High above the city on a tall tower, or so the story goes, stood the statue of the Happy Prince, gilded all over in jewels and fine gold.  And from this particular vantage point, he could see all the unhappiness and sadness unfolding within the homes far below.

You probably know how the story ends.  A beautiful swallow happens to alight upon the statue on his way towards warmer shores, but is delayed by the requests of the Happy Prince to remove his jewels, one by one, and offer them to the people of the town who needed them most. 

Whilst the story ends with the death of the swallow and the demise of the statue, this is Oscar Wilde as his best, both evocative and uplifting; helping us all to reflect on life as a form of continuous 'giving away'.

Once upon another time, I find myself sitting at the piano, playing songs from a children's musical I had composed 'back in the day', based on the same story of the Happy Prince.  Now, I have never counted myself as a true musician - at least not in the sense of being properly trained.  I have, though, enjoyed the opportunity to work, at several moments in my life, with children and to witness, first hand, the way in which music can bring these powerful stories to life, providing a context in which young people can wrestle with and reflect upon some of life's most important themes.  Each time my hands play out these simple melodies on the piano, I remember the children who sang for their friends, their parents and grandparents.  I wonder where they might be now, how life was treating them and whether they remember the Happy Prince.

Life as a forming of giving away. 

Stepping away from the piano, I am reminded of this simple thought and, if I'm honest, begin to feel a little sad.  I mean, there are all these fragments of my story - my life as it happens to have played out to date - that have each been meaningful, brought so much joy, and a strong sense that 'this is who I'm meant to be right now'.  But today these moments are relegated to grains of sand on a distant shore; dreams that, for one reason or another, got swept aside by the relentless current of 'real' life.

Now, tell me if I'm wrong but I don't think I'm alone here.  I believe that many of us look back and see episodes, themes, even whole chapters of our lives that seemed like gifts we could treasure and share with those around.  But, at one moment of another, they were gone.  We changed direction, took a different path, ran out of time or simply out of steam.

So, in the end, does everything end up the way of the Happy Prince and the dead swallow lying at his feet?

The more I think about it, the more I think the answer's "yes".  We are each born, covered with jewels and fine gold - each piece a gift destined to define and give meaning to a moment in our lives.  But here's the deal: it is only ours to give away and every day represents a ‘peeling away’ that reveals something of who we really are.  No I don't write children's musicals any more and I will surely never be a priest or academic, sitting in the shadow of Oxford's spires.  As a wise man once said, everything - yes, everything - has its time and there's no going back.

So the moral of the story?

The happiest prince (or princess for that matter) is he who looks back at the end of his life and enjoys the memory of what he had, not the regret of what he lost. 

Stepping off the train, somewhere on London’s Central line recently, I noticed an advert asking the community of underground commuters to submit their stories of kindness on the Tube.

The request, I later discovered, comes from artist Michael Landy, a man determined to celebrate what he calls ‘everyday generosity and compassion on the Tube’ by collecting and sharing these tales of hope as works of art.

Here’s an example:

“I was going through a difficult time and I was crying on the train from Victoria to Clapham Junction. A girl offered me a tissue from a hand-made little cotton purse. Her grandmother made it especially for her to hold hankies. I couldn't tell her why I was crying or stop. But the care that purse was made with and the love it represents, somehow made things a little better.” (Anonymous)

The project got me thinking: What’s the point of kindness anyway?   What is the relationship between kindness and risk?  And, perhaps the most difficult question of all, is there still a place for random acts of kindness in a world where altruism tends to be treated with curiosity and suspicion?

In 2009, psychologist Adam Phillips and historian Barbara Taylor published a book entitled, On Kindness.  Their key question: Why do we ‘generally see independent people as strong and charitable people as dumber or less developed’?  And how did we ‘get to a place in human history in which … we interpret small acts of random kindness as suspect – as a repressed need to be recognized, as a sign of an overly submissive nature, or even as a symptom of mental illness’? (Psychology Today)

Phillips and Taylor conclude that, in contrast to the Enlightenment view that we are all naturally greedy (Hobbes), there is, in fact, something out there called ‘kindness’ – a way of being that reaches beyond our self-obsession and embraces risk and vulnerability for the sake of others.

In short, the girl on the tube who took a moment to offer the stranger a tissue from her grandmother’s purse was taking a risk, making herself vulnerable and doing something intrinsically good and creative.

That makes sense to me.  

Far away, in another land across the sea, a group of people sat in a room and tried to come up with the top-10 reasons why people look beyond themselves and give (make donations) to schools.  I never once heard kindness mentioned.  But increasingly I’m convinced that people give because, in the end, its right – it's a risk, an act of generosity, that throws up new and creative opportunities for everyone involved.

So who will smile because of you tomorrow?

Some ideas are worth playing with, just to see what floats to the surface.

For some years now, I’ve been fascinated by the question of how we come to know the Truth.  What are the conditions, in other words, in which people suddenly see meaning amidst all of the white noise and find that everything makes perfect sense?

Plato was one of the first to kick this conversation off.  For him, the pursuit of Truth involved looking inwards and simply remembering what was innately present within the human soul.

Most of us will recall his allegory of the cave, illustrated below.  You’ll notice the captives.  They are the poor, helpless unenlightened ones (the majority) who think they are seeing things clearly.  In fact, though, they are faced the wrong way and only watching the projected images of the cave-dweller higher up the cave.

