Editor’s Note: Sam Bayer is the founder and recently retired CEO of Corevist, a Durham-based bootstrapped software company launched in 2008.  Bayer launched his career in 1980 working for IBM, which he left when he founded his first entrepreneurial endeavor Axiom Systems in 1987.  Axiom would eventually be taken public through an initial public offering.  Bayer notes that his entire 42-year professional career was guided by his determination to negotiate win-win value with his customers and fueled by his thirst for knowledge and scientific approach to problem solving.  Now, he will be recounting his entrepreneurial leadership experiences in his “Stories at Work” series for WRAL TechWire.  You can also follow Bayer on instagram @sam.bayer and at sam.bayer@gmail.com any feedback about this series.

His blogs are the latest addition to our Startup Monday package.

+++

DURHAM – Stories are as old as humanity. Around 30,000 years ago, prehistoric man drew the first pictures of animals and plants on the walls of the Lascaux and Chavaux caves of France. It is thought they may have been drawn to teach survival skills or to appease the gods before a hunt.

Of course we’re all aware of the stories by, and about our religious leaders: Abraham, Moses, Jesus, Mohammed, Buddha and others. These are the stories that give us spiritual guidance and the playbooks for ethical living.

Fast forward to modern times.  500 hours of YouTube videos were uploaded every minute in 2020 and viewed by close to 3 billion users every month. Each a story designed to accumulate as many likes as possible and to compete for our diminishing attention spans.

Earfluence’s Jason Gillikin talks about rise of podcasts, impact on Triangle startup community

Stories are a part of our humanity

The allure of stories is that they entertain us first.  While they have our attention, stories deliver their payload.  Stories can help us feel in control.  They attempt to make sense of the events of a random world.  They help us empathize and understand others.   Stories can motivate us into action and inspire us to greater achievements.  Stories can help us heal and steer us away from harm. Stories teach us the lessons of life and help us build on the experiences of our ancestors.

Sam Bayer, author of Stories at Work series

Sam Bayer, the author of the WRAL TechWire “Stories at Work” series.

In a nutshell, stories help us survive and thrive.

Stories take advantage of our evolved brains.

When our lives are being threatened, we don’t have time for stories. It’s either flight or fight. That’s the animal part of our brain acting on our behalf.

What separates humans from our animal ancestors is that we have an evolved brain enabling us to interact with the world in a more complex way.

Our brains love to engage the world with our senses and emotions. Humans are uniquely compelled to find cause and effect.  We derive great satisfaction from finding meaning and solving puzzles and mysteries.  That’s our evolved brain working on our behalf. Stories not only appeal to our evolved brain, they take advantage of our brain’s wiring designed to efficiently store and retrieve those stories.  Facts are difficult to retrieve, good stories aren’t.

Durham’s Corevist closes $5.4M Series B, with $4M in follow-on funding from Jurassic Capital

Stories at Work

In business, according to Bronwyn Fryer in his 2003 HBR article, persuasion is “…the centerpiece of business activity. Customers must be convinced to buy your company’s products or services, employees and colleagues to go along with a new strategic plan or reorganization, investors to buy (or not to sell) your stock, and partners to sign the next deal.”   He goes on to emphasize that a “…big part of a CEO’s job is to motivate people to reach certain goals. To do that, he or she must engage their emotions, and the key to their hearts is story.”

My career started as a Ph.D. Chemist in pursuit of facts and I believed that facts would convey their story.  I ended my professional career as a humbled CEO understanding that facts and logic were necessary, but insufficient to win the day.

In this series of articles, published exclusively by WRAL TechWire using the category tag Stories at Work, I’ll be sharing some of my favorite, and most useful, stories that have become part of my repertoire.  My wife, children, grandchildren, employees, clients, business partners and investors have all heard one or more of these stories.  I don’t offer them to you as prepackaged stories for your use…although feel free if you find any that resonate with you…but I offer them as examples of the potential power of stories in your personal and work lives.

Perhaps you’ll be inspired to tell your own stories.

When you do, just remember Abraham Joshua Heschel’s sage advice: “It is not enough to be a storyteller; one has to pray for good listeners.”

On quitting entrepreneurship: Bandwidth director chronicles decision to hang up startup hat