Health-tech CEOs reveal their storytelling secrets

I recently met with a founder who described the success of a larger competitor in the following way: “We have a better product. But I guess they were better at telling the story.” 

That comment was meant to disparage the competition, as little more than smoke and mirrors. But the ability to tell a story is a highly effective - and often underestimated - business strategy that should be praised, versus undermined. A good story can get any team well on their way, and it’s extremely challenging to compete against a company that has strong awareness in the market plus a strong product. In those all too rare cases, I’ve personally seen companies grow from being small startups to achieving escape velocity. 

Over the past five years, I’ve spent countless nights and weekends working on a book about the secrets of the best storytellers in business. I wrote the book through two births and postpartum periods, and I edited it on countless subway rides or hovering by the tub while my kids took a bath. The book is so important to me because I genuinely believe that healthcare entrepreneurs (and, really, all entrepreneurs) have the odds are stacked against them. And I know deep in my bones, from 15 years of interviewing founders and business leaders, that storytelling matters and can give them an edge.

Good storytellers aren’t just effective at winning media attention. They are also more adept at hiring and recruiting, at sales, and at raising investor capital. Storytelling catalyzes all the important business processes because humans are not objective beings that are driven by numbers and statistics. Our brains process information and retain it through stories. Neuroscientists have proven that via countless studies. I spoke to many of them in the process of writing the book, who confirmed that even in an era of AI.

So how can you learn from the top storytellers, and apply it to your own company? Well, I would first invite you to pre-order the book. For authors, that means the world and it’s especially important to give the book lift in the early days. But if you’re more of a CliffsNotes person or you need to read more to be convinced (your time is extremely valuable), then I wrote a preview for you of five lessons from the book. Several of these feature storytellers in the health-tech industry, although I chatted with CEOs across entertainment, retail, consumer, technology, sports, and more.