TED Stories

Telling Stories to Deliver Fascinating Presentations

Great speakers tell stories. As you watch the following presentations, pay attention to how the speakers use storytelling to make an emotional connection with the audience, tell them something novel and leave them with a memorable picture. 

In determining the specific story or stories they will tell, most TED speakers choose one of three types:
1. a personal story that relates to the topic and will make an emotional connection with the audience
2. a story about other people that has the same impact
3. stories of success or failure of innovations, products or brands

Speakers enhance presentations by  using visual aides or sound effects, props (physical objects) and/or dramatic body language  (facial expressions, gestures or movement),  Notice how these aides are used to enhance and not replace the speaker's message.

Visual aides: How are pictures used? How are props used? How much text appears on a slide? How big is the text?
Gestures: How high and how low do the speakers hands go? Where are their hands for most of the speech?
Facial expression and intonation: What tone does the speaker establish? What changes do you notice?
Movement: Does the speaker stay in one place or move around on the stage? What is the effect?
Body Language: Does the speaker change his or her posture? How? What is the effect?


Becoming an expert takes practice, connections and passion. In her blogpost,, Amanda Palmer describes (in very informal language!)  how she solicited help in planning, practiced in front of various groups, asked for feedback, revised, crowd-sourced, story-boarded, rehearsed, revised, rehearsed, revised and rehearsed before delivering a very natural, sincere presentation that connects through storytelling. 



Bryan Stevenson is an American civil rights attorney who has won countless cases, including at the Supreme Court, fighting for fair treatment in the criminal justice system.  In this talk, he spends 65% of his time telling stories about people who have influenced his life including his grandmother, Rosa Parks and a janitor. He backs up his main point about racial injustice with statistics, and specific examples, but it is his stories that make his talk so dynamic, and he achieves this dynamism without slides or props.



Ron Finley, known as the gangsta gardner, speaks of education, justice, nutrition, art and activism in a powerful story of urban gardening and the absurd need for civil disobedience to promote the movement. See how his gestures, body language, intonation, level of language, humor and photos connote authenticity and drive his story. Notice the effective use of comparison by repetition in his first story.




Susan Cain seems to feel a bit awkward as she tells her first story, but then we find out that this is at the heart of her topic. Notice how she uses her hands as she tells her stories. This lecture is particularly important for anyone who feels painfully shy about delivering presentations.



Amy Cuddy's topic is body language. As you watch this presentation, observe her use of body language and think about your own (in daily life and in formal situations).




Chimamanda Adichie is a novelest from Nigeria and uses stories from her own life to explain the danger of making broad assumptions based on a single story.