Thompson's Story Composition

At 10 a.m., Thompson’s job interview has come to an end. At this time, the interviewer asked: "Mr. Thompson, can you tell me your story?" Thompson was at a loss. Because there is countless information in his mind for him to choose from, he doesn't know which answer should be processed and polished.

In fact, many people hate being asked this question because it is difficult to reduce so much information into one answer.

However, the interviewer wants to ask you this question because he wants to get to know you. So, you should learn to choose the right things to say so that you answer the question in a way that makes people connect you to your story and remember you.

Ryan Patricki focused on art in high school, but in college he realized he enjoyed computer-generated art, such as "Toy Story." After graduating from college, he worked in graphic design for several years. Then he moved to a big company. After a few months at the large company, he got an opportunity to become a product manager, thus successfully completing his transition.

Now, 28-year-old Patricki is interviewing at EBSCO Publishing Company. EBSCO Publishing is a publisher of reference, subscription and other information services. During the interview, he said: "I am a creative person, and I also have many years of experience as a product manager!"

When you hear such a summary, you will find it very simple and clear, Because he said it exactly. As Patricki's interviewer, Brad Kelly said: "He told me in a package that he was exactly what we were looking for, and we hired him." Today, Patrickey Ricky has been a user interface designer for EBSCO Publishing Company.

Sometimes, you only have one sentence to summarize yourself and introduce yourself to others. But sometimes, the interviewer has more time for you, and at this time, you can tell a story.

If you want others to remember you, the best way is to tell a story. Of course, introducing yourself in this way takes practice, over and over again. Once you've decided on the story you want to tell, you'll have to work hard to polish it until you can tell it to others accurately and in a compelling way.

The following are three storytelling routines provided by Professor Chip Heath:

1. Challenging routines. If someone says to the interviewer during an interview: "I am a very good customer service worker," the interviewer will definitely find this expression unconvincing. But if someone says: "I work in an ice cream shop. In the summer, there are usually twenty or thirty people waiting in line, so it's a big challenge for me to make customers wait patiently and happily." Listen. By telling you, the interviewer will use their imagination to imagine how challenging a customer service worker you are.

2. Creative routines. In this routine, the turning point of the story is the flash of inspiration—when a great idea suddenly pops into your head, everything changes. Originally you might have said, "I sell textbooks." But now you have a good idea, so you say, "I want to sell textbooks, but I can't make readers like them. But one day it dawned on me : Although not everyone may like textbooks, everyone has a favorite professor, so I decided to attract my potential readers through professors.” If you tell such a story, I believe every interviewer. (Even your future boss) will rave about your creative thinking and approach.

3. Integrated routines. This routine is suitable for telling stories about working with a team. For example, tell this story: "Our toy company was merged with another toy company, and both parties worked together to create a new production line. I convinced our team to integrate the design and processing departments. That Christmas , the toys we produce almost dominate the entire toy market. "Such a story will make people feel that you have a good team spirit.

As long as you know how to tell stories, you will enjoy the moment of being appreciated. When someone asks you: "So, what do you do?" If you know how to turn your outstanding experiences into a wonderful story and tell it vividly to others, you can leave a profound and lasting impression on them. A lasting impression.

Starting as a handyman

In my opinion, whether a person can endure hardship and withstand torture is the necessary criterion to measure whether a person can truly become a talent. Chen Juli, the current vice president of Fuyao Company, graduated from Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics in 1990 with a major in information management. At that time, he received invitations from many top domestic and international companies. However, he wants to return to Fujian to work. One day, when he was passing by Fuyao, he saw the slogan I wrote on the pedestrian bridge, "We want to become a model automotive glass supplier." He made a temporary decision to get out of the car and walked into the factory.

He arrived at the company’s human resources department. After introducing himself, the human resources manager brought him to see me. At that time, I wanted anyone who was a college student. After meeting Curie and getting a general understanding of his school, major, and family situation, I said, "Let's stay and work."

He agreed. Our conversation lasted less than 5 minutes.

At first, he was assigned to work three shifts on the vertical furnace. Every day, he had to use a flatbed truck to pull the waste glass from the workshop to the glass pile outside for dumping. A truck of glass weighs one or two tons, so at most two people can push it. Curie looks gentle and weak, but he still successfully passed the training period required by the factory.

Because he is weak and not very talkative, Curie often takes the blame for others. Everything that others did wrong was blamed on him, but he never defended himself and shouldered it silently. Several times, when I was a little angry, I changed his job and demoted him to work in the workshop. Each time, he came through with strength.

Once, I asked him why he did not choose to leave after being so angry. He replied: "As long as Fuyao still has a desk for me, I will not leave."

"Why?" I asked again.

