Storytelling Skills for Management Accountants

Developed by the IMA Leadership Academy

Title Page
Welcome to “Storytelling Skills for Management Accountants”
Introduction
• This course will explore how storytelling benefits management accountants with strategies for
bridging the gap between just presenting data and providing insights and a call to action. The
course also contains an example of a management accountant using stories to reach her
audience and help them see what to do to gain more margin, increase revenue, and achieve
greater bonuses. Participants will learn how they can use stories to maximize their potential as
business partners.
• Finally, the course will demonstrate how to apply storytelling skills to overall management
competencies, including strategy management, leadership, and operations.
Navigation Instructions
Learning Objectives
• The management accountant role has been expanding and now includes being influential as a
strategic business partner who has an overview of the organization, a focus on running the
business, and more emphasis on sharing and using information.
• The goal of this course is to assist you in using storytelling to maximize your potential as a
business partner.
• After taking this course you will be able to:
o Define “storytelling.”
o Describe the important storytelling skills management accountants need to know.
o List the best practices for effective storytelling.
o Identify strategies for handling storytelling challenges.

Lesson 1: What is Storytelling?

Storytelling Basics
o What is Storytelling?
▪ Storytelling is one of the most powerful means that we have to influence,
teach, and inspire. What makes storytelling so effective? For starters,
storytelling forges connections among people and between people and ideas.
Storytelling is the art of making business communication interesting and
memorable.

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 ▪ Any business information, including the identity, goals, strategy, culture, and
value propositions, can be wrapped in a story.
▪ Business stories may be constructed with factual information or may include
fictional elements such as humor. Making the business story interesting and
entertaining is what engages your audience.
▪ The key to storytelling is that it compels the audience to understand and act
upon that understanding. The desired action is always the reason for the story.
Three Approaches to Business Storytelling
o There are three common approaches to business storytelling:
▪ The first way of business storytelling is like presenting a novel in the sense of
having a structure. It should have a beginning, middle, and end. The beginning
sets the stage and presents the characters (data). The middle is the actual
narrative (analysis). The end is the conclusion (call to action).
▪ Second, a story can illustrate the points in your presentation. Stories can clarify
and connect your viewer to the points you may be trying to make.
▪ Finally, a story can illicit an emotion from your audience. This emotion is often
needed to spur people to take the action we desire. People don’t change or do
anything differently without an emotion to convince them to take the action
that’s necessary. No matter how data or analysis is presented to us, emotion is
often the catalyst that makes our decision. In other words, we have to know
how we feel about the data to take action.
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Knowledge Check
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Why Use Stories? (Stories…)
o Why is storytelling so important to management accountants? Storytelling can help us
communicate what numbers mean. It’s about creating effective, relatable stories to
convey information about numbers to people who need the information so they can
fully understand the meaning of your analysis, the business strategy you’re proposing,
and the potential implications to make the right decision for the business.
o There’s a lot of software, such as Tableau, which can create beautiful data visualization
graphics from your data, and Excel, which has the capability to create attractive data
graphs. Yet data visualization is not storytelling. These graphics may not be enough to
move business partners to make decisions. In most cases, business partners aren’t going
to have a finance background, and numbers or data won’t be compelling enough for
them to make a choice. Data visualization can support effective, relatable stories, but it
can’t replace them. (Are NOT data visualization)
o Good storytelling can help people better understand what they’re seeing and are more
likely to lead to a favorable response and remember information more clearly, and it
will more likely lead to a favorable response.

