Tell a Story Without Sounding Like a Jerk 🤌

Turn Everyday Internal Communication into Story Gold with Clarity → Buy-in → Action!

Welcome to Part 2 of “Product Voyagers’ Sprint: Storytelling in Product”.
A 7-part, hands-on course that turns everyday communication into powerful mini-narratives.

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She was absolutely right about the data inconsistency. The spreadsheet was confusing, the column headers were unclear, and external stakeholders would struggle to make sense of it.

So why did her perfectly valid concern land like a hand grenade in a team chat? Look on how it was communicated 👇

"The reporting structure doesn't make sense - numbers are inconsistent across tabs and the logic is all over the place. How are we supposed to present this to leadership when even I can't figure out what goes where?"

Sound familiar? You've been there—maybe as the sender, definitely as the recipient. You have something important to say, something that genuinely needs fixing, but somehow your message creates tension instead of solutions. Defensiveness instead of collaboration.

So, what most people miss (not excluding myself): every internal communication is actually a micro-story waiting to happen. The difference between messages that create confusion and ones that create clarity isn't just about information, however it's about narrative structure.

Today, we're turning your everyday internal communications into storytelling gold using the CORE model. By the end of this piece, you'll never send another flat, frustrating message again.

A Hidden Story in Every Message

Before we dive into the framework, let's acknowledge something:

Internal communication isn't just about transferring information.

It's about moving people from one mental state to another.

From confusion to clarity. From resistance to buy-in. From debate to action.

Every time you hit send, you're not just sharing data, but you're crafting a micro-narrative that either helps or hinders your audience's journey.

Then, what’s the problem? Most of us communicate like we're reading from a paper/spreadsheet rather than telling a story that connects.

A “CORE” Model: Your Internal Storytelling Framework

C – Clarify the Context
O – Open the Conversation
R – Reflect Empathy
E – Express the Desired Outcome

Please don’t consider it another communication framework. It's a storytelling structure disguised as practical advice. Each element serves both functional and narrative purposes.

🙌 What you'll master in this guide:

• Step-by-step CORE breakdowns with before/after examples that show dramatic message transformations.

• Side-by-side “bad vs. brilliant” examples so you can feel the difference.

• 🔓 Master Moves: Advanced CORE Techniques for seasoned practitioners who want to level up.

• 🔓 Communication starter kit Copy/paste templates for Slack, email, and meetings including a prompt to do the work for you.

• 🔓 A ripple effect strategy showing how internal stories scale across your entire team.

C – Clarify the Context (Set the Scene)

→ “Why” Before “What”
Every good story starts with setting the scene. In internal communication, this means grounding your audience in the why before you hit them with the what.

Instead of diving straight into problems or requests, paint the picture first.

Before CORE: "The dashboard numbers don't match what we presented last week. Can someone explain?"

After CORE (Clarify): "I'm looking at our Q3 dashboard, and I'm comparing it to the metrics we shared in last Tuesday's board presentation..."

Notice the difference? The second version immediately orients everyone to the same reference point. You've created a shared context—the foundation of any good story.

🪄 Storytelling Secret:
Context isn't just background information. It's the narrative setup that makes everything that follows feel inevitable rather than random.

O – Open the Conversation (Invite Collaboration)

→ Investigate And Don’t Assume
This is where most internal communication dies. We state problems like verdicts instead of opening them like investigations. We make assumptions instead of asking questions that invite others into the story.

Before CORE: "The API integration is broken and blocking the release."

After CORE (Open): "I'm seeing what looks like an API integration issue that might be impacting our release timeline. Has anyone else encountered this, or am I missing something in my setup?"

🪄 Storytelling Magic:
You've just transformed a dead-end statement into an open-ended narrative. Instead of ending the story with a problem, you're inviting others to help write the next chapter.

R – Reflect Empathy (Acknowledge the Human Element)

→ Smart But Not Soft
We’re all doing the same: internal communication typically falls flat and we forget we're talking to humans with their own context, pressures, and perspectives. Reflecting empathy isn't about being soft—it's about being smart.

When you acknowledge the human element, you're not just being nice. You're demonstrating that you understand the full story, including the parts you can't see.

Before CORE: "Why wasn't this tested properly before deployment?"

After CORE (Reflect): "I know we've been under pressure to ship quickly, and this kind of edge case is exactly the thing that's hard to catch in normal testing scenarios..."

🪄 Storytelling Power:
Empathy creates character depth. When you acknowledge others' constraints, motivations, or challenges, you're not just communicating—you're building a narrative where everyone has understandable motivations rather than being painted as obstacles.

E – Express the Desired Outcome (Land the Story)

→ Help And Don’t Just Challenge
Every story needs a resolution, or at least a clear direction toward one. This is where you connect all the narrative threads and point toward what happens next.

And the key: you're not dictating the ending, however you're proposing it.

Before CORE: "We need to get this fixed ASAP."

After CORE (Express): "I'd love to get aligned on next steps—whether that's a quick sync to diagnose this together, or if there's a workaround I should implement while we sort out the root cause."

🪄 Storytelling Technique:
Notice how this creates forward momentum without closing off possibilities. You're suggesting a narrative direction while leaving room for others to contribute to how the story unfolds.

Upgrade and get all the advanced CORE playbook below + full 7-parts deep-dive series of Storytelling including Copy-paste templates & live chat help

Real-World Transformation: A Case Study

Same information . Completely different story . Dramatically different outcome.

Before we jump to the templates and prompts to use, let's see CORE in action with a scenario that sounds exactly like our opening example: