How Long?
Whenever I get to the Q&A part of my trainings, a reoccurring question comes up. “How long should my story be?”
This brilliant and insightful question requires a lot of thoughts to answer. I sense, however, the latent concern behind this question. Brevity is extremely challenging and time consuming to accomplish. Most people are strapped with time and don’t know how to craft short and sweet stories. So when does a story get so long that we loose our audience’s attention? (And how long of YOUR attention do I have so YOU will finish reading my blog?)
Keeping this latent concern in mind, here are two ways I’d answer the question.
In 2 words, and
In under 25 words
In 2 words: It depends.
(If you were master film director like Steve McQueen with an epic story to tell (12 Year A Slave, anyone?), your story can be over 2 hours. BUT. If you are not McQueen, and don’t have an epic story to tell, you might consider telling your story for as long as an average person’s attention span lasts: 8 seconds. There has to be a middle ground!)
So in less than 25 words: 5-7 minutes. There is intriguing and delighting; and there is data dumping. Know when to do what. Telling business stories is about the former.
Now, if you wonder how I came up with 5-7 minutes, check back next Wednesday. I promise the “how” will be just long enough to keep your attention!
