NarraText  Story Arc
The Story Arc (aka Dramatic Arc or Freytag's Pyramid) provides a general representation of the Structure of  Story - its major parts and dimensions. Gustav Freytag's original conception of the "pyramid" contained only 5 parts. The adaptation of the pyramid used by NarraText contains 7 parts to address the structure of business narratives.



Follow is descriptive details about the Story Arc:
  • The Grand Principles of Narrative describe 3 meta-dimensions that frame all stories and narratives.
Grand Principles of Narrative*1
SUCCESSION Sequencing in Time of Player Events or States
TRANSFORMATION Some Sort of Change that occurs in Events and States during the Story
MEDIATION Interpretations, inferences, evaluations,  judgments, etc. that are  made in the Story, but above the story-line

*1   From:  “Grand Principles of Narratology”, Henrik Scharfe, http://vbn.aau.dk/files/165921/GPN.pdf (accessed 2/2014)

  • Tradional Story/Dramatic Parts (column 1 are adapted from Freytag's Pyramid) are set along side the corresponding Parts (column 2) that make up the "Business Story Arc"
  • A description (in Business Story Terms) is provided for each part that provides some detail of what each interval or point  entails -- that is how it relates to the operational events that occure in "handling" the inciting issue.

Traditional Story Part Business Story Part Description
Setting Backgound This represents the Story Context - the place, time, culture, conditions, circumstance,  etc. which is the backdrop of the story.
Inciting Incident Inciting Issue This is the event or "state of affairs" that incites action and begins the transformation in the story. In the Business Story this is a product failure, service short-coming, catastophe, or other operational anomaly that incites the call to action.
Rising Solution Search This represents the activities and efforts to find a solution to mitigate the inciting issue and to get operations "back on track" or re-calibrated and to mitigate negative impacts caused by the inciting issue.
Climax Deploy Solution This is the "actionable" point where an intervention is initiated whereby  a chosen solution (or solutions) is deployed to correct or mitigate the impact of the inciting issue.
Falling Action Solution Evaluation This represents the  evaluation of the efficacy of the deployed solution to ensure it produces the "desired" (or acceptable) results.
Resolution Sign off on Solution This is the point where the deployed solution is formally accepted to "correct" or mitigate the inciting issue.
Operational policies might be set into place to prevent, detect, or facilitate correction of a repeat of the inciting issue
Denouement Wrap Up (Post Mortem) This represents the time after "sign off" where the players, events, states, activities, and goals of the Story are reviewed and documented, and the story is ended.