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 o Storytelling creates a structured approach for communicating data insight. It involves a
combination of three elements: data, visuals, and a narrative. The first two, data and
visuals, are often already part of your presentation. The last piece, narrative, is the
storytelling piece. How you approach storytelling will depend on your audience. For
instance, if you were meeting with the CFO, presenting a detailed spreadsheet and
reviewing the line items on the sheet would be appropriate. If you were presenting to a
marketing group or a research and development group, reviewing a spreadsheet in
detail wouldn’t be effective. Attaching a narrative to the analysis of the data would
make it more constructive. This is where your ability to create a compelling story from
the numbers becomes important.
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Interactive
• Click on each button to find out the reasons why storytelling is important to management
accountants:
o Our partners are not usually as fluent with numbers as we are. As management
accountants, we love a good spreadsheet, but spreadsheet data isn’t enough for many
of our partners without a compelling story to connect that data into action.
o Humans, not machines, excel at communicating meaning. Much of the data work that
accountants do have been taken over by artificial intelligence, bots, machine learning,
and other automation. Communication for management accountants has become more
important. This is where humans excel because it’s difficult to automate this. This can be
difficult for management accountants, but in order to excel in this profession, we must
learn to master this skill.
o Stories inspire action in ways that number don’t. Powerful stories evoke emotion and
inspire us to take action and make changes that numbers alone can’t. Presenting a
spreadsheet with numbers isn’t enough. We often need to have stakeholders take
action quickly to address issues or improve the business space based on the analysis, so
framing this to a narrative that they can relate to will compel them to act in the
direction you want.
o Stories help convert data insights into actions. Data may hold tremendous amounts of
potential value, but not an ounce of value can be created unless insights are uncovered
and translated into actions or business outcomes. Stories help us determine this
conversion from data into action.
o Stories share insight and ideas in a memorable, persuasive, and engaging way. A good
example of this is TED Talks. TED Talk presenters often present to a broad audience that
may not have knowledge of their expertise. By examining how they use narratives to
build a bridge of information between their expertise and the audience, we can see
examples of storytelling in action. I would recommend viewing TED Talks where you
may not have previous knowledge of the content presented. Pay attention to how the
presenters use storytelling to start the talk, how they present technical information, so
it’s understood by their audience, and how they conclude the talk.

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Knowledge Check
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Lesson 2: Amber’s Story

Amber’s Story - Case Study
• Let’s take a look at a case study of how storytelling can help a presentation.
o Amber is a senior financial analyst at a popular social media company whose revenue
predominantly comes from ad sales on its website and mobile app.
o Amber is the primary analyst for the company’s U.S. business unit. The company divides
this unit into three regions: East, Central, and West. Each of the regions is led by an
operations VP.
o Amber has been with the company for several years and has good relationships with
each of the VPs and their respective teams, but the gap in job levels between senior
analysts and VPs makes it difficult for her to be seen as anything more than a data
gatherer or reporter.
Amber’s Presentation
o Each week she updates her forecast for each region, and every month, she analyzes the
financial performance of each region and provides a report to the VPs and their teams.
o She attends a monthly meeting for the regions where she has a few minutes on the
agenda to report on her analysis of the monthly performance and give a high-level
update on the forecast, but she rarely gets any questions, and the team moves onto the
next topic as if her presentation didn’t happen.
o She notices that when she reviews the P&L that most people in the meeting either glaze
over or jump on their phones. Even the VPs seem preoccupied.
o Recently, she added some excellent data visualizations to her presentation thanks to
some new software her CFO purchased for all of the analysts, but that didn’t really
change the demeanor of the room when she made her presentation each month. She
was disappointed.
Why Data-Driven Presentations Fail
o There are three basic reasons why data-driven presentations fail.
▪ The first one is a financial story has not been identified. Simply describing data
doesn’t add value or give context to individual financial charts or tables; instead,
you should present a logical financial story. Walking into a presentation and
putting numbers on a chart while saying you are overbudget or underbudget
doesn’t really tell your business partners enough. They need to understand why,
or what is the driver, or what does it mean?
▪ The start of the story is not compelling. That’s another reason for a
presentation to fail. Without context or a compelling lead-in story, your
audience will find it difficult to engage with your data. Remember that scrolling