Coming to know the Truth, says Plato, is a journey in which the captive rids herself of her ties and begins the long and lonely ascent up out of the cave into the sunlight.

So what has any of this got to do with school admissions?

Here’s my thinking.  What if we replaced the word ‘captives’ with ‘prospects’? 

Doesn’t this somehow capture the desperate and unenlightened state of so many families as they seek the truth of what school is best for their children?  Oftentimes, these families are led to believe that the images they see are ‘real’.  We know, however, that these websites, brochures and social media platforms are only the projected images of the marketing team who hide behind a wall a little higher up the cave.

And yet, despite the darkness and the flickering reflections, a family will often make that choice and begin the lonely ascent towards the first day of school.

So does it end there?  Absolutely not!  The route, these days, is treacherous and fraught with danger along the way.  Even the more resolute will become exhausted by the number of forms we ask to be completed.  Not to mention the ever-present peril of life of a waiting list.

Of course, none of this is true.  I’m just kidding.  Playing with an idea that was never intended for this purpose.

It does make you think, though, doesn’t it?

In his book, Where Good Ideas Come From: The Natural History of Innovation (Riverhead, 2010), Steven Johnson examines how and why innovation occurs. 

Addressing this question from an environmental perspective, he is particularly keen to explore the spaces that have historically led to unusual levels of creativity in individuals and organizations.  Change your environment, says Johnson, and there is a chance that what begins as a ‘slow hunch’ will connect with other ideas and, in time, provoke the start of something completely new.

Seven years ago, a group of admissions professionals from schools in Central and Eastern Europe had a hunch that they should sit around a table and begin to talk about their craft.  At a time when there was very little by way of professional development in this field and even less allocation of funds towards those wanting to be trained in this area, this certainly seemed like a good idea.  Surely no one around that table could have imagined, however, how determinative this ‘hunch’ was to be for the future of international school admissions across Europe.

Seven years later, to cut the story short, another group of admissions professionals came together in Brussels for an event entitled ‘Admissions Job-a-Like 2012’.  This time, though, one table was not enough as nearly 70 representatives from over 40 schools across Europe and beyond packed the conference room for a two day symposium on ‘The State Of Our Art’.

Hosted by the International School of Brussels, there was plenty to talk about as conversations focused on some of the most pressing questions of the day: How do we define our role within a learning organization? What kind of policy and protocol will support the work we do? How do we manage and make sense of the data we have to manage?  When and how does admissions connect to the Advancement Office?

“The thing that I’ll take away from this event,” said Kathy Messick from the American School of the Hague, “is the fact that this kind of gathering keeps us strong and cohesive.  Another person’s challenge may also be ours and this is an opportunity to support each other and come away with real strategies.”

So is it simply the case that 70 people sit in a room together, share the ‘pain’, hope to have good ideas, and shape the future of international school admissions?  Whilst it might be true to say that the wisdom is ‘in the crowd’, it is almost certainly a little more complicated than that.  And one of the most exciting aspects of this year’s gathering was the support offered by the events sponsors, bringing a new perspective to the various conversations.  Finalsite spoke about the emerging role of digital technology in telling the story of our schools, as well as linked up with the event organizers to develop an online collaboration space to keep the conversations going.  Similarly, Faria Systems were there to listen to the needs of admissions professionals as they develop a range of new, supportive software applications in this field.  Perhaps most significantly, however, Jean Vahey, Executive Director of ECIS, was also present and spoke of the historical lack of good professional development in this field and the ways in which ECIS will be looking to support this critical function in the future.

At the beginning of this gathering, an idea was dropped into the conversation.  Admissions, it was suggested, is akin to the maieutic art of bringing people to the moment of decision, understanding and choice.  In short, the role of the admissions professional is, contrary our misperceptions, a critical educational function within our schools, not simply a secretarial point of information.

So what’s the future of school admissions?  None of us have a crystal ball, but there’s a ground-swell of opinion out there and a bunch of questions that are not going away about the relationship of this function to the story of the school and the need for some kind of certification for those who are just getting started.  The conversation from this year’s Job-a-Like is almost certainly going to keep on growing and they will be demanding new kinds of spaces in which to share, learn and reflect together. 

So if your school was not involved this time around, it probably should have been.  Watch this space and look out for the ideas that begin to come from it.

Once upon a time, a large rock stood next to the sea.  Not even the force of a hundred men could move it.

Then, one day, a man known to be carrying the evil eye remarked upon the stone, whereupon it immediately cracked in two.  Such is the power of the evil eye, at least according to Turkish tradition.

It is for this reason that the Nazar amulet, still today, can be seen all over this region of the world, dangling from the bumpers of taxi cabs, pinned to the clothes of babies, built into modern office buildings, guarding doorways and worn as earrings or necklaces.  Turkish people remain convinced that, with it, they are protected from bad energy around them.

Walking through the woods on a sunny spring afternoon, a hundred million miles away from where this tale first began, two seven-year old philosophers were heard talking about luck.

It was international festival day at their school, a huge celebration of cultural diversity, tradition and, critically, extremely good food.

The day had begun with a visit to the Irish Stand.  The luck of the Irish may be famous, but on this occasion the ‘lucky dip’ did not impress.  Personally, though, I wasn’t sure what they expected for 50 cents a go.

It was gift of a Turkish eye at a nearby stand that really caught their attention this year.

