In Part 1 of this three-part series, Chris Hare shares how a single founder story sparked a strategy pivot inside Amazon—and why storytelling isn’t fluff, it’s infrastructure. As a behind-the-scenes strategist for some of tech’s biggest companies, Chris has spent decades shaping narratives that align people, purpose, and performance. But his real power lies in his Gen X sensibility: low drama, high pattern recognition, and deep alignment between what’s said and what’s done. This episode explores how narrative becomes strategy—and why the most powerful shifts often start quietly, from the edges.From Ad World to Strategic Narrative“I started in marketing, but I got tired of talking at people.”Chris shares how his path from advertising to Amazon and Microsoft led him to discover a deeper kind of storytelling—one that doesn’t sell, but aligns and activates.Stories Fuel the Narrative—But Don’t Confuse the Two“Stories are time-bound. Narratives are ongoing.”He breaks down the difference between stories and narratives using a flywheel model—and why most companies misuse both.When a Story Shifts a Billion-Dollar Business“One conversation in Brooklyn rewrote the future of Amazon Marketplace.”Chris recounts how a single founder story changed the internal narrative at Amazon, sparking a strategic shift toward supporting brand owners—not just resellers.Narrative Isn’t a Department—It’s the Operating System“Everyone thinks they own the narrative. The CMO. The CEO. The team.”He unpacks why narrative must be rooted in strategy, and why trying to split it between brand, marketing, and product only creates confusion.How Change Starts with Listening“Storytelling isn’t a hero’s journey framework. It’s a pattern recognition discipline.”Chris explains how real narrative work starts with deep listening and curiosity—and how companies can design strategy around human insight, not hype._____________________Connect with us:Host: Vince Chan | Guest: Chris Hare --Chief Change Officer--Change Ambitiously. Outgrow Yourself.Open a World of Expansive Human Intelligencefor Transformation Gurus, Black Sheep,Unsung Visionaries & Bold Hearts.EdTech Leadership Awards 2025 Finalist.15 Million+ All-Time Downloads.80+ Countries Reached Daily.Global Top 3% Podcast.Top 10 US Business.Top 1 US Careers.>>>150,000+ are outgrowing. Act Today.<<<
Chapter 1: Who are the hosts and guests of this podcast episode?
Hi, everyone. Welcome to our show, Chief Change Officer. I'm Vince Chen, your ambitious human host. Our show is a modernist community for change progressives in organizational and human transformation from around the world. If you've been listening to my show, you know I bring guests from all corners of the world to share their stories.
Through these stories, we dive into hindsight, insights, and foresight for you, the progressive-minded listeners who crave change. Whether you're navigating a career shift a personal transformation like health challenges or driving change in your organization or community, there's something here for you. Today's episode has a unique twist.
I'm interviewing a storytelling expert to share his own story. My guest, Chris Hare, is a strategic narrative advisor and coach for companies like Amazon and Microsoft, guiding leaders and executives with his approach called Atomic Storytelling. His method breaks down complex stories into their cool, resonant elements.
In this three-part series, we'll journey through Chris' experiences in three stages. Today, in part one, we'll explore his expertise in helping businesses compelling corporate stories and understand the connection between story and narrative. Tomorrow in part two, we'll look at storytelling for personal transformation as Chris shares some of the best and worst stories he's ever heard
he will also open up about his own mental health challenge. Then in part three, he'll introduce tools we can use to develop our own stories and narratives. And here's a personal confession. I told him one of his exercises might just make me cry. I'll also be sharing my own experience with another exercise, highlighting both his challenges and insights.
So let's dive into the first chapter of Chris' story. Good morning to you, Chris. Welcome to Chief Change Officer.
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Chapter 2: What is Chris Hare’s background and career journey?
Good morning, Vince. Thanks for having me.
Chris is also a podcast host, so it's a pleasure to have him on my show today. Hopefully, I'll get a chance to return the favor and join his show one day. Now, Chris has a ton of experience in storytelling. And as many of my listeners know, I ask every guest to share their story.
