Storytelling

Challenge

I am an outreach volunteer in my organization who helps teaching poor young students who are  studying in government schools with no proper communication skills. I wanted to help the larger group  of students from 1st to 10th grade and the challenge was there is not enough volunteers to support and  teach them.

Selection

While I was going through the design thinking training, the Storytelling Tool had attracted me, and I got  a spark that people do things when they get inspired about what others do and how it impacts the  people. So, I believed that if I can convey the impact which we are doing to the society and people, there  will be more volunteers to support us.

Application

I organized a meeting in our work floor where 100s of people seated. I shared a story of a boy who born  poor with less option for studies, but with all difficulties he went up to the school which does not have  enough teachers to teach the students. He longed for knowledge and communication skills till last year.  Today, his total life is changed, he can communicate well in English with all the people and he passed  out his 10th grade in distinction. Now, it is his turn that he wanted to help others in the society. So, he is  volunteering 1 hour daily for the students of his school. Do you know, how the boy was able to be  successful? Our organization has taken up the volunteering activity to teach the students in the school, it  was only 5 team members who made this difference to the boy and his life. Just think about we 100s of  people spending 1 hour to volunteer what is the difference we can make for society. It is our  responsibility to give what we got at our early age. It is our responsibility to develop our country. I finally  finished the story with a question on who wanted to Make a Difference to our society.

Insight

Well, the story has connected most of the people on the floor and we drastically seen the difference in  the volunteering numbers. People were sharing their experience of joy and gratitude when they teach  the students for free of cost. It also gives them peace of mind knowing that they are making a difference  to the society.

This clearly gave me an insight that how a little story can connect well with people and open up their  mind to try a different things in life that they have not thought about. We were trying out emails and  floor walks to ask for volunteers earlier, but the result was not what we got now. The only difference we  tried was to include a story in it to tell the message to people. It made a difference to the result.

Approach

I will continue to use the same tool for this challenge as it has given an impact drastically. I will try to  improvise the story along with videos of the schools and students to make it more efficient.