"Because of you." Curie's answer was simple, "You are an upright person. How many companies can be like us, where the interests of the company are completely consistent with the interests of the boss? Such a good company "It's not easy to come across. I was lucky enough to come in. How could I leave so easily?"

"Why don't you plead your case?" I asked.

He said calmly: "The defense will make you think that I am shirking my responsibility. It is difficult to investigate in detail, so I will simply not defend myself."

He told me that he had seen a In this book about successful people, "The Autobiography of Iacocca", Iacocca said: "I spent 25 years working for Ford just to work hard in the last five years."

He believes that every You may spend most of your life doing odd jobs. Only when you have the opportunity can you do something important. You must do the chores of the previous ten or twenty years. If you don't do odd jobs, how would people know you? He said: "I remember the day I graduated, the teacher said something: If a person doesn't do odd jobs now, he will eventually do odd jobs in the future; if a person does odd jobs now, he will eventually stop doing odd jobs in the future. This sentence had a great impact on me. 'Do odd jobs' It can be understood as sweeping the floor and pouring cans for the master in order to learn martial arts; it can also be understood as the price a newborn calf pays for his ignorance; it can also be understood as a process of establishing affinity with the enterprise. Only then will the company finally recognize your talents and be willing to give you the treatment you expect. Looking for a job is like selling something. Only by showing your performance and ability can you get a good price. How do people know you have the ability? So you have to do it."

He has a good command of English, and later he went to handle the import and export business in Hong Kong and worked as the general manager of the Hong Kong company. In December 1999, I appointed Chen Juli as the vice president of the group, responsible for the overseas maintenance market sales system, and he has been until now.

Like narcissus, blooming calmly

At first, I worked in an advertising agency and ran a small shop at the same time. I also spent my evenings writing. After a while, because I was too tired, I decided to take leave and go home to recuperate.

My mother knew that I had always liked narcissus, so she bought two pots of narcissus for me when I came home from get off work that day. My mother said that narcissus needs three minutes to grow and seven minutes to carve. Only by carefully carving it, leaving axillary buds, and removing the bulbs will it bloom more beautifully. As soon as I heard about it, I became interested and decided to try it myself.

Holding the carving knife in my hand, I carefully removed the hard skin on the outer layer of the bulb. Facing the white and fresh stems, I hesitated. Because all the stems are so good, I couldn't decide which one to choose. After hesitating for a long time, I lightly carved a few times with a carving knife, and said to my mother: "I'm afraid of hurting the muscles and bones of the narcissus, so you should do it."

My mother said: "You have to be decisive when carving narcissus. Otherwise it won't grow well." After saying that, she picked up the carving knife and neatly started from both sides of the raised axillary buds. She peeled off the bulbs layer by layer with skillful techniques to create space for the growth of the axillary buds. better conditions.

Sure enough, after getting rid of the wrapping and restraint of the bulb, the axillary buds grew very quickly. Soon, the daffodils bloomed, and they were graceful and fragrant, making them very lovely.

After resting at home for a while, my body and mind were relaxed, and I decided to go back to work. My mother reminded me and said: "If you still work as hard as before and want to do everything, you will still be exhausted. Have you forgotten that when you first entered the advertising company, you once said with great pride, 'You want to be an excellent advertiser'" '?" My mother's words shocked me, yes, when did I forget this sentence?

My mother patted me on the shoulder and said sincerely: "Son, you don’t need too many goals in life. You are a rare talent for advertising planning. As for writing and opening a store, you have to decide for yourself. Let’s do it.”

Looking at the two pots of daffodils in front of the window, I thought silently, my mother was right. Working hard in the workplace is like carving a narcissus - you must remove unnecessary bulbs and leave axillary buds, so that the narcissus can bloom calmly.

I said to my mother: "Don't worry, I know what to do." After that, I put down my writing, transferred the shop, and went to work in the company with peace of mind, devoting all my time and energy to Use it at work.

Three years later, because of my outstanding work, I was promoted to Director of the Planning Department. The success of my career often reminds me of my mother’s words and the two pots of narcissus. If you want to be successful in the workplace, you should be like a narcissus, removing excess bulbs so that they can bloom calmly.

The Museum of Broken Love: A place to store the beauty of the past

In Zagreb, the capital of Croatia, there is a heartbreakingly romantic place: the Museum of Broken Love, a place that turns broken love into art. place. The Museum of Broken Love originated from the whim of a pair of lovers. Its founders, Olinka Vestica and Drazen Grubisic, are both engaged in the art industry. The same temperament prompted the two to fall in love soon after they met. , 4 years later, their love came to an end.