So inviting a storyteller like Chris to dive into his personal journey and share his approach to storytelling feels like a perfect fit for this episode. Chris, let's kick things off with your story. Give us an overview and then we'll dig into different elements of your journey.
I actually love to start with the future that I'm working to create. So for me, I'm working to create a future where business leaders and just humans in general are celebrated and remembered, not just for what they've built, but for how they built it. who they took with them and also who they became in the process of getting there. So very much anchored in the future.
My background, I started a very meandering career and then went into advertising, then went to Amazon and Microsoft, started my company in 2016, focused on marketing. And ultimately, probably around 2019, 2020, started to shift into strategic narrative practice.
So essentially translating the business strategy of a company into a narrative that aligns everyone from the board to the buyer who may want very different things around shared and differentiated future. And then now I still do that work, but I'm also significantly focused on the leaders and the narratives that drive them and to help them create that future that I was talking about.
So you started your storytelling journey by helping corporations shape and share their narratives. And now you've shifted the focus to individuals. Is that right?
Correct. I still work with corporations, but yes, I would say the seasons of it where I started with marketing, which is just oftentimes can be talking at people and then started to discover the power of narrative, which is more talking and co-creating with your audience. And then now I still do that some, but most of my focus now is on marketing.
leaders and the narrative that they need to create to bring their audience with them, but then also the internal narrative that's gotten them here and how that potentially needs to shift to get them to the future.
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Chapter 3: How has Chris Hare’s focus shifted from corporations to individuals?
Yeah, so it's tricky, right? I had a meeting with the chief marketing officer of a big tech company once and I asked her, how do you define narrative? And within a matter of minutes, she defined it at least three different ways. So there is a bit of a language challenge in that everyone uses these terms interchangeably, and oftentimes they can be the same thing.
What I've found helpful is to tease them out into, we all have stories that we tell ourselves and others constantly, and I view those as time bound. This happened, it started at this time, this thing happened and then it ended. And I view narrative as ongoing, but it's more of the narrative in my mind is more of an architecture that shapes a direction that an individual or a company is heading.
So the stories, in my mind, are really, as I conceive of it, are really the fuel for the narrative. And so we take those stories, we synthesize them, and then we create a narrative out of them, and then we follow that narrative, and it propels us, whether we're talking about a business or an individual.
In mass media, we hear the term storytelling used almost everywhere, maybe even overused. It seems like everyone is calling themselves a storyteller these days. But when you mention narrative, it seems like you are getting at something different. Could you use an analogy to help illustrate the difference or even the link between a narrative and a story?
Yeah, absolutely. So the first thing I would say to your point about the mass media, I absolutely agree. So for years, I wouldn't even... call myself a storyteller just because it was so overplayed. And I think on the one hand it's positive because it's sparked lots of conversations about it.
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Chapter 4: What is the difference between stories and narratives?
But I think what's also happened is it's very reductionistic where people say, okay, here's one framework, like the hero's journey. And it's a paint by numbers. We take these elements and we shove them into this framework and it's going to work for us. And I think it can be a lot more complex than that.
So one of my favorite examples, one of my clients, so he was a VP of Amazon Marketplace, took them from about eight employees to 4,000 and probably about 150 billion. And what was interesting is his name was Pete. At a certain point in time, their belief, I would say their narrative within the company was that the entire future of their business was resellers.
So people who had a product and they were from whatever brand and were reselling it on the platform.
And if you were to look at their data, and if you were to look at the stories that were hidden in those data, the stories that they would tell each other in the hallway about XYZ seller did this thing and had this success, it all pointed to the idea that it was just resellers and that was the future. So the stories were Vince has a product and has been selling this product successfully.
Therefore, we need to keep doing this. That's the story example. The narrative is that belief of the future of Amazon Marketplace is resellers. Therefore, we must invest in those resellers. And then as a result of that narrative, the business then changes. throws everything at that and pursues that.
