Story+PD: How do product managers learn about Story?

Part of a series at the intersection of Storytelling and Product Development

I’ve been steeped in design thinking and human-centered design since I was in high school. I cannot recall in design nor engineering education at Stanford, nor in my nearly seven years at Ford ever hearing someone mention “story” in our work, pre-2000. My frame on “story” was probably “fiction”, except in the context of a “story in the news.” Despite being an avid reader, I didn’t think much about it, until we started a human-centered strategy firm. My incredibly curious colleagues introduced me to writings on semiotics, media theory, linguistics, cognitive psychology, and other social sciences, among others, that were not core to the design and engineering curriculum. I certainly didn’t remember McLuhan nor Bruner from my electives. 

I’m sure it’s given more weight now, similar to how empathy, design thinking, and coding have all made it from the evangelism by the few into mainstream secondary school curricula over the past 20 years. But I don’t really know.

Storytelling in business in general has had an explosion of ‘thought leadership’ over the last 10 years. Much of it seems oriented to better marketing, especially B2C, and to motivational purposes.

Maybe the more salient question is: how are today’s PMs learning to use story in their work? What are the most favored courses, books, and other resources on the topic?