The Stories Behind the Stories: David

SHOW NOTES

The Stories Behind the Stories Episode David

Sometimes not knowing is the advantage. 

That's what my manager taught me when I first began this work. 

And it's why David's story works across every role, every industry and every sector.

I wrote David's story because it's a challenge I've observed people encounter in their working life. Technical expertise that goes unrecognised. Not because the person isn't capable. Because nobody can see the thinking behind the work. The person with the deepest understanding isn't always the one who shapes the decision. That gap — between what someone knows and what others can see — is what David's story is about. In this episode of The Stories Behind the Stories, I go deeper into the failure, success and passion stories behind the character — and into the real pattern I was observing when I wrote him.

RESOURCES

How to Turn Invisible Expertise Into Strategic Influence Through Storytelling.

The Programme Behind the Story: The Art of WorkLife Storytelling: Creating Three Fundamental Stories That Define Your Identity

Your Three Stories Takeaway

Before you go — something to take with you.

Your Success Story. 

What pattern do you see consistently that others consistently miss?

Your Passion Story. 

What hidden value are you drawn to making visible?

Your Failure Story.

What valuable insight have you been keeping inside a format that hides it?

Read the written version here: The Stories Behind the Stories: David

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

Sometimes not knowing is the advantage. That's what my manager taught me when I first began this work. And it's why David's story works across every role, every industry, and every sector. Hello, it's Carmel from School of Work Life. Welcome to the Stories Behind the Stories, where I go deeper into the work-life stories I've grafted. The thinking behind the ideas, the experiences that shape that thinking, the lessons learned from those experiences. Today's episode is David. His story is featured in the episode How to Turn Invisible Expertise into Strategic Influence through storytelling. In the last episode, I went deeper into Lisa's three stories. Today I want to go deeper into David's failure, success, and passion stories. Together they revealed something that no single story could show alone. Who he is professionally, what shaped him, and what drives him. The story behind the stories, what the numbers never said. Data tells people what happened. Story tells people what it means. David was good at his job. His thinking was sharp and completely invisible. Not because his work lacked value, because the value was hidden inside spreadsheets and reports that people referenced but never really discussed. I wrote David's story because it's a challenge I've observed people encounter in their working life. Technical expertise that goes unrecognized. Not because the person isn't capable, because nobody can see the thinking behind the work. The person with the deepest understanding isn't always the one who shapes the decision. That gap between what someone knows and what others can see is what David's story is about. What interests me about David is what his story costs. Not just professionally, the slow erosion of believing your thinking matters when nothing around you confirms that it does. The failure at the heart of David's story is quiet. Two years of valuable insights, shared accurately, professionally, and completely without impact on the conversations that mattered. Here's what I think was behind that. David believed his work would speak for itself, that if the analysis was sound, people would see its value. But expertise doesn't speak for itself. It needs a story to carry it. Data tells people what happened. Story tells people what it means. David had been providing the first and leaving out the second. His success story begins with a single decision. Instead of reporting the numbers, he shared a story. The Peterson electronics campaign, the click-through rates that looked like failure, and the discovery that the campaign was actually working so well the customers were bypassing the measurement systems entirely. One story told differently, and the room shifted. Not because the data changed, because suddenly people could see the thinking behind it. The decision to tell the story took courage, quiet courage. Joel had opened a door without knowing it. He was simply describing a problem, a campaign that wasn't performing. But David heard something in that, an opening, and he took it. Doing something he hadn't done before, speaking differently, stepping outside what was expected of him. This is the moment I find most powerful in David's story. Not the promotion, not the client wins, this one, a room full of people who had been looking at the same data and suddenly, for the first time, could see what it meant. That's what story does. It doesn't add information, it makes the meaning visible. David didn't share new data in that meeting. He shared the same data differently. That's the whole lesson. Not what you know, but how you carry it into a room, making the invisible visible. That's what David did in that meeting, and that's what I've always tried to do in my work, help people find what's already there and bring it into the open. David's passion story is revealing in an interesting way, because it reframes everything. His passion was never data, it was patterns, hidden patterns that others couldn't see, and a belief that when those patterns became visible, decisions change, outcomes change, people change. That's not a technical passion, that's a human one, making the invisible visible. That's not just David's passion, it's the foundation of