In advertising, when we hear about Storytelling we immediately think of creativity. When we hear about less fun topics like data, knowledge, and understanding, we think about Planning. But planning has a creative side few people talk about, one which has to do with organizing knowledge to reach something greater than the sum of its parts (data), or finding new relationships for the facts we know, to reach meanings we don’t know.

The story below is the development of an exercise carried out a few years ago. Although it does not constitute a strategic planning exercise in itself, it works to illustrate the point:

1945. Europe awakens from the nightmare of World War II to find it is no longer the centre of the world. The world’s power moved to East and West with Russia and the US as resulting vanquishers. Broken economies and infrastructures are common denominators between all European countries.

13 thousand kilometers away a "Latin" nation charged dividends from the brain drain and capital flight the war left: Entrepreneurs, Scientists and humanists found in Argentina a safe place for their trades.

The country consolidated itself as a center of thought and prosperity, affirming a historical identity that separated it from the rest of Latin America: A white identity, one of "pure" European immigrants that stayed “so” due to the absence of numerous indigenous groups.

A sort of gaucho-belle époque came. The country dedicated itself to enjoyment and opulence, while the European countries worked hard to rebuild their economies. Argentinean numbers started to slowly fall behind, reaching the bottom in the late 70's. By 1981 inflation reaches 90% and Jorge Anaya, member of the military ruling board, came up with an idea to distract the attention from the economic disaster: To claim the Falkland Islands from Britain.

A surprise attack unleashes the war. The English, in ruins a few decades ago, needed just 3 weeks to get rid of Anaya’s troops.

The shame of the defeat was more than a military matter, just like the pride of the World Cup Victory Maradona would bring later, would be more than a sport matter. 

For the country, this was not the loss of the isles, but the loss of their “white and first world identity”.

World Cup Mexico 86: The Falklands disputers meet again in a match where Captain Diego Maradona would take his team to semi finals.
Minute 51. A high pass to the English area is too high for Maradona’s 165 centimeters. He jumps for a header while goalkeeper Peter Shilton reacts fist high to reject.  Maradona raises his left forearm above his head “aiming for momentum”, and hits the ball before the keeper. The ball passes right over Shilton's fist and rolls towards the net.

Before the fury of the English and amazement of the world, the referee grants the goal.

Minutes later Maradona dissipates some of the controversy with a goal that would go down in history as "the goal of the century" (someone later said was worth two). But it was only until the game’s press conference that would arrive the element that truly vindicate the fault, the element that putted things together from 1945 to 1986 and would let Argentines deal with a Latin identity. This element would be Maradona’s answer when a journalist asked him about the handball; an answer with it a 'Latin load' of -mischief- and -faith in divine justice- hard to find in so few words:

"I didn’t touch it; it was the hand of God".

So, the ingenuity in the press conference, added to the ingenuity in the field of play, nourished the infamous (now famous) goal and gave order to a series of events that Argentineans could not explained themselves before.
Days later Argentina became world champion of the game the English invented. 

Years later Maradona opened a related interview with a Latin popular saying, which reads: “Thief who steal thief, gets 100 years of pardon”.

*    *    *

Without the variable of the Falklands, the hand goal would have remained as an anecdote in the history of the World Cup. And without the variable of the Argentine identity, it would have been just a pride clash.  

But creating a story connecting dots (from WorldWar II in 1945 to a press conference in 1986), is possible to create a whole new meaning for a single fact, or in this case, make a historic episode, from an anecdote.

And this is important because only when new relationships between visible events are sought, invisible meanings are found. And it is only by finding these meanings that is possible to make communication important for people, and therefore important for brands.