What then happened then where a story actually shifted that narrative was Pete was invited to visit Brooklyn and met a number of multi-generational family-owned businesses. For example, an immigrant family potentially came over in the 30s or 40s. They may have started out repairing vacuum cleaners.
get to the third generation and now they're inventing new products and consumables for vacuum cleaner bags, for example, and they're the brand owner. So all of a sudden he met brand owners and had conversations with them and just incredibly compelling stories that move you both emotionally, but also you're seeing the business potential of this.
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Chapter 5: Why does Chris Hare see storytelling as overused and what is his approach?
They didn't have a way to measure that or look for that in their data, or they weren't. If it was there, it was hidden. And so they took those outside stories, what I would call them as atomic stories, these small moments of energy and matter, so that peat collided with these people.
heard their experiences, and as a result, brought those stories into the ecosystem and rewrote the narrative and said, actually, we believe the future might include these brand owners. And when that happened... had a tectonic shift. Now, I believe those brand owners, I believe they're an extraordinary part, tens of billions of dollars, if not more, of Amazon Marketplace's sales.
And so in that case, the third generation owner that he met, they told him a story. So that's the story. And then it shifted the narrative, which is, this is the future of Amazon Marketplace. So that's how I view the interplay of them.
So as I understand it, narrative and story really reinforce each other. If I'm hearing you correctly, you're saying that a narrative isn't static. It can evolve over time. For example, in a business context, you might start with one narrative that helps attract customers or business partners.
Those people in turn generate their own stories, which marketing and communications teams can collect to learn more about the customers and their experiences. These stories then help to reshape or even reposition the narrative, potentially attracting a new segment of the market. Would you say that's a fair summary of how narrative and story interact?
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Chapter 6: How did a single founder story shift Amazon Marketplace’s business narrative?
If we had our cameras on right now, you'd see a huge smile on my face. Yes, exactly. That's exactly it. So I find it helpful to think about it as a narrative flywheel. That's probably my Amazon background. But exactly. So the stories are the fuel that flows into the flywheel.
And then within that, the stories come in and then we synthesize those stories and look at the patterns within them, look at the different directions they could take us. And then we make choices about those Roger Martin's where to play and how to win. Based on these stories that we have now synthesized, we are going to make decisions about where to play and how to win.
And then lastly, then we have experimentation or learnings from those that then create more stories. And then we continue to bring in stories from the ecosystem and around it goes. But you're exactly right. And I think the other piece that you said that is really powerful is is if you're Amazon or any other large company and you're to come out with
Like a narrative, you need to have one narrative. But you also spoke to the flip side, which is you said it needs to be flexible and there needs to be room for experimentation. And so I think there is Dr. Herminio Barra at London Business School talks about this for the individual is running experiments around different possible future selves when you're talking about your own narrative.
But again, with companies, I think you can do the same thing. You're not going to put a bunch of different narratives out into the world and tell the world everything. Hey, shareholders, we're going to experiment with all these narratives. You've got to come to the market with one narrative, but having the ability to experiment and learn with possible futures and then use that to adapt ongoing.
Is the narrative essentially part of the branding or is it something bigger? In other words, does the narrative serve as an umbrella under which the brand and all its messaging operates? Or are they distinct but closely related? How would you explain the relationship between narrative and brand in a business context?
Yeah, so I think I was just thinking about this morning before our call is that a business is a collection or an ecosystem of narratives and not an infinite number, but seemingly infinite number of narratives that are just colliding against each other. I have a narrative internally about what you're saying right now.
Or if you're my manager, you have a narrative about me and what I'm doing with my time and what my future is. We have all of these narratives that can collide with one another. In an ideal world, there's one narrative within a company. One of the challenges is the way that the word narrative is used. Oftentimes within companies, the chief marketing officer will say that they own the narrative.
I had a conversation with someone from a company, a well-known company, that was struggling a lot. And this person's manager was the CMO, and the manager said, I own the narrative. I want you to work with me on the narrative. And the CEO came to this person and said, I own the narrative. I want you to work with me on the narrative.
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