everything I've built. The stories are always there in the people I work with, in the challenges they are navigating, in the experiences they have dismissed as ordinary. School of work life exists to bring them into the open. But that's not where the story ends. David's three stories didn't just change how he contributed to meetings. They changed how the agency worked with clients. A retail client ready to pull their budget, a pharmaceutical client company puzzled by their own results. In each conversation, David helped them see their own three stories, not just his. And something shifted, not just understanding, strategic clarity. That's what the three stories do when they're shared authentically. They create strategic clarity and help others see who they are. This is what the three stories do at their best. They don't just reveal who you are, they create the conditions for others to find who they are. That's not a technique, that's a way of working with people. David shows that happening in one agency in one year, starting with one story. The learning travels. Sonia came to David frustrated. Her insights were valuable, but no one was listening. David recognized himself immediately, and he knew exactly how to help. That's what I did for the people in Ireland, what Sarah did for James, what the Edinburgh consultant did for Lisa, what David did for Sonia. That's what this work is something received, something passed on. What I hope you take from David, beyond the framework, beyond the technical context, is something simpler. Your expertise is not invisible because it lacks value. It's invisible because it hasn't yet found its story. David is every professional whose thinking is genuinely strategic, whose insights could shape decisions, but whose contribution stays hidden inside the formats they were taught to use until they find a story that makes it visible. From my notebook, a fact. I know little about the technical specifics of the role, but I didn't need to, because David's story isn't about data analysis, it's about expertise that stays invisible and the moment it finally becomes visible. That experience belongs to every professional, regardless of role. Early in my career as a coach, I was paired with clients who wanted to change careers. My background was in investment banking, but my manager consistently gave me clients from law, not banking. When I asked why, he explained something that has stayed with me. Coaches with the same industry background as their clients often got in their own way. They brought assumptions inside knowledge that narrowed rather than opened. A coach without that background created different conditions. The client didn't expect industry expertise and didn't receive it. What they received instead was something more useful. Questions that came from genuine curiosity, not from assumed knowledge. That's what this work is built on. The three stories work across every role, every industry, every context, because they're not about what someone does. They're about who someone is. On David, I wrote Dave a third. James showed the three stories in an interview room. Lisa showed them at a networking event. David shows them in a meeting. Three different contexts, the same three stories, because the gap between what someone knows and what others can see isn't just an interview problem or a networking problem. It shows up everywhere in every room where decisions are made. What I've observed is this the thinking is always there, the formats just don't carry it. Reports and spreadsheets share what was found, not what it means, not how the thinking arrived. The story is what's missing. It's always a story. On reflection, David is a reflective person. That evening he did what reflective people do, including me. He sat with what had happened, he asked himself why it worked, what had shifted, what it meant. Reflection is powerful, not passive, active. It's how we make sense of our own experience, how we find the learning inside it, how we direct our own growth, without waiting for someone else's intervention. What David was doing was self-coaching, self-directing, self-leading, asking insightful self-questions, giving himself effective self-feedback, finding his own answers, carrying the learning forward. That's what this work is, designed to develop self-coaching, self-directing, self-leadership through reflection, through insightful self-questions, through effective self-feedback. David's story shows what happens when reflection becomes practice. Definitions from School of Work Life. Self-coaching is a process of guiding your growth and development, particularly through periods of transition in both the professional and personal realms. Self-directing is a series of independent actions and judgments free from external control and constraint, independent individualism from an independent mind without intervening factors or intermediaries. Self-leadership is having a developed sense of who you are, what you can do, where you are going, coupled with the ability to influence your communication, emotions, and behaviors on the way to getting there. David demonstrated all three that evening through reflection and a willingness to find his own answers. Your three stories, before you go, something to take with you. Your success story, what pattern do you see consistently that others consistently miss? Your passion story, what hidden value are you drawn to making visible? Your failure story, what valuable insight have you been keeping inside a format that hides it? In the next episode, I'll go deeper into Emma's Failure, Success, and Passion Stories from the episode How to Unlock Hidden Strategic Value Through Storytelling to take you inside the story behind a story. Thank you for listening.