Back in the forest, the conversation was now in full swing between Juliette and her philosopher mentor and friend, the little girl from just a little further down the street – who also just happened to be Irish.

I listened in with interest.

“I got this from the International Festival today.  It is supposed to bring you luck,” Juliette explained.

The little girl glanced at the amulet hanging around Juliette’s neck and replied that she too had one in her bedroom.  However, she added, the luck in hers had all run out.

“What do you mean ‘run out’?” Juliette asked.  “Do you mean like when a printer runs out of ink?”

“Exactly!” her friend replied. 

I could tell that Juliette was intrigued with the idea and wasn’t about to let it go. 

“Perhaps it hasn’t run out entirely,” she pondered.  “Perhaps it still protects you when you go to sleep?”

The girls walked in silence for a moment.

“I don’t think it does protect me when I sleep,” her friend declared, at last.  “because I don’t believe it works at all when I have my eyes closed.”

As the Spring sun shone through the trees and illuminated our path, I thought how lucky both girls were to have this opportunity to talk to one another and consider questions that, in the end, probably none of us can answer.

The train from London Paddington left from platform eight.

By the time I reached the station, I knew that I’d be one of the last to alight and, as usual, the choice of available seats was limited.  Bags in one hand and coffee in another, I politely asked the woman in the corner if the seat next to her was free.

Apart from the fact that her coat may have needed to be laid out flat, it was clear that no one was occupying this seat.  The combination of her frown and audible expression of frustration made it clear, however, that she was far from happy with my ‘intrusion’.

As the train pulled out of the station, I could feel the tension and hoped that the next station would give me an excuse to move and find another spot. 

I closed my eyes and tried to ignore the vibe.

Twenty minutes later, I was woken by a tourist trying to pronounce our first destination stop.  After years of observation, I have to conclude that our friends from the US find it hardest to announce their arrival in a place named Slough.  Nine times out of ten, it comes out as ‘sloff’ or ‘slew’.

I smiled to myself and then remembered my neighbour.  I bet she wasn’t smiling, I thought.  But I could hardly dare to look.

Then, all of a sudden, she tapped me on my shoulder.  My heart sank and I prepared to defend my position.  Except that, when I turned towards her, I saw a kindness in her face that wasn’t there before.

‘I just wanted to say,’ she said, ‘in case you were getting off here that I’m sorry for how I was with you before.  It is just that I am about to have a really bad weekend and I took it out on you.  Please forgive me.’

It wasn’t at all what I expected her to say.  Not this side of sloff, anyway.

I quietly said that it was okay.  I was sorry she was going to have a bad weekend, I added.

This was her cue to tell me her story.  Her parents were recently divorced and this weekend she would be visiting them in Oxford for the first time in separate houses.  She explained how hard it was for her to make sense of what had happened.

I smiled sympathetically and went back to my book. 

If only she knew, I thought to myself.  I’ve been on this journey for years now, a divorced dad aboard the train of modern family life; trying my best to keep travelling closer towards those I love most in all the world; sometimes struggling myself to make sense of having children in separate homes – in separate countries.

As the train reached its final destination, the American family, I noticed, were busy gathering their things and excitedly debating how to pronounce Magdalen College.  I wanted to turn to my neighbour and let her know that it really was going to be okay; that even a broken home can provide a homecoming.  I wanted to tell her that I was trying to make sense of everything too and that I truly believe that, in the end, these things will all be well.

But before I had a chance to say anything at all, I noticed that she was already on her way.

When I did finally read the book, however, I realized that the point of Lori Silverman’s Wake Me Up When the Data is Over (2006) was not exactly what I had expected. It was less a book about data (and how to survive it), more about the role and function of storytelling to drive results and effect positive organizational change.  Data was not even listed in the index.

Talking of storytelling, I’ve thought long and hard, throughout my career, about the importance of narrative for schools, often saying that those of us who work in that cluster of related offices we call Marketing, Admissions and Advancement are integrally linked by a common job description: telling the story of our school and helping others find their place in that story.  That said, when I actually came to read Silverman’s book, I found myself strangely at odds with the general direction of this collection of essays. 

In fact, the more I thought about it, the more I became convinced that data and storytelling should never be reduced to a simple Either/Or – a junction where we are forced to leave behind all those complex numerical formulae, graphs and spreadsheets and run headlong into a sunset where every sentence begins ‘Once upon a time’. Surely, it is possible to understand data as a particular form or expression of the storytelling art; a form that also happens to be of increasing relevance to those of us who are charged with the task of capturing and passing on the truth about what learning looks like in our schools.

With only this hunch to guide me, I started to poke around and notice how data was being collected, used and passed on around me – at least in the External Relations Department of the International School of Brussels. Brian, my co-editor for the current book, was a colleague at the time and it was his practical insight and ever-thoughtful analysis of the situation that finally convinced me that we had some work to do.  We collected line after line of data, but no-one could say why we went to all the trouble. We produced beautiful graphs, but immediately filed them away for safe-keeping.  We measured where we were, but never stopped to consider where we actually wanted to be.  We mined the information, but shared it with no-one – so, not surprisingly, nothing ever changed.  Looking back, it was all ‘busy work’ that made everyone sleepy.