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 through numbers isn’t compelling and you’ll notice your audience checking their
cell phones.
▪ The story closes with a whimper. A lack of clarity in your specific
recommendation about what has to be done, when, and by whom will cause
confusion and delay decision making.
Amber’s Data and Analysis
▪ Despite the ineffectiveness of her presentations, her analysis has been top-
notch. Her company captures much data about its customers, the ads they run,
the people who click on those ads, and the effectiveness of those ads.
▪ Using the new data visualization software and some hard-core statistical
techniques, Amber has discovered that certain ads have been garnering more
clicks and resulting in more revenue for customers than others.
▪ When she digs into the details, she finds that certain keywords and placements
on the website or app garner more clicks and are likely to be more successful for
customers.
▪ She tests her hypothesis across the regions using data from the past year, and
her hypothesis holds true.
▪ She also notices that the East region has seen a recent surge in revenue growth
above the other two regions, so she digs into that apparent outlier to determine
the cause.
▪ She discovers that the East region’s sales team has an assistant who works with
the salespeople to set prices for the ads. While the algorithm used for pricing is
dynamic, the regions can override it if they believe that there are substantial
opportunities outside the system-generated pricing.
▪ The East region’s assistant had noticed a trend among some customers and had
alerted the salespeople so that they could adjust prices higher and obtain more
revenue from a select pool of highly effective ads.
▪ The customers were willing to pay more because the return on these ads was
so much higher than run-of-the-mill ads on the site.
▪ Amber spent some time with the assistant and learned the details behind the
pricing strategy. She also calculated the impact of the strategy above the
expected revenue generated by the pricing algorithm.
▪ She talked to a few of the customers who were using the highly effective ads
and learned their stories and what was important to them.
▪ She examined the ad sales across the other regions and determined there were
similar customers across those regions who could benefit from the advertising
approach and would be willing to pay more for the service.
Identifying a Financial Story
o It’s risky to depend on just numbers to convince your audience of your conclusions,
actions to take, and the benefits of your conclusions. You should present a logical
financial story that progresses step by step.

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 ▪ Take members of the audience on a meaningful journey so that they can see
how you arrived at your conclusions and why you’re making your
recommendations.
▪ Help them see how you arrived at your conclusions. Think about Amber’s story.
She started out with the most successful ad in the company’s inventory. She
noticed that the East region has seen a recent surge in revenue growth above
the other two regions. She discovered that the East region’s sales team’s
assistant works with the salespeople to set prices for the ads but can override it
if they believe that there are substantial opportunities outside the system-
generated pricing. She talked about how the West and Central regions were
falling behind and how if they wanted to meet their market projections, they
would have to take these actions to accomplish this.
▪ The story progressed logically, and by the end of the story, the VPs for the West
and Central regions were eager to take the actions that she had prescribed.
▪ Remember that financial data is the supporting actor, not the star. When
presenting a chart or table, headline it with insights or conclusions you have
drawn from the numbers rather than simply describing the data shown on the
slide. Instead of making the headline, “2019 Sales by Region,” make it “East
Region Grew Twice as Fast as All Other Regions in 2019.” The first headline
doesn’t provide any meaningful context, while the second headline tells a story
and certainly gets people engaged and ready to act.
Amber’s Story-Enhanced Presentation
o Amber had all of the information she needed to report back at the next meeting, but
she changed her approach.
o Instead of flashing a pretty graphic up on the screen that showed the East’s trend line
rising above the other two regions, she put up a picture of one of the ads used by the
East region and began to tell the story.
o “Does anyone recognize this ad?” she asked.
o Of course, the East VP raised her hand, but so did several other people. For the first time
in recent memory, no one jumped on their phones as they looked at the display ad in
befuddled amusement.
o “Good, because this is the most effective ad in our inventory, and it’s also the most
profitable.
o The amusement transitioned to confusion, because, while the ad was for a good
customer, it wasn’t the biggest customer in terms of revenue.
o The East VP spoke up, “How is that our most profitable ad?”
o “Not for us, but for the customer,” Amber responded.
o There were some glances around the room. Amber knew they’d be confused because
this meeting was mostly about how they could maximize their revenue to meet
expectations and, quite honestly, exceed them for their bonuses.
o Amber moved to the next slide, which showed the customer’s logo and some very
happy people enjoying its product. She continued, “This customer is part of a surging

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 industry that has a lot of competitors vying for market share right now. They are placing
very targeted ads to grab share and they’re not as price-conscious as many of our other
customers are. Because of the effectiveness of our platform, they are buying lots of ads
and making lots of money. We’re not capturing the value of our ad platform in the
standard rates that we charge them.”
o She paused and moved to the next slide, which showed the logos of a bunch of
companies in the same industry.
o “Furthermore, their competitors have caught on and have begun buying more ads on
our platform all across the U.S. This customer segment is our fastest-growing segment,
but our pricing algorithm has not kept up. We’re leaving money on the table. A lot of
money.”
o Amber moved to a slide that had three giant dollar signs centered across it. The
amusement and confusion that had rippled across the room turned to concern. She
could feel the tension ratchet up considerably, but before anyone could interject with a
question or give their opinion, she moved to the slide that showed each region’s
revenue performance vs. target.
o “While all of the regions easily beat their revenue goals for the month, there’s one
key difference that could affect your bonuses for the year.”
o She paused for dramatic effect as she moved to the next slide, which had a graph that
showed each region’s margin. The sales team’s bonuses had a kicker related to profit
margin, which could potentially double salespeople’s bonuses if they exceeded margin
targets.
o The graph clearly showed that the East region was the only one that was well above its
margin target. In fact, Central and West greatly lagged the margin target. Amber saw
Erica, the East VP, smile at the back of the room, while the other two VPs were clearly
perturbed. Amber continued her presentation.
o “East has been consistently overriding the pricing for our most effective ads and has
raised its prices by more than 15%. This has helped Erica easily beat her revenue
targets, but it has also helped her exceed her margin targets. She has a sales assistant
in her region who has been monitoring customer activity and going after customers
who are less price-sensitive to garner more revenue and margin. This sales assistant
has earned her salary five times over already this year just from this selective
targeting. She has turbocharged the East’s results.”
o The other two VPs stared at the margin graph in stunned silence, while Erica could
barely contain herself at the end of the long table. Amber could tell they had questions,
but she finished up her presentation.
o “I’ve put the P&L details in a packet for you for your region,” she said as she stepped
around the room and handed each VP their packet. Erica looked like she wanted to hug
Amber. “I’d recommend that West and Central duplicate the sales assistant’s efforts in
their regions so that we can capture the additional revenue and margin. I ran an analysis
and assumed that West and Central had similar potential as East, and if they are able to
realize that potential, I would expect both regions to earn significant incremental
revenue and margin for the entire fiscal year.”

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 o Amber flipped to her last slide that showed the revenue and margin forecast for each
region for the year. The additional value from the sales assistant’s efforts was
highlighted on the graph. It showed that neither West nor Central would hit its margin
kicker unless they gained margin from the pricing override efforts. She let the slide sink
in across the room. Almost immediately, the VPs began peppering her and Erica with
questions.
o Instead of five minutes, Amber’s time in front of the team stretched to 30 minutes,
but it was the most engaged and productive presentation she had ever given to the
team. Not once did anyone look at their phone during her presentation.
Create a Compelling Start
o Your opening should not cause your audience to think, “I’m too busy for this!” or
“What’s the point?” These are common refrains that you may hear at a finance
presentation. In each case, you’ve lost your audience before you even begin.
o The most effective openings to a presentation are direct and to the point.
o It’s timely and relevant to the audience.
o It immediately grabs their attention and leaves them eager to hear more.
o Think about Amber’s story again. She opened up with the ad. All of the people in the
room were familiar with the ad, and it grabbed their attention because it focused on
what they do.
o This is a simple three-step guide to creating a compelling introduction that helps you
demonstrate your understanding of your audience’s situation in the first two minutes of
your presentation.
▪ Summarize the situation the audience is facing.
▪ Describe specific opportunities or reasons why it’s important to act.
▪ Finish your introduction with the risks of not taking action NOW.
o Let’s go back to Amber’s story. She summarized the situation early on. She said, “This is
our most profitable ad for our customers.” The East is doing a really good job; it’s
exceeding its goals, while West and Central are not. She then talks about the
opportunities for West and Central to do the same thing. She finished strong with, “If
you take action now you can still beat your goals for the year.” She took them on a
journey to understand her conclusions and her recommendations.
The Story Closes Strongly
o After you’ve hooked your audience with a strong introduction and taken them on a
journey, you need to close in a clear and convincing manner. You should be clear about
the next steps as well as the benefits of taking your recommendations.
o Use these three steps to create a strong closing:
▪ Communicate your recommendations clearly and candidly. Substantiate them
with data where it lends credibility. Think back to Amber’s story. She presented
data and graphs, but it wasn’t overwhelming. She really focused on the story,
but she had enough data to support it. She showed the revenue for each of the

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 regions as well as the profit margins. This clearly communicated the message
she was trying to get across.
▪ Plainly describe specific actions to take. Amber wanted the West and Central
regions to institute the same practices that the East region had.
▪ End with strong benefits statements that describes the likely positive outcomes
of following your recommendations. She emphasized that following her
recommendations would allow the West and Central regions to meet and
exceed their targets as well as receive their bonuses.
o Stories Build a Bridge
▪ When you package your insights into a story, you build a bridge for your
audience to understand the insights and ideas buried within the data. Those
insights and ideas help your audience take appropriate action.
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Knowledge Check
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Lesson 3: Storytelling Competencies and Best Practices

Characteristics of Great Storyteller Leaders
Interactive –
• “There’s no limit to what you can accomplish as long as you don’t care who gets credit for
it.”―Harry S. Truman
• Let’s look at the skills involved in storytelling. BB and Company is a Vancouver-based consulting
company that specializes in helping companies with strategic storytelling. It has identified five
common characteristics of great leaders who use storytelling either consciously or
subconsciously when making presentations. Click on each number to find out what these are.
o 1 – They listen, engage, and interact with their audience. They make the audience feel
as though they’re part of the conversation between two people.
o 2 – They empower others. The storytelling guides the listener to a conclusion but lets
the listeners reach the conclusion on their own. Rather than telling them the answer,
the leader shows them how to solve for the answer.
o 3 – They are generous in spirit. The storyteller leader is selfless and shares the story
with an emphasis on the story rather than looking for any praise or accolades for the
storyteller.
o 4 – They are human, vulnerable, truthful, and trustworthy. The storyteller leader isn’t
afraid to admit doubts, confusion, or mistakes. As a storyteller, you have to be authentic
so you come across as credible.
o 5 - They make sure there’s a point to the story they’re telling. The storyteller leader is
strategic about when to tell a story and understand its intended purpose and
anticipated outcome. You want to make sure they’re concise and to the point.

