Any writer, reporter or broadcaster can spot a good story, but it’s the skill of a successful storyteller that gives life to the content. For nearly 15 years, Daniel Wallace has told compelling stories on a variety of platforms that showcase innovation, ignite passion and inspire community engagement.
For Daniel, every story is a new opportunity to give audiences a fresh perspective. His ability to spot detail and tap into the emotional pulse of a story sets him apart and allows readers and viewers to truly connect with the storyline or message.
As a young writer at Ford Motor Company, he found his niche and sweet spot by finding new ways and angles to tell difficult or mind-numbing stories. By humanizing the content, he was able to effectively relate fairly complex topics and elevate the profile of narratives that was sometimes ignored.
As an example, while working his beat mining for automotive innovation, he came across an human interest story that involved an engineer whose family was trapped in Sri Lanka’s devastating tsunami. A good reporter always knows when to pivot to a better story. Daniel chronicled the tumultuous situation from the employee’s point of view, sharing raw emotions that captivated the heart of the company forming a ring of support around the employee. A story done right will always ignite action and sometimes stir up passion.
Months down the road, Daniel was recognized by a New York Times recruiter at a career fair at the Poynter Institute, who praised him for finding such compelling stories, especially in an engineering organization.
Shortly after his Poynter experience, Daniel was offered a position as a business reporter at the Democrat and Chronicle (D&C) in Rochester, NY. There, he worked in a variety of mediums, including print, audio, video and photography. A year into the position, he created his own multimedia column profiling emerging young professionals – an audience the paper wanted to increase its readership with.
The column, "On the Ladder", was published in Sunday’s print edition of the D&C and was frequently ranked among the top 10 most clicked on stories on the newspaper’s website. For context, the D&C is the fourth largest Gannett-owned publication behind USA Today, the Arizona Republic and the Indianapolis Star.
"On the Ladder", which also featured online videos filmed and edited by Daniel, had become a powerful tool to tell impactful stories of triumph. In one of the editions, Daniel profiled a young lady who survived insufferable circumstancing in the Bosnian Civil War that fueled her ambitions to build a successful life in life in America, which included climbing the corporate ladder at Bausch and Lomb. It was this story that put Daniel's column on the map for the Rochester community. Again, Daniel captured all of the right elements to capture the heart strings, from the piercing bullets to the challenges of shattering the glass ceiling.
From a corporate perspective, Daniel’s used this same storytelling acumen to connect audiences with company ideals. At General Motors Company, he’s held a number of communication roles. As the author of GM’s retiree website, which was visited by more than 120,000 viewers, he capitalized on opportunities to turn disenchanted retirees into brand ambassadors. He revamped the company's retiree site into an online community that featured engaging stories, multimedia videos and webchats; and informative product news. His efforts helped mobilized a small army of supporters who the company could utilize to advocate on GM’s behalf with local politicians and to sell vehicles to potential customers.
Within his diversity roles, Daniel worked with as many as 12 culturally diverse employee resource groups to unearth hard to find but critically important narratives that highlight contemporary topics that reinforce cultural values held by the company. Through a creative journalistic lens, he tells stories that elevate conversations around diversity that positively speak to professional excellence, corporate leadership and social change. Additionally, these storylines are used as examples of GM’s inclusive culture and diverse framework that has garnered external coverage and award recognition.
Daniel has brought all of his talents full circle by building programs with partner organizations to further tell GM’s diversity story. Through meticulous planning and strategic brand messaging, audiences experience GM in a whole new way that generally result in positive brand perceptions.