The turning point was the moment the conversation began. As a team, we simply set time aside and started talking to one another.  We discussed a set of nagging questions that just wouldn’t go away: How do we get a snapshot of the school on one page? How big do we actually want this school to be? How do we really gauge the health of our organization? With a transient international community, how do we preserve our institutional memory? How do we efficiently report to the Board? How do we make best use of management meetings? How do we assess the progress of our strategic plans and projects? What are the key drivers that define great schools? How do we find simplicity in all this complexity?

Every road led us back to the increasing role and importance of data.

To be continued.

An extract from the upcoming title, Effective Data Management in Schools (John Catt Educational Ltd), Brian Bedrick and David Willows, Ed. (Published April 2012). 

Well, that’s it for another year.

When the tree in the corner of the living room looks more like the sole survivor of a nuclear winter than a winter wonderland, then we tend to know it’s time to call it a day, pack up what’s left of the lights and twinkling ornaments, and return to our work-a-day lives. 

We’ve travelled, eaten, played, laughed, argued sometimes.

We’ve opened, bought, given, smiled, perhaps even cried.

But has any of this festive cheer changed us for the better?  Are we in any way different because of the story of Christmas that we have, in one way or another, re-enacted?

I’m not particularly speaking of faith here, although clearly this is where the story began.  I’m simply wondering whether, as the dark days of winter begin to take their toll (at least for those of us living ‘above the line’), the light that grew with all these ‘good times’ will be strong enough to last the onset of yet-again-ordinary life.

Or perhaps we’re accustomed to letting it fade away slowly – faith, hope and charity eroded by the winds of anxiety that accompany the stresses and strains of modern family life.

Looking back with the hindsight that January tends to bring, I notice that most of us head into the New Year firmly resolved to do less than what we did back in December. 

Eat less, drink less, make less mess. 

Could it be, though, that is where I tend to go wrong?  Are we too quick to extinguish the long shadow of the season and settle back into something less than real life?

American writer and broadcaster, Andy Rooney, died just before Christmas, only a few weeks ago.  “One of the most glorious messes in the world,” he once is reported to have said, “is the mess created in the living room on Christmas day. Don't clean it up too quickly.”

Don’t clean it up too quickly. 

The tree in our home is gone.  To be perfectly honest, I’m not at all sad about that. 

And yet, this year, I’m determined not to forget too quickly those few days of seasonal cheer, surrounded by those I most love in the world.   I’m determined not to forget the feasting, lounging, playing, and long half-meaningful conversations that end deep into the night.

That is my resolution.

After all, these are the moments that my children will remember.  The rest is nothing but white noise.

The postman rarely comes around our way, except to deliver bills or spam. 

Even at Christmas, this messenger’s route is stubbornly unchanged.  But it never used to be like this.

Perched on the window sill, back when I was the age my daughters are now, I can clearly recall the feeling of exhilaration as our local postman came into view at the far end of the street.  Holding an impossibly large collection of letters and small packets (the large ones would come later in the day by van), I remember, on each of the days between the end of school and Christmas Eve, trying to guess how many he would drop through our letter box.

The wait was almost painful, but eventually and without fail a dozen or so white envelopes, each one adorned with special festive stamps, would land on the carpet, spraying in all directions across the floor.

By Christmas Day, each one of these cards had been opened, read and placed on suspended strings right around the walls of the living room – a festival of colour and testimony to the fact, I thought, that my parents had so many ‘friends’. 

I still recall the magic that accompanied all this red, gold, glitter, and seasonal goodwill; simple messages of cheer now posted on a wall.  They never said very much (except for those who chose to add a typed attachment, describing in tedious detail the wonderful achievements of their children).  In the end, though, 140 characters was normally enough to get the message across.

A generation later, there is no one waiting for the postman.  Not in our house, anyway.  A few cards have dribbled in, but sadly not enough to hang upon the wall or convince the kids that anyone is thinking of us at this particular time of the year.

The Christmas card, at least at this end of the street, is dead; replaced by another Wall, where our messages of hope and love are posted by those we chose to call our ‘friends’.

The medium has changed, but our human need to reach out to others and let them know that we are thinking of them during this season of goodwill, clearly, has not.

And probably never will. 

This story needs little explanation.

It's simply an attempt to stand out from the crowd and tell the story of a school at a moment in time when words and pictures no longer differentiate us.

So sit back. 

Relax.

And if you like it, share it.

At the start of the year I took a few moments to look back and capture the wisdom and wit expressed by the youngest members of our family. 

You can read it here.

Twelve months on, these moments in time keep on occuring: surprising us, delighting us and, on occasion, stopping us in our tracks.

That’s what kids do, I guess.  They see the world in colours that, with increasing years, we tend to become blind to.  

So, without further ado, here’s a look back on 2011 as captured by two seven-year old twins.

Enjoy!

