STORYTELLING FOR EXECUTIVES AND PROFESSIONALS

Speaker, Robin Nickel, JD

ABOUT OUR PROGRAM: 

This hands-on workshop will teach participants strategies to build and share more interesting and authentic stories blending their own experiences with persuasive storytelling skills to make the messages they communicate more engaging, meaningful, and memorable. Participants will learn how to move beyond facts alone and craft stories that capture attention, build connection, and give audiences a reason to listen.

By the end of this workshop, participants will be able to:

1. Identify the structural elements of a persuasive story — including a clear hook, tension or stakes, and resolution — and distinguish story-driven communication from fact-based delivery.
2. Construct an original, personal or professional story using a repeatable framework, ready to use in a real business context (pitch, meeting, presentation, or client conversation).
3. Apply storytelling techniques to strengthen message retention and emotional connection, including specificity, sensory detail, and strategic pacing.
4. Adapt story structure to different audiences and settings — from a two-minute elevator pitch to a longer client presentation — while keeping the core message intact.

Why this matters:

For HR professionals: Storytelling is central to onboarding, culture-building, change management, and internal communications. HR often has to make policy, benefits, or organizational change feel human rather than transactional — a skill directly built in this session.

For business owners: Every pitch, every hire, every touchpoint conversation, and every piece of marketing is a story whether or not it's framed that way. Owners who can tell a compelling story about their business differentiate themselves in crowded markets where competitors often make nearly identical factual claims.

For sales and account executives: Buyers are inundated with feature lists and data sheets. In a landscape — especially in Payer Strategy and other complex B2B environments — where offerings can look similar on paper, the ability to make a prospect feel the problem and see the solution through story is often the actual differentiator that closes deals.

ABOUT OUR SPEAKER:

Robin Nickel, J.D. - Associate Director of Training for Market Access

Robin grew up in Redding, having graduated from Enterprise HS before getting her B.A. in Political Science from Chico State and her J.D. from California Western School of Law in San Diego. After 10 years of practicing civil law at several firms Redding, she took her legal knowledge and skills into the world of big pharma, serving for 9 years in multiple advancing positions at GlaxoSmithKline, and the past 12 years in multiple advancing positions at AbbVie. She is currently an Associate Director of Training for Market Access at AbbVie, and regularly designs and delivers high-level trainings, workshops, and on-boarding programs for mid to senior-level leadership professionals in various training and conference settings.

OUR SPONSOR: 

PAYLOCITY

Let's Work Together.  It's our priority to understand your business, where you are and where you're going, so that the solutions you get are just right.

From the just-starting-out local boutique to the rapidly growing multi-location franchise, from brokerage firms to associations, we can tailor a solution that's the right fit for your needs today and into the future.

We know your time is valuable (and in short supply), and you also don't have a penny to spare for bad decisions, redoing work, or solutions that are just "good enough." Our flexible offerings evolve at the pace of your business to help you tackle your biggest HR challenges today so you can focus on what matters most — your people.

Joby Gaide, HCM Account Executive Jgaide@paylocity.com