Storytelling: Making Climate Action Reporting More Appealing 

Fritz Schumann, journalist, film director and communication trainer, knows how to tell compelling stories. He shared the following key storytelling and writing tips for climate action reporting with members of the EUKI community during an EUKI Academy training event in July 2025. 

What makes a compelling story?  

A good story is about change through conflict, Fritz Schumann says. It goes beyond recounting an event or describing a situation — it’s about transformation from a starting point characterised by a challenge or state of disruption. It imparts information with emotion, includes an interpretation and helps the reader to make sense of the world.

“To engage readers from the start, it is key to raise the conflict question early on, sparking curiosity, but avoiding giving away too much too soon,” Fritz Schumann advises. 

Every strong story involves people. What do they want? What do they do? A mere description of their personality is unlikely to be appealing for the reader.

How to find a good success story 

The concept of a story path helps in developing the right narrative about a project’s results and successes. Along the path, writers identify topic, place, people and protagonists and use them as the basis for creating the story. 

• Topic: What is the story about? At first sight, the topic of a project success story seems to be clear: It is about the change the project has achieved. So try to find an issue within your topic that people can relate to, such as changing their lives for the better, justice, survival, identity or hope. What could the story be? 

• Place: Where does it happen? Be as specific as possible.  

• People: Who is involved? 

• Protagonist: This is someone who is confronted with the conflict mentioned before.  

• Story: The story is told around the protagonist’s journey: How did they experience the conflict, how did they respond, and what changed as a result?  

This structure helps transform dry facts into a narrative and find strong story angles in each project. Don’t forget to ask yourself which question drives your story and what the audience should remember when it’s over. 

Writing the story 

There are millions of writing tips out there. One by storytelling trainer John York brings many of them to the point: “Bad writing explains; good writing shows.”  

Fritz Schumann also has some advice. He says: “Distance makes words sad, so avoid vague or overly general language, because it creates emotional detachment. Bring your audience closer by being as specific as possible. Make the world of your story tangible and real. When introducing contrast, try to avoid using ‘but’ and let the conflict of the story emerge naturally. And always make it specific: Don’t just say ‘tree’ if you can say ‘pine’. The more vivid your words, the more vividly your audience will remember the story.” 

Some tips for good writing  

• Cut filler words such as “also, very, just or really”. 

• Clear writing is better than beautiful writing. 

• Avoid non-specific adjectives such as “different, special, big, small or perfect”. 

• Replace adjectives with verbs whenever possible. 

• Write like people speak and it will stay in their minds for longer. 

• Show, don’t tell: Show meaningful details instead of making absolute statements. 

• Provide one new piece of information per sentence and one topic per paragraph. 

• Write what is happening, not what you intend to do.

These few basic tips can help unearth countless compelling stories hidden in climate projects and activities. With these easy-to-use storytelling tools, climate action experts can breathe life into project reports or impact statements, making them more convincing and leaving a lasting impression. 

For more insights on communicating success stories, have a look at this handout from the Leipzig School of Media.