****

"Daddy, when you wear that scarf your neck looks very small."
(Juliette, On giving someone a Complex)

"Daddy, I feel like a slup." 
(Lea, On the importance of not confusing your Ps and Ts) 

"I spy something beginning with F. It's not an object. Give up?...fun!"
(Juliette, On seeing a dimension of life in the Emergency Room at 0230hrs that adults are simply blind to)

”I can't touch you, Daddy, because you are sick and I'll catch the fleas.”
(Lea On bedside manner)

"Daddy, why is it that humans can eat chocolates, but chocolates cannot eat humans?"
(Lea, On standing up for the rights of others)

"Daddy, in my new library book it says that if you have a Border Collie like ours, you have to buy 24 sheep. Otherwise, it will get bored."
(Lea, On pushing modern pet care a step too far)

"After next year, I'll be in Grade 2 and then we go to High School."
(Lea, On accelerated learning)

"No, Daddy, I don't want to come for a walk with you this morning - unless you want to take me in a pushchair."
(Lea, On taking laziness to a whole new level)

"Daddy, there are humans and there are aliens. We don't actually know if there are really aliens. Apparently, though, if you go onto the internet you can find out for sure."
(Lea, On the ultimate Google search)

“So the snake was Harry's mummy."
(Lea, On summing up the Hogwarts adventure)

"Is there police in England? It doesn't look like it."
(Lea, On mindless acts of violence)

"Did you hear about London? Someone broke it."
(Juliette, Discussing recent social unrest with a friend at summer school)

"Today was a fabulous day. Amazing. Super."
 (Juliette, On being in grade 1)

"ISB is a vere gu schol.  Mum is a fablus wurcr.  Dad is a fublus wurcr." 
(Juliette, On learning to write)  

"Daddy, Daddy, I came second in the track race today!" (Twin 1)
"Daddy, Daddy, I almost came second too.... second to last." (Twin 2)

"Someone in my class can turn their tongue into a flower. I wish I could turn my tongue into a flower."
(Juliette, On green envy)

Juliette was proudly reading her reading book tonight when she came across the line, "Sam got some water for the ditch." It was a bad day to get her b's and d's mixed up.

"Why are you rushing? You don't have a boyfriend waiting for you at a restaurant."
(Juliette, On why Lea should colour in the lines)

"Ooh Dad, you said the 'sh...' word! ..... (pause).... Shtupid!"
(Lea, On swearing)

"You exist.  I exist.  Ghosts don't exist."
(Juliette, On the meaning of the word existence)

"Daddy, you MUST not set the alarm or make a fire this evening or St Nicolas will not be happy when he comes by tonight."
(Lea, On making sure nothing will spoil her chances of getting the present she wants)

‎"Daddy, can your boss chuck kids out of school? Because, if he can, I have a name for him. Someone who has been really mean to me today."
(Lea, On pulling strings)

"You know, Daddy, when we went to the Grand Place we saw sheep and kings and shepherds and the baby Jesus. We even saw God. But it was the fake one."
(Juliette, On seeing things as they really are)

THE END 

This story begins somewhere outside of Paris in the summer of 1918 along the banks of the river Mame.  The story is less than half true.

During this, the last major German offensive on the Western Front during the First World World, more than 139 000 allied troops lost their lives or were wounded in not even three weeks.  Among them, a young man named Alfred.  Alfred, like so many others, wasn’t born a soldier.   He was a poet – a sentimentalist – in love with life and all that it had to offer.   But that was then, before the world collapsed.

Sitting in those stinking, rotten trenches of human despair, Alfred Joyce Kilmer (for let us use his full name) was undoubtedly less sentimental.  All light now extinguished.  All hope now gone.  And yet his words and his story remain, as I recently discovered through happenstance and with a little help from Google.     

Alfred, just two years before his death, I discover, was fascinated by what he called “The magic of the circus”. 

We who every morning at the breakfast table read of war and desolation need to cheer our hearts with the burlesque battles of the clowns; we who ride in the subway need to exult when the charioteer, with streaming toga, guides his six white horses on their thunderous course; we whose eyes are daily on our ledgers and sales records need to lift them, if not to the stars, at least to the perilous wire on which a graceful pedestrian gayly flirts with death. (The Circus and Other Essays)

I wonder whether Alfred thought of clowns and therein found comfort on the day he died?  Did he still believe this theatre of childhood dreams was the “greatest poem in the world”?

Fast forward to 1971.  There’s Bradley standing a short distance away from the expectant crowd, just next to the row of caravans that had been the closest thing to home that Bradley (and the rest of the Troup for that matter) could recall.  In the wake of the Second ‘Great’ War, jobs were hard to find and any sense of purpose even harder. 

People love the circus, his father used to say.  It gives them something to believe in.  Faith arising from something as simple as a poster telling them that “there are in the slide-show a man with three legs, a woman nine feet tall, and a sword swallower.” That’s all it takes.

Bradley didn’t have three legs and wasn’t particularly tall.  But he could make a plate turn upon a stick.  He was a clown, you see - the clown that once had cheered his poor father’s heart, right up until the day he died on that unfortunate summer’s day.

Now in his sixties, any sense of cheer was long gone.  Children and their parents came and marveled, came and laughed, came and sat in awe of those who painted themselves to hide the sadness of who they had become.

Fast forward to 1996.  Bradley doesn’t spin plates any more.  In fact, he doesn’t do much at all except watch the television in the corner of the room that seems to be the only form of permanent entertainment the nurses want to offer.  On this particular day, though, the old man lifts his head in time to catch a glimpse; recognizing immediately that familiar lassoo and flicking of the wrist that is sufficient to produce the magical gyroscopic effect.  David Spathaky, assisted by Debbie Woolley, it is reported, has managed to spin one hundred and eight plates simultaneously on live television .  A new Guinness World Record is set. 

