As part of TEDxLondon’s work, we provide space for storytellers to explore what best practice for storytelling and narrative change is and help them to connect and collaborate with one another. After all, the TED platform was built on the premise that stories and ideas are powerful tools for changing the world.
Even for those not familiar with the concept of narrative change or storytelling, you’ll come across this kind of work everyday – in what you watch on TV to the adverts you see around you to what podcasts you listen to. So when we talk about storytelling and narrative change at TEDxLondon, we really mean this in the broadest sense. Whether you’re a creator, campaigner, writer, activist or artist, if you’re telling stories about the world we live in, we’re interested!
Why did we focus on Adolescence?
Earlier in July 2025, we brought together two brilliant previous TEDxLondon speakers, Ben Hurst and Nathalie McDermott. Ben works at Beyond Equality as the Director of Facilitation, where he works with boys and young men to deconstruct and reconstruct masculinities and explores what positive masculinities look like. Nathalie is the Founder & Co-CEO of Heard, a charity that works with people and the media to inspire content and communication that changes hearts and minds.
We wanted to use the TV show Adolescence, as a case study to explore successful storytelling techniques and zoom out to ask: Are you ready for your Adolescence moment, in your field and the issue that you work on?
How Adolescence created wider conversations
Ben and Nathalie both shared how Adolescence combined brilliant artistic storytelling within the medium itself – from the amazing technical shots to the actors to the script. However, they both noted that certain decisions about the story itself were really significant to its success. Nathalie explains:
“What I think Adolescence did extremely well was.. that they didn’t focus on the murder of Katie, the girl. Now, I know in some circles they criticise that move, because it felt like erasure… The problem with just focusing on what happened is that we get lost in the trauma of that experience and we become blind to seeing anything else, like we’re stuck in that place of pain.”
Nathalie explains that by moving beyond trauma-based storytelling (see her TEDxLondon talk), the audience does not just focus on the horror of what happened to Katie, but is pushed to zoom out, to widen the lens and start to talk about the structural issues at play. Similarly, Ben noticed that the creators of Adolescence were very focused on creating conversation around why this crime happened, rather than who did the crime itself:
“They [the creators] really wanted to point to what the systemic issues were, without having 100% of a conclusion or a solution to the issue. They wanted to pose a question that would force people to grapple with the conversation. … You saw lots of parents asking, What can I do differently? You saw lots of educators reassessing whether they should just be showing kids videos in classes…”
The reaction more widely to Adolescence seems to evidence Ben and Nathalie’s points. The wider media commentary around the show focused on the role of parents, technology, phones, social media, the manosphere, online safety, gender-based violence and much more – not just on the individual actions or the tragedy of Katie’s murder.
Key takeaways for storytellers
Once we jumped out of the conversation solely on Adolescence, Ben and Nathalie brought up some practical and thoughtful takeaways for storytellers more widely:
⚙️ Build a rapid response system
Create internal infrastructure that lets your team pause business-as-usual and pivot fast. Big cultural moments are disruptive, and organisationally you need the flexibility to meet the moment with speed, clarity, and intention.
“So how do you create some kind of emergency infrastructure that allows people to step away from that role and into a slightly different role for a period of time?… And taking the moment seriously and allowing for the time and the creativity that needs to happen.”
Ben Hurst
💡 Lead with solutions, not problems
Have a clear campaign or call to action ready. When audiences feel emotionally expanded by storytelling, don’t close the loop with a heavy “ask.” Instead, offer ways to help – donate, join, share – that feel light, accessible, and empowering.
⭐ Create your ‘North star’ with meaningful collaboration
Many organisations working together towards an overarching goal, a “North Star”, are far more powerful than organisations going it alone. You may have different ways of working or different approaches to tackling the issue, but without working together it’s going to be very difficult for lasting change to happen – or to take advantage of viral moments like this.
Nathalie noted that the Right-wing movements have a clear North Star that often allows them to be more effective. What if the more progressive/Left-wing movements had this baked into their makeup?
“You can play underneath that North Star. You can do a million things… You can have all of these different positions, but you’re not fighting with each other. This is like 1000 flowers that can bloom underneath that North Star… but everyone is broadly faced in the same direction.”
Nathalie McDermott
🌊 Swim in the narrative ocean
Your work doesn’t stand alone. It lands best when it flows with broader cultural currents. Adolescence hit hard because the narrative had already shifted – parents were already primed to rethink access to smartphones and the internet, for example.
Nathalie shared insights from Bridget Antoine Evans and the Pop Culture Collective, who widely share the concept of narrative oceans and how we are all influenced by the messaging around us.
‘We can’t make an Adolescence moment occur… there’s a lot of moving parts there. What we can do is change the narrative waters and our campaigners have a massive influence in that space’
Nathalie McDermott.
🤔 Consider the long term impact of a viral moment
You’ve successfully jumped into action after a viral moment and pushed through your campaigns or lobbied that MP or raised those funds. However, even with powerful short and medium term actions, Ben does counsel us to think about potential backlashes in the long term – whether that’s after a viral moment like this, or the backlash experienced by a wider movement like Black Lives Matter.
“Now if we’re smart, we will be preparing for what the backlash of this moment will be… – a strengthening of the manosphere, guys feeling like they’re being blamed for everything… I think we have to have responses to that ready.”
Ben Hurst
Thank you to our funders for making this storytelling panel possible. We look forward to sharing more events and insights about storytelling and narrative change in the future. Follow us to keep up to date.