In 2003, on the night they broke up, the two of them silently sorted out each other's things, but those worthless badges, scarves, ashtrays, mugs and other small objects kept popping into view. Every small object They all tell a story and represent every precious memory in their relationship. What to do with this stuff? Throw it away, a bit reluctant to part with it; keep it, but have nowhere to put it. It's better to build a museum, so that even if the relationship is gone, the beautiful memories of the past can be preserved.

When they are in love, two people always like to travel around the world together. If one of them has something to do and cannot travel together, the other will bring a rabbit doll with him during the trip to symbolize the lover who is not around. In their travel photos, you can always see this spotlight-stealing doll being held tightly in the arms of a sweetly smiling person. Later, the rabbit became the first exhibit in the museum.

When the museum was first built, most people around me took a wait-and-see attitude and were mostly curious about the project. Olinka and Drazen envisioned building a place that would help preserve memories for donors, and a place for visitors to collect love tokens and tell love stories. Nowadays, most of Drazan's professional activities revolve around the Museum of Broken Love, and for the lovers, the biggest memorial of this relationship is the Museum of Broken Love that they have run together for 8 years.

Until 2006, as part of the 41st Zagreb Art Salon, the first exhibition of the Museum of Lost Love was located in an abandoned ship container at the Croatian Academy of Arts and Sciences. All exhibits came from dozens of relatives and friends. of donations. After the Broken Love Exhibition was introduced to the public for the first time, many people made requests to donate things. Over the next four years, the Museum of Lost Love continued to receive invitations from all over the world, and the exhibition began touring 19 countries around the world. By the time the museum was permanently inaugurated in October 2010, the exhibition had been visited by 200,000 people around the world. Today, this number has reached nearly one million.

Today, this exhibition space contains more than 1,300 love tokens from lovelorn people around the world. The exhibitions are rotated regularly and the exhibits will not be repeated. This year, the museum displays *** 104 exhibits of various types, from a photo album and a wedding dress to an ax and a prosthetic limb. Each item tells the love story of a pair of exclusive lovers.

This model of irregular traveling exhibitions changed after the permanent construction of the Museum of Broken Relationships in 2010. Unlike other museums in Zagreb, the Museum of Lost Love is open to the public every day and is especially popular with foreign tourists. Drazan and Olinka, along with three full-time employees and four part-time students, make up the entire management team.

According to the planning of the two people, the entire exhibition space is divided into 8 exhibition rooms according to different themes: distance, desire, anger, rage, sadness, history, rite of passage, time and home. Each exhibit with a different story is displayed according to these themes. Visiting along the way, you can feel all the emotions in the process from falling in love to falling out of love. At the beginning of its development, the Museum of Broken Love only focused on pure love relationships. Gradually, Drazan discovered that behind these exhibits from different stories of broken love, there were actually different social themes about family, faith, politics, friendship, etc. hidden behind them.

In February 2014, Drazen and Olinka opened a second permanent museum in Zagreb, extending the theme of lost love to a broader category of love. In this new museum, there are now 92 exhibits on display. Their stories tell the different kinds of love in people's lives: first love, playmates, work companions, dangerous relationships, parents and children, marriage, etc. . In the future, the partners hope to open another permanent museum in other corners of the world.

In 2011, at the European Museum Awards held in Bremen, Germany, the Museum of Lost Love was nominated for the "Europe's Most Creative Museum Award" and was awarded the Kenneth Hudson Award. In the past eight years, the Museum of Broken Love has developed extremely rapidly, and has toured more than 30 cities including Buenos Aires, Berlin, Taipei, Cape Town, Houston, and Istanbul.

“Every time we hold a new exhibition, we receive new exhibits with very storytelling and local characteristics, which impresses us. Love always finds different ways to make different cultures unique. "Communicate without obstacles." Today, there are more than a thousand collections in the museum. Every visitor will encounter exciting exhibits, gain their own surprises and touches, and even read more than just the story. Interact with the exhibits in your own way and gain an unforgettable life experience.

Drazin said: "Instead of calling it the Museum of Broken Love, it is better to call it the Museum of Love." Every exhibit in the Museum of Broken Love belongs to a touching love, telling the world the throbbing of love. with beauty.

Do your best at things that others do perfunctorily

In the year I graduated from college, at the invitation of several friends, I went to a prosperous city in the south and began my youthful hard work. trip. Although my father had already contacted a school for me before, I was restless and didn't want to live a peaceful life. The wonderful world outside was my ideal life stage.

I am applying for a real estate company, which has a certain influence in the local area. After many rounds of assessments, I was lucky enough to be hired.

My job is as a clerk in the planning department, which means printing documents and making forms for department managers. This is an ordinary position, but I believe that success in the workplace does not depend on how high your platform is, but on whether you are dedicated to your work.