Fast forward to 2009.  Sue never knew her dad, just rumours about him.  And the rumours weren’t sufficient to arouse much curiosity beyond that point.  In any case, there was too much to do these days to get all sentimental about things.  There was nothing sentimental about her life, she thought.  Three children, a long forgotten man in her life, a job she didn’t care for and a boss who didn’t much care for her.  It’s like spinning plates, she’d say.  I just can’t do it anymore.  Sooner or later they are all going to come crashing down at my feet.

And on the banks of a river, just outside of Paris, the memory of a voice rang out from the darkness.

You are exactly right.  They might just do.

But by daring to do what you do – nurturing those now adolescent children in the way that you do – you have now become the greatest poem in the world.

Your grandfather would be proud.

I opened my eyes.  Had I been conscious all this time or was it simply the aftermath of a terrible dream?

In any case, I was now most definitely awake and, in the most silent hour of the night, still moving closer to the edge; daring myself with each premeditated step to look into the infinite abyss that now lay just a little way ahead of me.

My heart was racing, causing my body to perspire more than it should.  Breathe was short and hard to catch.  A sign a panic, no doubt.

It took a few minutes, especially in this state, but I managed to crawl far enough to catch a glimpse of what, for as long as I can recall, had consumed me with a sinking feeling of absolute dread.

I saw myself and my future; a future, decades, centuries, millennia from now; when I am no longer even a memory; when my footprint on this earth and every one of my best efforts have been obliterated by the winds of time.

I saw the terrifying fact of my eternal non-existence and felt the sinking dread of my humanity, facing up to the realization that none of this actually matters.  At least, not in the grandest scheme of things.

Like the brightness of the noonday sun, it was impossible to look at directly.  Short, terrifying glimpses, viewed from the corner of my hand, with my hands covering my face, were as much as I could muster. 

It was morning now and, even if the sun had not begun to rise, I had a train to catch.  Already packed, I reached for the book that was still unread beside my bed and headed straight for the station, headed for London - a city that lives, breathes and sells a very different kind of story about the way things are.

The book's introduction, after the night I had, intrigued me.  It was dedicated to a family member - and all others like him - that felt that their life on earth had been unimportant and without meaning, significance or love.

I was already gripped and happy to indulge in the tale of an old man and the people he meets immediately in the the 'days' following his death, after an accident at the fairground where he worked until the age of 83.  Eddie, I discover, lived an unimportant life and, yet, each one of these post mortem encounters is singularly designed to help him make sense of his life, bring meaning and perspective, and understand the story of who he was from some more central region.  Heaven, in short, is the opportunity to fit together the broken fragments of his life once and for all.

It could be said (and no doubt someone, somewhere, already did) that Mitch Albom's best-selling book, The Five People You Meet In Heaven, is nothing more than a sentimental attempt to postpone my fear until such time as I am no longer able to feel at all.  Perhaps.  But, still, it certainly left me thinking.

Three simple, loosely tangled, thoughts:

1. The power of a single story lies in its ultimate connectivity.  'No story sits by itself,' says Albom, 'Sometimes stories meet at corners and sometimes they cover one another completely, like stones beneath a river.'  If I look at myself, whichever way I look, I will always find a fragile story of almost utter insignificance,  But it's not just me is it?  My story, as Albom illustrates beautifully in Eddie's meeting with the Blue Man, is inextricably bound up with those around me and reaches across space and time - each voice joining another, until finally the chorus of dissent against the abyss is harder to ignore.  That is the beauty of the crowd.  And, in the history of the universe, humanity will at the very least declare itself to be a 'moment' of energy and unparalleled beauty accompanied by the orchestra of the natural world (or perhaps the other way around).  'The world is full of stories,' Albom concludes, 'but the stories are all one.'  We learned from our ancient predecessors the importance of knowing ourselves.  What they forgot to say is that every one of the stones that today make up the sands of our time come from somewhere.

2.  There is one story that covers us - defines us - almost completely from our beginning until our end.  'All parents damage their children,' says Albom as Eddie comes to understand better his relationship with his father.  'It cannot be helped,  Youth, like pristine glass, absorbs the prints of its handlers.  Some parents smudge, others crack, a few shatter childhoods completely into jagged little pieces, beyond repair.'  As I get off the train and fall again into the arms of my adorable, teenage son.  I look for signs of wear and tear; smudge marks left by my carelessness and selfish ambition.  Later in the day, he tells me that he is stressed because something about his mobile phone bill is not quite right.  He is the victim of a cheap phone scam.  I see his anxiety and recognize myself in his reaction.  At the same time, in that moment, I remember my night and how, in the ultimate end, this moment will not and should not define how he feels about himself and who he is.  I want to do nothing else except pull him close and wipe away all of the heaviness from his heart.  Forever.  I refuse to let him wait until his time has passed before understanding how much he is totally and utterly loved.  My beautiful boy.

3. If I am in control of my own story, I'd rather meet my five on earth.  The point, in the end, is a pragmatic one.  If I'm honest, I don't actually know if I'll have a chance to meet my top five after my sand has run out.  And I'm not sure I get the opportunity to help others understand quite how much they influenced, inspired and loved me along the way.  So I'd rather play it safe and start now.  That way, when my day comes and I am required, for better or for worse, to jump into the abyss - I will do so knowing that I have lent my voice to the chorus of this wonderful life and sung my heart out from the cheap seats at the back.

Eddie's death at the age of 83 was unexpected but predictable:

A stunning impact.
A blinding flash of light.
And then, nothing.

