Timeline Photos No Laughing Matter – How Improv Translates to the Corporate World
Are you a good listener? When you are in a conversation with a co-worker, are you truly listening to their ideas, or are you half-smiling/nodding and really rehearsing your own thoughts in your head?
For a recent corporate meeting we wanted to create an ice-breaker session that was unique (no trust falls or t-shirt making). We also wanted to convey our client’s meeting theme of the world is constantly changing – how can we successfully adapt?
This idea made us think of improvisational comedy. As it turns out, improv has a lot of valuable lessons to share with the corporate world, not about laughing or being funny – but how to really listen and be present.
Holly Mandel, based in NYC, offers improv workshops for corporate groups, and facilitated our training.
“Improv until recently has been associated with comedy and theater so when people in the business sector hear that improv is becoming a very valuable tool and companies are bringing improvisation techniques into their training, I think some people have a hard time understanding exactly why. But if you’ve studied improv as long as I have you know improv is much more at its core than just being funny. It’s a very efficient and effective way to get a group of people to work together.”
The improv session that Holly and her team coordinated for our group of thirty executives was unique in that it stressed the idea of “Yes, and..” versus immediately saying “Yes, but...”
When the attendees split into smaller groups to practice some brainstorming and used the “Yes, and…” response the teams generated more ideas and encouraged bigger concepts. When the attendees were then told to use the more common “Yes, but…” reply, the creative stories ended quickly and fizzled out.
So the next time you are in a brainstorming session or talking with a co-worker – try the improv technique of “Yes, and…” and see if you this leads to a more productive conversation. ... See more