Story telling is one of the most primal aspects of human culture: we use narrative to relate to one another and it flows into all areas of our lives.

Peter Guber, head of Mandalay Entertainment, had an epiphany on the role storytelling played in his life and the lives of those around him. It was so powerful, it prompted the writing of his new book, Tell to Win.

“When I began to look at the last few years of my life, at the times when I’d failed, it was most often because I’d forgotten to tell the story or because I had the wrong story. When I was moved, I was moved by the right story, and when I paid it forward, I was often the winner even when I was advocating someone else’s story,” Peter told me. “And why is that? Because story telling is the way we see life. Everything that has a tradition has a narrative.”

That narrative is inside all of us: if you want people to join you, help them use the tool of telling their story.

“I went to the interior of New Guinea and spoke with Shamans who don’t use written language but use oral narrative.Then I went to the bowels of Ethiopia, one of the most remote places in the world, and they used the same method,” he emphasized. “These distant cultures and places depend on the  story, it’s the way they move people.”

When you have a product, a brand, when you’re the leader, you have to know how to emotionally move people. And as Peter says, telling purposeful stories is the key to it all.

Watch my interview with Peter Guber below: