How many stories does your building have? One person may say: "The elevator goes to 19." Another might say: "Well, there are only two of us and we work out of a garage, but we’ve got a million stories." Obviously, "story" has two meanings. Not so obviously, these meanings originated as one. We call the levels of a building stories because they once were painted on or sculpted so that each story actually told a story. And perhaps these stories said something about what was taking place inside the building–sort of like the earliest form of public relations.

Ten years ago I joined a small software company outside Chicago as director of corporate communications. On my first day, the CEO asked me to sit in on a review of the corporate newsletter. The lead piece was about an award the company had won for its flagship product. The next was about the CEO being feted at some industry luncheon, the kind where everyone congratulates each other endlessly. The third reported the company’s quarterly sales volume had taken a nice uptick. Etc. Zzzzz… I was snoring.

"So whaddya think?" asked my latest commander in chief. Being new, I was desperate to make a good impression. I pondered deeply. Then I said: "I think it sucks." A moment of stunned silence followed. However, the CEO took my point. "It’s all about you," I said. "But who cares about you? Isn’t this supposed to be about your customers? Why not showcase their work and interests? Get some of them involved in the publication." And so it came to pass. But not before the PR guy stared daggers at me and the marcom maven shot me a look that could wilt a cactus.

Of course the company newsletter is now the corporate Web site, so things have changed. But they haven’t changed enough.

In 1994, I was building an early high-profile (and equally ill-fated) e-commerce site. I met with a guy from Bolt, Beranek and Newman who said he thought the outfits that would prosper on the Internet would be those that connected their customers not just to the company but to each other. These customers would tell each other stories that would be far more interesting and useful than the usual corporate blather. I thought his observation was dead-on. Still do.

Several months ago I met with the Web marketing team at a major industry analyst organization. As background, they’d read my Gonzo Marketing article in Esther Dyson’s Release 1.0 newsletter (www.edventure.com/ release1/0200.html), where I wrote "If the pitch is the epitome of broadcast, the story embodies the essential character of the Web." The group had produced a couple stories of their own, and wanted my opinion of them. One was ostensibly by a single mother, the other by a harried IT executive. After listening carefully, I said, "Anyone who takes the time to read these will hate you. They begin as real stories, but then you hit readers with an advertisement. You lull them into believing you, then trick them, break faith with them. Lose the pitch," I said. "Lose the biz-speak."

"Ouch, that hurts," they said. But they also said, "Yeah, that’s right."

Laurie Doctor (www.lauriedoctor.com) is an artist, calligrapher and poet who wouldn’t know biz-speak if it bit her. She puts on workshops, one of which is called Finding Your Own Story. "The best stories," she writes, "have been passed down through time, not because they reflect unchanging fact, but because of a deeper truth about the human condition. Remembering these stories gives societies context, dimension, vision. Stories contain warnings, predicaments and universal answers. They become an invisible architecture that holds us, creating cultural cohesion."

The language of business has strayed far from the language of the heart, but it is still heart that most deeply connects us–to each other and the things we genuinely value. Business used broadcast advertising to revise the concept of value wholesale, casting all of life in the kind of monetary terms it valued most itself. But the Internet is not a broadcast medium, and that changes everything. Corporate control over "key messages" is a joke, a fantasy. With that iron-fisted control gone, people are once again talking in human terms, telling stories in their own voices.

Companies don’t have values or voices, only people do. Fortunately, your company has lots of people. How many stories does your building have? Before you can answer, you must understand what a story truly is. To do that, you first have to find your own. If you can’t, you’ve got nothing to say worth listening to. And your audience is listening. For a heartbeat. P

Christopher Locke (clocke@panix.com) is co-author of The Cluetrain Manifesto. He is currently at work on Gonzo Marketing: Winning Through Worst Practices (Perseus Books, 2001).