should think of the product experience as a story.

2. Improve user experience A powerful product narrative helps users understand how tools and features will help them and guides users through the PX from start to finish.

3. Secure stakeholder buy-in Intra-organizational product narratives balance conceptual user stories with core business goals beyond concrete facts and figures and keep stakeholders engaged.

4. Instill passion in the product team Strong product narratives help teams stay connected to a shared vision and and increase alignment. Storytelling can help teams tap into their role in the organization’s broader narrative as a whole.

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Storytelling in the Roadmap

When have you used storytelling in your Roadmap?

Your roadmap presentation is a story to your executives.

When you organize the details of your product roadmap into a coherent and compelling story for leadership, you’ll be engaging them emotionally . Storytelling also puts a complex strategic plan for your product into a simple framework that’s memorable. This is much more likely to lead to the buy-in you need over just recitation of features and timelines.

Storytelling in Dev’t and Sprint Meetings

When have you used storytelling in your dev’t or sprints?

Planning meetings are stories for your developers. When communicating product requirements to your development team, instead of just explaining how you want them to build something—which is in their wheelhouse - try communicating WHY you want them to build something. And the best way to do that is through the use of stories.

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Demo Storytelling

Where are you using storytelling in your demos?

In your demos, introducing a narrative and characters can help bring out empathy in the customer. They can see how the product is used by real people, which is why case studies are great storytelling tools. Explaining the product as a combination of story and facts will make it stick.

Product Marketing Stories

Which product marketing stories are your favorites?

Every product’s marketing materials tell some kind of story— hopefully it’s compelling and not boring. You should use the actual elements of a real story—hero, guide, obstacle, villain, etc.

—to build a message around the product.

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Delivering Compelling Product Stories

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Know your purpose – answering ‘What do we want to do?’, ‘How?’, ‘Why does it matter?’

Organize your story in a logical sequence Be sure to practice and rehearse frequently prior to delivering it.

Be familiar with the setting where your presentation will take place.

Choose comfortable yet professional clothes to wear.

Visual aids should fit the presentation.

Start strong with a powerful opening that will grab your audience’s attention.

Be conversational. Avoid reading your story word for word.

Speak with passion and you’ll be better able to keep your audience’s attention.

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Delivery Tips and Tricks •

Start your stories in different places.

You don’t have to start a story at the beginning.

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Keep your audience curious from the beginning with questions you can you plant in their minds.

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Get to your stories quicker and avoid too

much set-up (i.e. the “pre-ramble”).

Take your time between your lines using looks/facial expressions for emphasis.

Remember: “Reactions tell the story.”

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Condense to connect and put all of the important statements in no more than a couple of lines of dialogue.

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Don’t be the Hero of the story. Remember – you are the guide.

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Invite your audience members into your scene.

Gestures, Body Language, and Vocal Variety (They matter!)

Eye contact establishes an immediate bond.

Control mannerisms which are nervous expressions.

Put verbs into action by physically acting them out.

Change your voice for emphasis or for transitions.

Avoid insincere gestures.

Move around the stage as topics change.

Be patient!

Storytelling is not easy and it takes time to hone your skills.

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Breakout Activity: Craft and Deliver Your Product Story It’s your turn!

Time to take what you already know (products), sprinkle in what you learned (storytelling), and deliver a storyline that is new. I challenge you to think beyond the stats, graphs, and charts and personalize this. It can be a presentation, a demo, a user story, a product update, etc. Get creative!

Instructions 1. Choose a captain and form a team of 3-4 people. Our remote attendees will go into breakout rooms on Teams.

2. Decide whose prompt you will work on and choose a storytelling framework.

3. Here are some questions to consider: •

Know your purpose – answering ‘What do we want to do?’, ‘How?’, ‘Why does it matter?’

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Where can you add storytelling? Can you move a story elsewhere?

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What about your user? What’s compelling about them and their struggle?

4. We’ll call you back together to go around the group and present what you came up with.

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Notes

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Customer Stories Kathleen Lomax, M.D., Medical Director, Immunology

Dr. Lomax’s goal when treating psoriatic arthritis in pediatric patients is to reduce joint inflammation, maintain mobility and prevent deformity.

She is able to do this with a recent FDA approval of the pediatric indication of an existing Janssen therapy.

The drug works as an anti-inflammatory in the body, tempering the overactive inflammatory response in

David Thomas, CEO Omico

Oncology partnerships lay the groundwork for personalized healthcare options. This one between a number of agencies and Roche is generating high-quality clinical and medical data. This information is used to assess the impact and value of comprehensive genomic profiling (CGP) in patients with metastatic non-squamous non-small cell lung cancer, a rare, difficult-to-treat condition. Roche has since invested up to $20 million in this new initiative.

Lin Smith, Cancer Patient

When Lin was diagnosed with stage 3 colon cancer, he was told he only had 6 months to live.

A trusting relationship with a doctor, the right technology from Stryker for surgical visualization, and the support of his family helped guide him to remission.

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