Story is not fluff. It’s strategy.
Strengthen trust, deepen impact, and design programs that truly serve your community through story-driven strategy rooted in ethical listening and lived experience to increase your impact, become more efficient, and command the attention of funders and decision makers.
Data moves the needle, but it doesn’t build trust.
Across health, justice, philanthropic, and community-centered organizations, leaders are facing competing pressures as they work to serve their communities:
Community trust is weakening
Programs aren’t landing the way they were designed
Staff feel disconnected from purpose
Decision-makers need clarity and stories of real impact
Funders want to understand the “why,” not just the numbers
Communications efforts feel disconnected from lived experience
Even the most well-intentioned strategies fall flat when the wisdom of the community is missing from the design.
What’s missing isn’t effort. It’s story.
Story is how humans build trust, make decisions, understand complexity, and create lasting change.
But most organizations treat story as a nice-to-have, not as infrastructure.
The Center for Story & Strategy™ exists to change that.
When we listen differently, we build differently.
I grew up in a culture where stories carried knowledge, caution, humor, and meaning. They shaped how decisions were made and how wisdom was passed on.
When I entered public health—first as a student, then as a researcher, strategist, and care worker—I couldn’t understand why systems designed to serve communities rarely listened to them.
Through work with organizations ranging from small community centers to federal ministries, I learned a truth that guides everything we do:
Programs fail when lived experience is ignored.
Programs flourish when lived experience is centered.
At the Center for Story & Strategy™, we support organizations to:
Build trust with the communities you serve
Create strategies with built-in buy-in
Reduce wasted resources on ineffective initiatives
Reconnect staff to the meaning of their work
Develop communications and advocacy tools that move decision-makers and funders
Increase impact with greater ease and clarity
We treat story as a core method for strategy, not an afterthought.
Our work creates meaningful, measurable, human-centered change.
case studies
Our work creates meaningful, measurable, human-centered change.
case studies
Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center
We trained rural care workers to gather stories in communities where small datasets couldn’t reflect the true impact of their work. These stories became powerful advocacy assets that secured support, funding, and recognition.
Federal Ministry of Health of Ethiopia
Led a nationwide story-gathering project across all levels of the health system—informing the country's first Compassionate and Respectful Healthcare Initiative.
The Vermont Network
Facilitated StoryGatherings with survivors and healthcare workers to better understand systemic barriers. These stories informed new training programs that honor both patient and provider experiences.
International Crisis Response (Greece & Ethiopia)
Designed and implemented storytelling initiatives with displaced individuals and communities—shifting narratives, influencing policy conversations, and supporting humanitarian response.
Past partners include:
Ways to work together
We're here to support you at every stage of the journey, from building foundational understanding to implementing system-wide transformation.
Tools for your team
Story-Led Strategy Trainings
You’ll get:
- 16 training modules on ethical storytelling, trust-building, strategy design, and advocacy
- Study guides and implementation exercises for each module
- Tools to help your team build trust, reduce burnout, and create more effective programs
Self-Paced
Story-Driven Strategy Trainings
Diagnostic strategy sessions
Story Lab Sessions
You’ll receive:
- A 3-hour organizational story-mapping session (virtual or in-person)
- A comprehensive Strategy Brief outlining recommended initiatives
- Implementation guidance tailored to your existing workflow
- A follow-up meeting to support rollout
Perfect for organizations beginning their storytelling journey—or those needing clarity for a specific initiative.
3-hour intensive + strategic brief
Story Lab Sessions
Hybrid implementation support
Story Hours
Includes:
- Access to the full suite of storytelling trainings
- Twice-monthly calls for guidance and Q&A
- Intermittent Slack support
- Peer learning with other teams
Ideal for organizations wanting collaborative implementation without a high-touch retainer.
4–12 months
Story Hours
Done For You Customized Partnerships
Customized Collaboration
Includes:
- One Story Lab Session + strategy brief
- Up to 10 hours/week of hands-on implementation support
- Regular calls, email, and Slack communication
- Evaluation, adaptation, and embedded culture change
Perfect for organizations in transition, facing complexity, or ready to transform systems from the inside out.
4–12 months
Customized Collaboration
Intensives & Retreats
Intensives & Retreats
Includes:
- Story Lab Session to shape the retreat vision
- A retreat brief + curriculum design
- An in-person or virtual retreat or intensive
- Experiential learning that strengthens trust, connection, and purpose
Ideal for teams seeking grounding, connection, and shared language around story-driven work.
2–4 weeks
Intensives & Retreats
Our Signature Groundwork Framework
A focused diagnostic strategy session that uncovers your organization's story. the narrative waters you swim in, the strengths your brilliant team brings and the assumptions that need attention.
This is where we go to the community and listen. depending on what you need: a community map that shows your strengths, services, and gaps from the ground up, or a compliance-ready needs assessment for funders and regulators. Either way, the priorities that come out are ranked, defensible, and based on community wisdom. The community sets the criteria. The community confirms we heard them right.
We build stratetigic plansfrom the validated priorities, plus the story assets — audio and written, in community voice — that move funders and decision-makers without extraction.
You can buy any one of these on its own Or move through all three as one arc, each stage feeds the next and learning is compounded along the way.
Ethical.
Strategic. Human-centered. Effective.
- A background in public health, narrative strategy, and doula-informed care
- Deep experience across community health, philanthropy, justice systems, and crisis response
- A proven track record of creating system-level change, including inclusion in the Public Health 40 under 40 class of 2026
- A methodology that feels like a deep exhale, not another time-consuming priority to manage
- A commitment to ethical listening and non-extractive practices
Her work integrates lived experience, strategy, and human connection to create meaningful, long-lasting change in how your organization improves the lives of the communities you serve.
"When we set out to create a new training program for health professionals, we knew we needed the stories of people with lived experience to sit at the heart of that project. In a time when those most harmed in our communities are often the ones most researched, questioned and extracted from to produce solutions, we chose to work with Madison Barney to ensure that the gathering of those stories would serve as much as a gift to the people who shared them, as it would to the people who will learn and benefit from their telling.
Madison was intentional and timely with project planning and correspondence. She entered every room with clarity, joy and a deep understanding of the purpose of our time together. And she delivered a clever, well organized, and engaging learning tool that pulses with the voices of our project’s participants.
I cannot recommend her more highly and I look forward to working with her again."
-Kiona Heath
Director, Trauma Informed Care Vermont Network
"To many in this modern world, data means statistically significant numbers and is seen as the only valid way to document reality. Madison Barney understands how bereft of truth and usefulness this definition really is, especially for historically marginalized people, small groups, and rural communities. Madison is an ally and a partner in bringing these voices to the table in ways that honor their traditions and reduce the harm that can be done with extractive data collection approaches. She is a pleasure to work with – always teaching, always advocating, and always drawing me closer to a true understanding of what health equity should look like in our community."
-Alice Ely
Executive Director, Public Health Council of the Upper Valley
This approach integrates into your existing workflows. It’s intentionally low-lift and often saves teams time.you'll never look at a workout the same way again.
Most organizations see shifts in engagement and clarity within the first few weeks. Community and funder impacts build over time.
Story-driven strategy reduces wasted resources by ensuring your initiatives have built-in buy-in and alignment.
No. Communications tells the story you’ve already decided.
Story-driven strategy shapes what you decide.
No. Your team already uses storytelling naturally. We simply help translate that into organizational practice.