During the few months of my rookie period, my work was not impressive. At the end of the year, the company requires each employee to submit a year-end summary, a written summary of their work throughout the year, which not only summarizes experience, but also puts forward suggestions for the company's development in the second year. Nearly a thousand employees of the company ridiculed this move as the greatest formalism. So, when I was typing my inspiration on the keyboard word by word, senior clerk Ah Hui patted me on the shoulder and said: "You are such a stupid kid. Who would write this thing by themselves now?" There are so many things on the Internet that you can just download an article and modify it, and it can be done in a few minutes." I asked him seriously, "How can it be done? If I download the same content as others, wouldn't it be a joke to the boss?" Hui smiled and bent down, "Do you think the boss will read them one by one? To tell you the truth, a few days ago I saw someone selling last year's year-end summary to a scrap collector." My enthusiasm was not affected. Ah Hui fought back and still completed this year-end summary seriously. After staying in the company for several months, I have seen a lot and had a lot of feelings. I want to take this opportunity to express my inner feelings to the company leaders. I have an impulse to take this opportunity to express my views on the company's current situation and future development direction in detail and completely.

The day before the stipulated date, I sent the year-end summary that I had stayed up several nights to write to the general manager’s office. It was a year-end summary that cost me a lot of effort, and it even looked like an eye-catching fashion magazine. I used the company's panorama as the cover, and the company's strategic development slogan on the title page. The main text is divided into three parts, namely "My Year", "My Thoughts" and "My Little Suggestions", which looks warm and practical. I put my best painting skills in college to use, making it very unique.

In the next few days, I found that everyone in the company looked at me a little differently. Ah Hui, in particular, said sourly in front of me more than once: "This year-end summary of your kid has caught the attention of the general manager, and I can't even think about getting rich!" Sure enough, three days later, the general manager called me to him. in his office, and what was on his desk was my "fashion magazine." He smiled and asked me to sit down. "Your summary left a deep impression on me. It can be seen that you are a person who works hard and has a sense of responsibility for the company. When others are perfunctory, you But I am thinking and working hard, it is not easy. I think you need a job where you can better display your abilities. I hope you will continue to work hard!" After the Spring Festival, because of this summary, I was promoted to assistant manager of the planning department.

Although I later left that company for other reasons, over the years, I have never forgotten the days of working hard outside. It was bitter and sweet. What I gained more was the experience and understanding of the company. An insight into life: When others are doing the same thing, you must do it the best you can!

Making clay is also good

My student Shen Ping has been graduating from university for a year and has not found a suitable job. That time, he said to me with a frustrated face: "Teacher, I remember you told us that gold shines everywhere. But now I feel that I am not gold at all, just a piece of mud, and I can't hold myself up against the wall. , I feel really useless. After studying for so many years, I can’t find my own stage..." It can be seen that Shen Ping, who was frustrated for a while, felt very inferior. I said to him, "Which one is more valuable, gold or clay?" "Of course it's gold," he said with a dull head. I asked again: "If you were given a seed and asked to cultivate life, which one would be more valuable, gold or soil?" He raised his head and looked at me with some confusion.

I told him a story about another student of mine. After graduating from college, that student also looked for jobs everywhere. She set a high threshold for herself and wanted to stay in the provincial capital. After several twists and turns, I also encountered some very helpless things.

One day it finally dawned on her that it was best to live a life that suited her. Instead of looking up at the unattainable so-called happiness, it is better to see your situation clearly and leave a metropolis full of talents, maybe you can better realize your value. Therefore, she went to teach in a county primary school and stayed there for seven years. She got married there and planned to stay there for the rest of her life. She said that she had already fallen deeply in love with her job. Although she could not become a glamorous white-collar worker like other classmates, she felt fulfilled and happy when she was with the children. Moreover, living in the county is less stressful and has a high happiness index.

I admire her attitude towards life. If some people are like gold, constantly shining in the fierce competition in the workplace, she is like the unknown clay. Although there is no dazzling light, every seed she has worked hard to cultivate is equally valuable.

There is another student who originally worked for a Fortune 500 company. His job pays well, but it is also extremely stressful. The competition is fierce, and there are silent battles between colleagues. In terms of academic level and work ability, he may stand out, be promoted slowly, receive a salary increase, and have a better future. But then, he would feel too tired and powerless. There was a time when his mother was sick and needed care, but it was impossible for him to ask for leave. After careful consideration, he quit the job that others coveted and went to a small company. Although the salary in the new job is not as high as before, the pressure is less, the life is leisurely and comfortable, I feel relaxed every day, and I can spend more time with my family. He has no regrets at all about his original decision. He said that the suitable one is the best.

I told Shen Ping that if you feel you are not gold, you can make useful clay. As the saying goes, what I am born with will be useful. Not everyone is suitable for making gold. Everyone has his or her own advantages. Shen Ping nodded and said, "Yes, making clay is not bad!"