But, then again, Albom explains, every story has at least two different angles.  So who knows how to make sense of it all?

The fascination continued when, as a young theology and philosophy undergraduate, I learned of a world where Truth could no longer be reduced to a series of objective facts, but captured in the meta-narratives that define and guide our reading of the way things are.  Then, and I am really not sure why, I started reading the work of people like Stephen Denning and his ground-breaking work on storytelling and organizational change.[i]  Despite the fact that I knew nothing at the time about the world of Corporate Communications, what he had to say still had a ring of truth about it – and not just to me.  Today, more than a decade later, narrative approaches to what we do are everywhere and Denning is arguably responsible for a brand new tribe.

Now I say we, but who am I kidding?  I work in a school – with kids!  Isn’t that a world apart from the real business of Corporate Communications?  In one sense, of course, it is different.  Entirely different, unless you follow David Perkins’ line of reasoning when he says that all organizations are really only about conversations and that, notwithstanding the particular line of business we are in, effective leadership is always about helping people to have better, smarter conversations.[ii] 

And if you talk about conversations in one breath, you surely have to mention stories in the next.  After all, stories are the ‘stuff’ of most conversations and unique in their ability to bring meaning, pattern and order to the otherwise disconnected fragments of our lives.  

Not convinced?  Well just try and think of any recent, meaningful conversation, at work or in the office, in which you did not tell a story to illustrate your point, contribute an idea, raise an issue or make a connection with somebody.

In short, it’s all about stories.

In fact, these days, notwithstanding the complexity of our art, we are in the end nothing more and nothing less than a band of storytellers: Telling the story of our organization and helping other people find their place in that story.  It really is that simple.  Everything else – all our plans, budgeting, annual targets, policies, and protocols – is just white noise.

Now this does not mean, of course, that we have left our work-a-worlds and plunged into a realm of fantasy and make-believe.  On the contrary, as Michael Margolis explains, for those of us who communicate on behalf of our companies or organizations, it is high time we faced up to the fact that ‘people don’t really buy your product, solution, or idea, they buy the stories that are attached to it.’[iii] 

So what does a storytelling approach to Corporate Communications look like?  The good news is that today there are a bunch of people out there, like Margolis and Denning, redefining and bringing the narrative dimension of what we do into sharp relief.  Rather than simply tell you what they already know, I will therefore stick to what I know best: my practitioner’s tale, which turns upon three story-focused questions we happened to ask along the way, and some pointers for further discussion.

Is our story coherent at every stage along the way?

Have you ever sat down at your desk only to stumble upon a lack of coherence in the story that you were trying to tell.  It’s the moment you first notice that, despite the best laid plans and awe-inspiring publications, inconsistencies have appeared like bubbles on a freshly painted wall.   

Of course, in a school with 1500 students from 70 countries and 300 employees, inconsistencies are everywhere.  So where to start?

Our approach began by recognizing that, just as epic tales conjure up characters , each one of which may happen to be on some kind of journey, everyone connected with our organization also is journeying and could literally be mapped on a continuum between first ‘attraction’ and ‘release’ (See Figure 1).

Of course, each one of my colleagues focuses upon different aspects of this life-cycle depending upon their prescribed roles within the team.  From a storytelling point of view, however, it was critical that we came to a common understanding that it really is all part of the same process: telling the story and helping people – students, parents, donors, partners – find their place in that story. 

Having seen ourselves connected in this way, we went on to ask whether there was sufficient coherence between each of these ‘staging posts’.  Concretely, was the experience of ‘inclusion, challenge and success’ that is so much a part of our brand proposition in Stage 1 so keenly felt as students and their families journeyed through the school?   After all, it is one thing to have a story.  It is quite another to see it lived out in every aspect of who we are and what we do.

Is our story listening or even making sense?

A wise man once wrote that ‘if a story is not about the hearer he [or she] will not listen … A great lasting story is about everyone or it will not last. The strange and foreign is not interesting – only the deeply personal and familiar.’[iv]  From a storytelling point of view, the idea that a story is as much about the listener as the narrator is hardly new.  Yet it was only a few years that we all sat reading The Cluetrain Manifesto, transfixed by the suggestion that this truly was the end of business-as-usual; pondering that audacious proposal that markets are now conversations and that ‘in just a few more years, the current homogenized "voice" of business—the sound of mission statements and brochures—will seem as contrived and artificial as the language of the 18th century French court.’[v]

A little more than ten years on, sitting in our communications offices, it is all too apparent how prophetic this manifesto was.  The Internet, to say nothing of web 2.0 and social media, has changed everything – forever.  Even at school, we have become accustomed to a world of daily Google alerts and moderated Facebook or YouTube comments.  Via our website and other online platforms, we have got used to the fact that we can no longer get away with the digital equivalent of our dusty, old brochures, but instead are required to offer a space where conversations about learning take place; a dynamic environment in which people feel that their questions are pondered, opinions heard, and values, well, valued.

Personally, we are not there yet.  That said, we keep coming back to this question with two simple observations.

First, in story terms, our school website is slowly becoming as much a narrative about the organization we want to be as the organization we already are.  Again, to Margolis’ point, it is not the product (even if that ‘product’ is an education) that is driving effective conversations with our prospective customers or future employees.  No, it’s the stories behind that product – all of the values, aspirations, struggles, ideas and customer feedback – that capture the imagination and inspire people to believe that we really could become the school we desire to be.  So, rather than being narrators of a static script, everything is today far more fluid.  It’s less about giving information, more about sending out invitations to join the discussion.

