A great story.  Good writers and journalists crave one if they can find it, and for good reason: stories powerfully connect with the audience. Stories with a narrative arc, with a beginning, a middle and an end.  Humanized stories, usually with real people in them—people we can understand, and perhaps even see a bit of ourselves in them.  Humans have been telling such stories to each other for millennia.  They are a medium through which we have transmitted our thoughts, our emotions, our cultures, our values.  Today the purpose of stories is no different, even though the tools and speed by which they are disseminated continue changing rapidly.  Our audience, once in rapt attention for hours around a campfire or in an amphitheater, is now scrolling through newsfeeds on their mobile devices, whiplashing from shiny headline to the inside scoop and then on to pop culture’s flavor of the week.  But what makes everyone from the most cynical teenager to the hardened, harried executive stop and savor for a while is that good story. 

As a reporter, columnist and editor lucky enough to work for some of the United States’ most prestigious journalistic institutions, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and NPR, I have chased to find and present those stories to American and international audiences.  More recently, as a professor at Columbia Journalism School, Harvard Kennedy School and now my old alma mater, the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts, where I have the fortune to run a center named after one of our most storied story tellers, Edward R. Murrow. I have been trying to teach would-be diplomats, social workers, executives and journalists how to do the same. I try to teach them how to capture an audience either to inform or to influence opinion. And I try to show them that nothing does so, if they can find one, better than a human story related to their subject. 

But what if the great story is closer to home?  Much closer.  What if we are the story?  Many of us tend to get so caught up in studying data, and events, and other people, that we forget to reflect on the experiences in our own lives that have shaped us.  We think sharing these “touchy-feely” stories are somehow unprofessional, even though they are ultimately far more powerful to our audience.  We need to tell the world who we are, what drives us, what inspires us—and we can do that through our own stories.  

That is what Minutes of Magic was all about.  In this book, 80 young leaders found their personal stories, crafted them into four-minute speeches, and shared them with the world.  Yes, some of these young women and men felt awkward and uncomfortable laying out their deepest—sometimes most painful—experiences in front of hundreds of people.  Yes, it took a herculean amount of courage to step on a stage and talk about what makes you, you.  For some, giving a speech was even more difficult, since they had to give it in a language that isn’t their native tongue.  But all of them were nurtured in an encouraging, team-oriented, no-judgment environment.  All of them were coached with the most important public speaking lessons like speed of speech, soundbites, and Aristotle’s three appeals of ethos, logos, and pathos.   And all of them were trained with sincerity, commitment and passion by my colleague-in-crime, Mihir Mankad.

Mihir was Deputy Director of the Murrow Center, and I often sat in his Arts of Communication classes to witness firsthand his incredible gifts as a communications teacher, mentor, and leader.  He helped graduate students unleash their public speaking potential, expertly coached faculty members for media appearances, and offered executive education sessions to diplomats and central bank officials from around the globe.  His courses covered a range of scenarios, such as impromptu speaking, elevator pitching, debates, and media management.  All were hungry to learn these skills to help them succeed, whether in diplomacy, policy, or business careers.  Mihir has taught at other institutions, too, including Harvard and the Indian School of Business, and ventured into creating popular speaking events, including at The Fletcher Ideas Exchange and Faces of Community, which drew audiences from around the Boston area. 

With students in particular, Mihir helped build their self-confidence, on the one hand, and ability to generously collaborate, on the other.  The students worked in teams and gave each other constructive criticism that was often remarkably insightful. Your fellow students, after all, were also your audience.  You might say that Mihir’s classes went beyond teaching to become a form of community building.

In the era of “fake news”, his students told real stories.  In the era of mis- and dis-information, their tales were refreshingly authentic.  In the era of demoralizing political slugfests, where netizens pack vitriol into 280-character tweets and hurl them across the internet, the student’s speeches were long-form and inspirational.  Today, as the world reels with anxieties from pandemics to violence, we yearn for authentic and inspiring stories to lift us up and move us forward.  That’s why this book matters.  It represents an important exchange of ideas, and a sharing of core values from young people around the world—values forged by years of experience, hours of preparation, and four minutes of magic.