How to Tell a Story

A brand is a story. An IPO is a story. A career is a story. What is your story and how will you tell it? All great stories contain the same elements and structure, and anyone can become a master storyteller—once you have cracked the code and learned the hidden formula that drives Greek myths, Harry Potter novels, Star Wars movies, Wall Street Journal articles, and even Rolex advertisements. How can you persuade journalists to write about your company? How can the storytelling formula transform every part of your business—sales, marketing, customer support, internal communications? Dan Lyons is a multi-format storyteller: an international bestselling author, Hollywood comedy screenwriter who wrote for HBO’s hit show Silicon Valley, and creator of the legendary Fake Steve Jobs blog, which earned him accolades as “the Mark Twain of Silicon Valley,” and “the Jonathan Swift of our digital age.” Dan also has been a journalist, a marketer, a media consultant, a ghostwriter, and even a creative writing lecturer at the University of Michigan—and he draws upon all those experiences to deliver a master class in corporate storytelling.

Dan Lyons is a humorist, journalist, and screenwriter. He has been called “the Mark Twain of Silicon Valley,” and “a Jonathan Swift of our own digital age.” He’s a sharp-eyed, cynical humorist in the spirit of Dave Barry, P.J. O’Rourke, Jon Stewart, and Bill Maher. But instead of politics, Dan aims his laser-sharp wit at the world of business, and especially Silicon Valley. Over the past decade Dan has done more than 100 keynotes and corporate events, entertaining audiences with his irreverent, laugh-out-loud takes on tech and the modern workplace. Dan’s combination of smart and funny have made him “the expert on the culture of work, and how it’s changing business and lives,” says Dave Ramsay, who runs the legendary “Ramsay Talks” series in Toronto.

Dan’s career as a satirist began when he created the Fake Steve Jobs blog, a smart-funny website where he spoofed the persona of Apple’s legendary founder and established his reputation as a gifted humorist and savvy critic of how technology shapes our culture. He wrote for HBO’s hit series Silicon Valley, and published Disrupted: My Misadventure in the Startup Bubble, a rollicking New York Times best-selling memoir about his time working inside a cult-like tech startup run by Millennials. He published Lab Rats: How Silicon Valley Made Work Miserable for the Rest of Us in 2018. Dan has written for the New York Times, Fortune, Forbes, Newsweek, and many others. He’s quick on his feet, loves doing Q&A, and will have your audience in stitches with his rapid-fire delivery and self-deprecating wit. He aims to entertain but also to inform, leaving your audience with new ideas and a fresh perspective

Follow him on Twitter @realdanlyons