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 How storytelling integrates into the IMA competencies
• Let’s take a look at how storytelling integrates into the IMA Management Accounting
Competency Framework. Storytelling relates to each of these sections.
• Strategic Management – This is the competency required to envision the future, lead the
strategic planning process, guide decisions, manage risk, and monitor performance. Apply
this by working closely with decision makers and understanding direction and strategy,
which helps storytellers identify if the story is one of triumph or tragedy.
• Reporting and Control – This is the competency required to measure and report an
organization’s performance in compliance with relevant standards and regulations. Apply
this by gathering facts to outline the message of a story.
• Technology and Analytics – This is the competency required to manage technology and
analyze data to enhance organizational success. Apply this by using stories to convert data
into insights and ideas the audience can understand.
• Business Acumen and Operations – This is the competency required to contribute as cross-
functional business partners to transform company-wide operations. Apply this by
identifying which story message an audience needs to hear.
• Leadership – This is the competency required to collaborate with others and inspire teams
to achieve organizational goals. Apply this by using communication and team-building skills
to empower an audience and lead them to a logical conclusion for the story.
• Professional Ethics and Values – This is the competency required to demonstrate the
professional values, ethical behavior, and legal compliance essential to a sustainable
business model. Apply this by using truthfulness and trustworthiness, which help the
storyteller connect on a personal level with the audience and allow the audience to validate
the message.
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Knowledge Check
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• Storytelling Best Practices
o Let’s talk about the best practices related to storytelling. There are several actions you can take
to improve the effectiveness of your storytelling.
o Interactive (only text on screen) – Click on each keyword to discover what these are.
▪ Know your audience. Find out what’s most important to your audience and lead with
that information. Choose the details and framework that best resonate with your
audience. Amber knew her audience and chose to lead with an ad that her audience
knew rather than slides of data. It got their attention. Most people outside of their
related field really want to know how it will benefit them and how the information
relates to what they’re doing.
▪ Identify the message you want to impart. Once you’ve identified your audience’s
concerns, create the message you want to impart about those concerns. Determine the
best way to illustrate that message. Don’t overcomplicate the message. Streamline the

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 message to its most important takeaway. Most people can only remember three things
from a presentation.
▪ Use your own experiences, but don’t make yourself the hero. The best storytellers use
their own life experience to illustrate their stories. Anecdotes that illustrate a struggle,
failures, and barriers that have been overcome make leaders appear authentic and
acceptable. Remember to not make yourself the hero of the story. This can appear self-
serving. Focus on the event, the people you know, and the lessons you learned.
▪ Highlight a struggle. A story without a challenge isn’t very interesting. Conflict is
necessary to create engagement. Don’t be afraid to suggest that the road ahead will be
difficult. Use this to create a rallying cry that “We can do this together.” This will help
people want to be part of the journey.
▪ Make sure the story answers “What’s in it for me?” (WIIFM). If your audience doesn’t
feel that the story benefits them, they will disengage mentally from your presentation.
Always answer WIIFM.
▪ Use pictures to enhance the story. Use full, bright, and high-contrast photos to help set
the tone for your presentation. Use data visualization charts to help your audience
quickly identify major trends without getting distracted by trying to read a business
slide. Limit a slide to only a few concepts and photos so you don’t distract from the
message.
▪ Simplify. Finance professionals have a tendency to present more information, numbers,
and graphs to support their slide. Avoid this tendency. Present only the information you
need to support the story. Intersperse interesting details, but remember, “Less is more”
and don’t overwhelm the story.
▪ Watch out for jargon. Avoid the “jargon” associated with the finance profession. This
will only confuse your audience if they’re not finance professionals.
▪ Practice. Storytelling is a real art form that requires repeated effort to perfect. Practice
with friends, loved ones, and trusted colleagues to hone your message into the most
effective story. Present whenever you can. Your stories may not be great at the
beginning, but with practice, they will get better.
▪ Develop your storytelling abilities. We aren’t born natural storytellers, but with effort
and practice, we can develop into them.
Course Summary
• Let’s review the important points we covered in this course.
o We defined storytelling.
o We examined three approaches to storytelling: story as a presentation, as an
illustration, or to illicit an emotion.
o We identified why storytelling is important to management accountants.
o We explained how stories help build bridges between data and insights and ideas.
o We identified characteristics of great storytellers.
o We explored how the domains of the IMA Management Accounting Competency
Framework include elements of storytelling.

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 o We followed Amber’s story and how she used storytelling to make a bigger impact.
o In conclusion, storytelling is a powerful and effective means to influence, teach, and
inspire. It makes connections between people and ideas, creating a bridge to
understanding and action.
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Final Assessment
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