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Dr Milton Erickson was a famous psychiatrist whose patients would wait more than 18 months for an appointment. They would send other clients to him for years later because they were doing so well.

Milton told Joe a story about a tomato plant. Joe was struggling with pain from terminal cancer. Because of the story, within a few hours Joe’s pain lessened. In a few days the pain was under control enough for him to be in care at home.

Stories make things happen

Stories do more than amuse. They entrance. They suggest ideas. They encourage people to find their own solutions. People remember stories. They forget facts.

Perhaps you would like clients to have so much faith in your abilities that they’ll wait 18 months for an appointment with you.

Maybe you’re interested in relieving the pain of your work team. Even helping your clients feel so good they recommend you to their peers.

Story has long been a vehicle for teaching and learning, and is gaining prominence in the business world as a tool for knowledge management.

Daniel Pink chronicles the use of story in fields as traditional as medicine and law, suggesting that story telling is a $1 trillion USD business.

You can make stories work better

If you’d like to learn more about how to tell a good story, to make your stories more relevant, come play story with us. Good stories clarify and reveal your vision. You can make stories work to fit your point, learn how to feed your audience’s values and satisfy the human need for story.

Discover the world interpreted through story: the hero stories, the cautionary tales of your everyday life and of your flights of fantasy will entrance and guide you to a place that nourishes your spirit and keeps your staff and colleagues entertained and listening.

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Interact and stretch your mind

The story workshop is interactive. You work in large and small groups to craft fictional stories as well as retell stories from life. You will have an opportunity to learn to:

• structure a story to capture people's attention
• apply stories to work – and make stories work as persuasive tools
• make it easier for people to see your vision, using enough detail without being boring
• add humour and feed values through story

The workshop will also cover:

• why tell stories
• when and when not to use story
• making your stories even more relevant, and using others' stories to make your point

Led by experienced facilitators and improvisers

The facilitators are improvisers with business backgrounds. Enrol now.

Cindy Tonkin is the Consultants' Consultant. Her background in accelerated learning, NLP and more than 15 years experience in corporate consulting and training makes this workshop practical and fun. You're sure to learn with her extroverted interactive style.

Richard Bennett is an accomplished improviser and comedy performer, with a background in radio production, people management and technical mentoring. He has organised and presented at countless conferences and workshops in Australia and in the U.S., and is the director of both Scared Scriptless and the Cranston Cup, Sydney's only currently running improvisational comedy shows.

Richard and Cindy create a weekly improvised show in Petersham every Friday night. Together they run Ludic Creative - a professional services company providing focused entertainment and conference workshops using improvisation techniques.

What people say about our workshops

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This workshop will run on Saturday May 26 2007.

We developed this workshop because people loved the segment on storytelling in our other public workshop Life is not a rehearsal: start improvising. Our feedback forms kept on saying "Please more story telling". So this is it!

Here is what people say about the Life is not a Rehearsal workshop:

• "[means I can] allow my team members to practice being creative. I learned to trust others to deliver results"

  Joseph Renzi, MD swapace

• "Well done – very appropriate to business people today – helping to develop mind-flexibility"

  Noelene Dawes Unlocking Potential

• "taught me to have an open mind in relation to my business partner"

  Virginia Choy Eat Manifesto

• "Fun, practical exercises, tools. The day was well put together – a layered experience that took me through skills and improvisation exercises. At the end of the session I realised I had achieved my outcomes. Great fun too!"

  Suzanne Mercier – Business Alchemy International

• "Interesting and inspiring. Worth doing if you want to discover inner strengths."

  Joseph Arena

• "A few hours to get re-acquainted with the innocence and openness we used to have as children. A GREAT afternoon. Love your positive take on absolutely everything! Well Done!"

  Sandra O’Neill

• "Fun, unpredictable, opening, enabling. A joy!"

  Jill Chivers - The Corporate Compass

When and where

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This course runs Saturday 23 June 2007, 1 to 5pm, at Sydney Venue, Ground floor, 213 Miller Street, North Sydney. We will provide afternoon tea. If you have any questions, please contact us.

Please wear comfortable clothing and shoes (avoid high heels). You may sit on the floor for some activities.

We provide afternoon tea. The course fee is $297. Enrol now.