"The secret to telling awesome stories", Steve Clayton, digital anthropologist, Microsoft's Chief Storyteller

[Previously posted here]

Stumbled over Steve on Twitter some time ago and was intrigued to learn more about him as he is a Brit working at the heart of Microsoft in Seattle in the States and studied at my home town university, Loughborough.

Steve Clayton GM, Microsoft storytelling. In this role, Steve is responsible for Microsoft communications via CEO and executive voices along with channels such as Microsoft News Center, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. Steve was the architect of the acclaimed 88 Acres story that heralded a new direction for Microsoft’s corporate storytelling and led to the creation of microsoft.com/stories.
(from Steve's Linkedin profile)

When #FLdigital 1st ran I posted about storytelling referencing Robert McKee's book "Story: Substance, Structure, Style and the Principles of Screenwriting" (seehttps://goo.gl/H2Bfiy). I recently received the following weekly email from Steve referencing a different book on Story so posting this now. Whilst doing this post, I found Steve' s "The secret to telling awesome stories".

"The Friday Thing #434 is a reader suggestion from a bloke called Frank. Like me, he enjoys the craft of storytelling and is a fan of seminal work on the topic, “The Hero With a Thousand Faces” by Joseph Campbell. In our time challenged world though, who has the time to read a story about storytelling? I mean, you should but if you don’t have time, check out this wonderful 1m 57s video from Netherlands-based filmmaker Iskander Krayenbosch. In 12 steps (based on Christopher Vogler’s work that was inspired by Campbell) you’ll get the essence of storytelling – and perhaps marvel at how much George Lucas and Steven Spielberg are the modern day masters of the craft. There a no bonus points for naming every movie used in this video to tell the story – but you do get points removed if you don’t recognize every movie. Check out "The Hero’s Journey"."
(from Steve Clayton's Friday Thing #434 )

Resources
(1) "The Secret to telling awesome stories", Steve Clayton at Microsoft Ignite NZ, September 2015:



(2) Video: The Hero's Journey: https://vimeo.com/140767141

(3) Steve's Linkedin profile: https://www.linkedin.com/pub/steve-clayton/15/3ab/243

(4) Microsoft's Stories web site: http://news.microsoft.com/stories

(5) Steve's Twitter page -@stevecla: https://twitter.com/stevecla

(6) Wikipedia page for Joseph Campbell's "The Hero With a Thousand Faces”: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Hero_with_a_Thousand_Faces

(7) Google Books preview of Joseph Campbell's "The Hero With a Thousand Faces”: https://goo.gl/CBTmbH

(8) Wikipedia page for Christopher Vogler's "The Writer's Journey: Mythic Structure for Writers": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Writer%27s_Journey:_Mythic_Structure_for_Writers

(9) Microsoft's "88 Acres: How Microsoft Quietly Built the City of the Future" corporate story: http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/stories/88acres/

 

Steve’s Twitter Stream

Tweets by stevecla

 

To sign up for the Friday Thing, send email to stevecla@microsoft.com with subject “sign me up for The Friday Thing”.

 

Steve and music

Steve is a big music fan. He mentioned this playlist - Spotify’s Time Capsule. Click the link to play your own time capsule and be amazed!

Also hear Steve talking about his fave songs from each decade of his life on this “Music Talks - Episode 1 - Steve Clayton” Spotify podcast episode. “It starts with Steve's five choices from each decade of his life. There are then 20 other songs from artists/films referenced during the Podcast.”