Hero’s Journey Story

Overview

The American Lung Association (ALA) was founded in 1904 and is the oldest voluntary health organization in the U.S. It fights lung disease with a special emphasis on tobacco control, asthma, and environmental health. The ALA recognized a key gap in its anti-smoking educational programs: 10-14 year olds experimenting with tobacco products.

Business Challenge

The ALA realized that most lifelong smokers began smoking as teenagers. During the middle school years, many adolescents try smoking for the first time. Many of these students don’t realize they are addicted to the nicotine in cigarettes until it is too late. The ALA wanted to catch those students during that critical experimentation phase and convince them to quit smoking. It looked to Design Access to create an interesting and engaging educational solution that could be easily implemented in the middle school setting.

Solution

After reviewing other anti-smoking sites that feature medical experts, the ALA asked us to design a new approach. Design Access decided to turn the problem upside down, and put the learner on the other end of the gun, as it were. The gun idea eventually led to the site’s “target, bait, and trap” theme.

In this interactive game, we put the learner in charge of selling a brand of cigarettes. The CEO of Big Tobacco tells them they must target new users, bait them with advertising, and then trap them with addiction. As they work through a series of tasks assigned by the CEO, they meet a series of unscrupulous people, and they begin to see Big Tobacco’s reasoning behind selling cigarettes to adolescents. When the learners choose a target market, they must understand why a company would target adolescents rather than adults. When they build an ad, they can see why ads always use beautiful images and catchy phrases. When the learners build a product that will guarantee repeat sales, they must add steps that make addiction more likely. So, as they get closer and closer to the stated goal of building a successful cigarette brand, our learners are really getting farther and farther from being fooled by the methods of Big Tobacco. It gradually dawns on the main character (and our learners) that they are on the wrong end of this gun!

Results

This e-learning solution has been a big success. Learners find it to be effective and engaging. They retain the key statistics and show an awareness that they are exploited. As a result, the ALA is expanding the use of the program to reach a larger portion of its target audience.

The Hero’s Journey

One format that a story can take is called “The Hero’s Journey.” The Joseph Campbell book of the same name explores common structure in human myths. The original “Star Wars” movie was patterned after The Hero’s Journey format. In The Hero’s Journey, a hero gets the call to adventure. The hero refuses, but a magical guide provides a way for them to continue. The hero suffers setback after setback as the story advances. The guide helps the hero through the most difficult parts. In the end, the hero answers the final challenge, and returns in triumph, bearing a new hope.

In this project, we created an adventure using the idea of The Hero’s Journey. Sue, our hero, is walking to school. As she is reaching for her cigarettes, she realizes that the object is not her cigarette pack at all! Instead, it’s a talking “guide” device that tells her Big Tobacco needs her help. The guide transports Sue to the headquarters of Big Tobacco, where the CEO makes her brand manager of a new cigarette brand.

Along the way, she meets three department heads who will target, bait, and trap the next generation of smokers. Mr. Hunt, in Market Research, helps Sue select a target market. Mr. Hoax, in advertising, helps Sue create the myth that acts as bait. Dr. Halitosis, a scientist, helps Sue formulate a product that will trap users in addiction and guarantee repeat sales. As she leaves each encounter, Sue questions the morality of her actions.

In the end, when the CEO explains why he does not smoke, Sue makes her decision. She quits. But in her mind, echoes of the statistics she has learned make her question whether she can really stop smoking.

The guide explains the idea of a quit plan, a proven method of quitting, and Sue sees the light at the end of the tunnel. She returns to her life with a new hope.

The “Hero’s Journey” format allows us to jump into Sue’s story without setup, and leverage the familiarity of the format to give the story structure and connect the various messages we need to deliver. Instead of saying “Big Tobacco targets 10-14 year olds” we let the learner choose a target market, and give them feedback on their choice. Instead of saying that ads influence kids, we have the learner build an ad designed to influence kids. Instead of saying cigarettes are addictive, we have the learner add steps to guarantee repeat sales. In other words, we respect the intelligence of our user, and give them experiences that allow them to fully understand how and why they are targeted as replacement smokers. And we do it all in the context of a story.

Perhaps a Hero’s Journey simulation story might work for your problem. The structure of the story is both exciting and familiar, and the learner is engaged as the hero seems to get farther and farther from their goal. It is an engaging and compact format that can communicate a series of messages in a coherent, organized, and compelling whole. We have used variations of this formula for other successful communications projects in the past, including sales training, new employee orientation, and safety training.

Design Access creates custom solutions that teach, inform, and inspire. We combine business expertise, design creativity, and technical mastery to develop innovative solutions to our customers’ business problems. We have partnered with over 60 Fortune 500 companies to help them achieve their communication goals. Let us put our experience, talent, and energy to work for you. Give us a try!