For project managers
Project vision video
Your finished project as a short animated story. Every stakeholder, in every office, sees the same result before the build starts.
Why it works →Show your stakeholders the finished project on day one.
Your project might not deliver for a year. At kickoff, I show everyone the finished result as a short animated story, so they all agree on what’s being built. At go-live, the same story trains your staff.
Project work inside 28 organisations, including
- BP
- IBM
- Microsoft
- Sonic Healthcare
- Queensland Police
- Petro-Canada
What I make
Three ways to work with me
Same method each time: start with the end.
For learning and HR teams
Story-based e-learning
Rise 360 courses built on a story your staff recognise, instead of steps and a quiz.
How it’s different →For any business
Business explainer video
A short video that tells one client’s story: where they start, and where you get them.
Who it’s for →The problem at kickoff
Everyone nods. Nobody pictures the same thing.
Kickoff day. Stakeholders flown in from other cities, maybe other countries. A long deck, and a project document few of them will finish. Everyone nods, then goes home picturing a different project.
The gap surfaces months later, in testing, as rework, scope creep and a steering committee asking why the system isn’t what they expected.
The idea
Start with the end in mind.
Good projects agree on the finished result before anyone builds it. That keeps scope in check. A project vision video does it in a few minutes.
Amazon
Amazon writes up the finished customer experience first, then works backwards to what to build.
Colin Bryar & Bill Carr, Working Backwards, 2021
5 minutes
Kotter’s test for any change: if you can’t explain the vision “in five minutes or less” and see it understood, you’re not done.
J. P. Kotter, Harvard Business Review, 1995
47%
Nearly half of unsuccessful projects miss their goals because of inaccurate requirements management.
PMI, Pulse of the Profession: Requirements Management, 2014
Vision videos
Software researchers call this a vision video: a short film of the future system in use. It builds shared understanding where text falls short.
Karras, Schneider & Fricker, Journal of Systems and Software, 2020 · Nagel et al., Requirements Engineering, 2023 and 2024
Results
A 40-page deck, or one short story.
A project manager on a multimillion-dollar healthcare project had a 40-page PowerPoint, a thick specification, and doctors flying in from across Australia. She didn’t give me the slides. We talked. About five days later she had a two-minute story of one patient using the finished system. Everyone understood it, and it changed how the project was delivered.
The briefing she had
- A 40-page PowerPoint
- A thick specification
- Stakeholders flown in from across Australia
What they saw
- A two-minute story, made in about five days
- One patient, start to finish
- Everyone understood the outcome
How it works
We discuss your project. I make the story.
After almost 30 years building and documenting complex systems, I talk to you the way you’d talk to your own team.
-
Stage 1
Conversations
You talk me through the project. I come back with questions.
-
Stage 2
Storyboard and script
I storyboard the user journey, stage by stage. The script is written within it, so every point you need is covered. You sign off both.
-
Stage 3
Production
AI tools make the scenes, animation and voiceover from the storyboard and script.
-
Stage 4
Kickoff
Play it at kickoff, and send it to everyone who couldn’t be in the room.
Story-based e-learning
Your staff practise the job, not the Next button.
Most e-learning lists the steps, then tests them. People click Next until it says 100%, then move on.
My courses tell a story: someone like your staff, a real problem, the wrong way, then the right way. Then it’s their turn. On a project, it’s the kickoff video’s story.
Someone like them
A character your staff recognise, doing their job. Across 37 studies, stories were understood and remembered better than explanations.
Mar, Li, Nguyen & Ta, Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 2021 (opens in a new tab)
A real problem
The story is the job, not decoration. In one study, a plain slideshow beat a narrative game built around the same content.
Adams, Mayer et al., Journal of Educational Psychology, 2012 (opens in a new tab)
Wrong first, then right
The old way fails; the new way works. Across 117 studies, showing both transferred best to the job.
Taylor, Russ-Eft & Chan, Journal of Applied Psychology, 2005 (opens in a new tab)
Then their turn
They make the same decisions in a new situation. Across 65 studies, simulation training gave 14% more procedural knowledge.
T. Sitzmann, Personnel Psychology, 2011 (opens in a new tab)
Want this inside your own learning team? I also take six-month contracts as an instructional designer or e-learning producer. Start a conversation →
Business explainer video
Explain what you do, from your client’s side.
Most businesses describe themselves with a list of services. An explainer video tells the story of one client instead: where they start, and where you get them.
It works on a small business website, a corporate team’s intranet or in a pitch. Same method as the big projects: start with your client’s future.
About
Ken McHardie
PRINCE2 FoundationITIL v3 FoundationBrisbane, Australia
Most people see a handful of major projects in a career. I’ve been an IT contractor all my working life, so every job was a project.
Ten years as a developer, building more than 30 commercial databases. Then almost 20 as a technical writer on major projects. I’ve seen what makes projects succeed, and watched them fail.
I’ve built e-learning for corporate teams since 2005, ran my own e-learning company, LearnByCartoon, and still build courses in Articulate Rise 360.
Storytelling consultants teach your leaders to tell stories. I make the story of your project, your business or your service.
Also available for six-month contracts as a technical writer, instructional designer or e-learning producer.
Contact
Start with a conversation.
Tell me what you need and when you need it.
Prefer LinkedIn? Message Ken McHardie on LinkedIn.