Are you leveraging the power of storytelling to connect with your Architecture/Engineering/Construction stakeholders? We know prospects want to hire professionals they know, like, and trust. Recruits often seek a firm with a culture that aligns with their beliefs, and employees want to feel valued.
With 2024 winding down, it’s a great time to review how effectively you capture and share your project success stories with prospects, recruits, and employees.
Gabrielle Dolan, author of Magnetic Stories, provides a compelling argument for integrating storytelling into your firm’s strategy.
“Good stories make us feel something as we listen to them, whether that’s excitement, fear, anger or enthusiasm,” says Dolan of Gabrielle Dolan Consulting, Melbourne, Australia. “Consequently, we feel something towards the person telling the story, which helps create connections.”
She contends that the same can be true for companies that share stories. Dolan believes stories “can help create an emotional connection, an attraction to your brand.”
Select a few key success stories, and incorporate them into your external and internal collateral. Here are five practical ways to use storytelling to differentiate your firm.
1. Proposals
A/E/C firms often must follow strict rules regarding proposal submissions. To have a greater impact, see if you can incorporate the human element in these documents, even if it’s only a few sentences.
Include a testimonial from a satisfied client or highlight how the project improved quality of life for the client, their customers, or residents. Beyond the technical details, how did a project make a difference for your client or even the end user?
For example, an upgraded wastewater treatment plant plays a critical role in protecting the water supply. However, this improved facility is now allowing for a community’s future economic growth, which is expected to increase the number of jobs and tax base.
Which projects will you feature in your proposals? If possible, add quotes from the happy client or metrics showing the project’s success? Consider contacting your reference and getting an update on the project’s benefits.
2. Client Interviews
As you prepare for your next client project interview, consider ways to include engaging stories about how your firm has helped other clients. Stories make your firm memorable and can effectively convey your value proposition to prospective clients.
Firms use stories in client interviews because prospects are more likely to remember them than technical data. They showcase a firm’s expertise and can include valuable testimonials from existing clients.
During the interview preparation, all stakeholders can brainstorm potential projects and stories that could be included.
As a result of these planning discussions, the interview team will probably come up with a potential list of significant stories to share. The challenge will be to customize them to specific issues related to the upcoming project.
Client stories can reveal a project’s tangible results and lessons learned that could benefit prospects. Firms can also share how they met project timelines, saved the client money, and satisfied the needs of the client and their end users
3. Client-Focused Case Studies
Since 2022, I’ve been discussing the benefits of client-focused case studies for the A/E/C industry. In these case studies, a happy client explains how an organization helped them solve a challenge. In addition, a project manager or other leader can offer insights into a project’s successful solution.
These narratives, from one to three pages, offer details about the project. The reader learns about the challenges faced by the client and how your firm resolved them. Photos, graphics, and metrics can help tell the story.
1 Case Study = 3 Wins because the A/E/C company, happy client, and prospect all benefit. Through a case study, a prospect learns how a company solved a challenge they faced. Your happy client provides the social proof that prospects typically seek before hiring a company.
When a Request for Proposals comes out, companies can turn to these case studies for vetted testimonials, graphics, and metrics to help enhance their next proposal. Companies can post case studies on their website as a link from a shorter project summary. Case study elements can be used in many ways, including blog posts, social media posts, project interviews, and trade shows.
4. Recruitment
To build engagement with your recruits, include employee stories that show how your firm lives its values. With such fierce competition for top talent, showcasing authentic employee stories can set your firm apart.
When recruits consider joining an A/E/C firm, they want to know about its culture and wonder if they’ll fit in.
One firm that successfully used employee stories to share its values is Fickett Structural Solutions, Madison, Wisconsin. I worked with President Andy Fickett to create a corporate identity piece. In this narrative, Fickett and five diverse employees explain how the firm lives its values.
The company invites recruits to review the core values to see if they align with their own.
Fickett says the piece has been successful in the firm’s recruitment efforts. Check it out.
The brochure “helped us hire new staff and interns in a competitive market,” Fickett adds.
One way to show how a company lives its brand is by creating employee-focused case studies. Through these narratives, which can be short, employees tell their stories of what it’s like to work at a company. They can help recruits envision themselves as part of your team. They also emphasize the importance placed on employees’ voices and perspectives.
5. Internal Communications
Are you sharing information at your firm in an engaging way? Effective communication can be challenging since many companies have multiple domestic and international offices. Stories can help.
If you want to capture your staff’s attention, use relevant stories. They’re more likely to be remembered. Stories provide many benefits. They can:
- Offer solutions
- Build your brand
- Preserve knowledge
- Teach staff
How can you celebrate a recent strategic win? Encourage your client contact to explain the process that led to the victory.
Frank Lippert, FSMPS, CPSM, of Delve Underground, Sacramento, California, explains that internal case studies can reveal how a relationship with a client matures. These client stories offer two significant benefits. “One is that these stories preserve some knowledge from the past that should be passed on. It honors the senior seller-doers in a really nice, meaningful way,” he says. “The second benefit gives the younger seller-doers some confidence that this process can work.”
Lippert emphasizes that stories must be concise and to the point—no longer than 15 minutes. It’s good to share obstacles that were overcome and explain how the technical team helped the client achieve their goals.
Selling work and doing work are both equally important. “We don’t know how to do either really well until we hear a story about it,” he adds.
How Do You Use Stories?
Your A/E/C firm has a lot of great stories. The challenge is capturing and then sharing them to emphasize relevant points, whether it’s at a client interview or in a corporate meeting.
Technical expertise helps you deliver project success, but why does it matter? Stories can show how your company is improving the quality of life or business operations for your clients and their users. They’ll help you form stronger human connections, which is a valuable benefit in a world that’s becoming more driven by artificial intelligence.
Want to Know More?
Want to learn more about using case studies and storytelling to connect with your stakeholders? Contact me at blaizecommunications@gmail.com and subscribe to A/E/C Connect. I’d love to hear your questions or challenges in the comments section below.
How are you using stories at your firm?