Second, there is the lingering issue of losing control vs losing the plot.  As social media inevitably and relentlessly pushes us to become better listeners, have better conversations and become more flexible in relation to our ‘customers’, it is clear that sooner or later we will all have to give up the myth that we can control what people are saying about us, our companies or organizations.  They always did talk about us, in fact.  The only difference now, with the advent of Web 2.0, is that we can listen in more easily and, in some cases, measure what people are saying out there.  Even if we have lost control, however, a lot of our customers are enjoying a great deal of ‘airtime’ right now and it’s time to ask ourselves whether we are really ready to throw up our hands in despair and give ourselves up to the winds of common opinion?  Or is there another way of championing the story, holding on to the vision, and guiding people in the right direction.

Can we play with the story and is there a chance it will break?

If effective communications is all about storytelling, then it follows that there must also be an innate playfulness to our art.

This association is not new.  Alan Kelly, CEO and Founder of The Playmaker’s Standard has spent his career analyzing the communications role and come up with what he believes to be a series of essential, irreducible elements – ‘plays’ – which together make up a lexicon, a lingua franca, by which we can talk about, strategize, organize and predict the impact of the conversations we are having out there.[vi]  Communication, Kelly argues, is thus akin to a game of chess; a game with rules, strategies and, if not predictable outcomes, predictable moves. 

As we reflect upon our roles within the organization, however, it may be that predictability is not the first word that comes to mind.  We may consider ourselves playful, but more along the lines of the Shakespearean fool who pops up at key points in the narrative to simplify things, summarize, explain or simply bring a different perspective to the conversation – always looking for new ways and new opportunities to engage those around us. 

The key to change, in this sense, is innovation.  So we can never forget that ours is also the task of understanding, communicating, criticizing and reinventing the story almost on a daily basis – like a child rearranging Lego™ bricks to mirror constantly the imaginations of his or her mind. 

There is a chance, of course, that a story under such pressure of re-invention will shatter into a thousand tiny fragments.  At the same time, as C.S. Lewis once wrote, it is only by playing that we can break the story and begin to tell a truer tale.

Talking of truth, you may well ask, is any of this true?  Well, like a good communications plan or any other good story for that matter, to ask the question is to miss the point entirely.  After all, stories – even Corporate stories – are always personal and can never be reduced to matters of fact.  Are the tales of Narnia true?  Of course they are!  Like effective communication, they are sealed with a ‘ring of truth’ and spoken with an authentic voice.  In the end, even as communications ‘professionals’ that is surely as much as we can ever hope for.

This article was written for publication in Communication Director: Magazine for Corporate Communications and Public Relations.  To view the article in PDF format, click here.

[i] Denning, S. The Springboard: How Storytelling Ignites Action In Knowledge-Era Organizations (Butterworth-Heinemann,2000)
[ii] Perkins, D. King Arthur's Round Table: How Collaborative Conversations Create Smart Organizations (Wiley, 2002)
[vi] Kelly, A. The Elements of Influence: Introducing The Playmaker's Standard: The New Essential System For Managing Competition, Reputation, Brand, And Buzz (Dutton Adult 2006)
[iii] Margolis, M. Believe Me: Why Your Vision, Brand, and Leadership Need A Bigger Story (Get Storied Press, 2009)
[iv] Steinbeck, J. East of Eden (Penguin Classics, 1992)
[v] Levine, R. et al. The Cluetrain Manifesto : The End Of Business As Usual (Basic Books, 2000)

At this time of year darkness creeps into both ends of the day.

The sun has finally given up its fight, it seems, and stays permanently low in the sky.   We raise our voices to celebrate light coming into the world, but find ourselves more accustomed to its absence.

Away from city lights on nights when the stars are covered by a blanket of cloud, the woods are particularly dark.  And with only the dog as my companion, I find myself alone with my thoughts and, more particularly, my fears.

I recall that Joseph Campbell described life as a journey; a journey in which our doubts and fears act as guardians, taunting and daring us to leave the country that we know and stride towards whatever lies in the darkness ahead. 

Campbell’s view was that, in the end, fear was a positive thing inasmuch as ‘the very cave you are afraid to enter turns out to be the source of what you are looking for.’ 

Okay.  But still I find the darkness weighs heavy around me.

It is just as Dr. Seuss described in his humerous tale, What Was I Scared Of?

Then I was deep within the woods
When suddenly I spied them
I saw a pair of pale green pants
With nobody inside them 

I wasn’t scared but yet I stopped
What could those pants be there for?
What could a pair of pants at night
Be standing in the air for?

And then they moved! Those empty pants
They kind of started jumping
And then my heart, I must admit
It kind of started thumping.

Through this silliest of stories, Seuss conjures up for children and adults everywhere an impossible world in which a spooky pair of green pants waits, lurking in the shadows.

And now he’s got me thinking: what are my green pants?  What’s out there, lurking in the woods, waiting for me to wander by? 

Statistically, the answer is that there probably isn’t actually anything out there that is going to getting my heart thumping any time soon.  And yet the anxiety remains.

In the morning light, I know this path will take on an altogether different complexion, but for now my mind is powerful enough to keep the light at bay.