Improvisation is a form of theater in which the performers make up a performance on the spot, with no prior planning. Improvisation – aka Improv - is really about two things:
(1) Being spontaneous – trusting your gut, staying in the moment, listening carefully, adapting quickly, supporting your fellow performers.
(2) Being purposeful – not just flopping around the stage, making funny faces, or cracking jokes, but trying to construct a scene and tell a story – again, all on the fly.
Daily Improvisation is simply improv used for a purpose other than entertainment. Daily Improvisation can be something as simple as using your ATM card to clear an icy windshield when you can’t find your scraper, or as complex as regrouping on the spot when your project plan runs up against reality.
Everyone improvises - every day! And anyone - not just stage performers - can benefit from learning how to better apply improv to handle the unscripted twists and turns of daily life.
Part of “learning improv” involves developing a set of skills, such as listening carefully, thinking fast, using intuition, and trusting your gut. But “learning improv” also involves cultivating certain attitudes - giving up the need for control, supporting your team members and making them look good, being positive, having fun.
In this blog, I intend to explore how these improv skills and attitudes track with current thinking about the best ways to lead and participate in a human enterprise. The old-school hallmarks of business organizations – strict hierarchy, cold rationality, command-and-control – are still remarkably persistent but are crumbling before newer concepts – lateral leadership, leading with the heart, empowering others. Improv is based on all of these newer approaches and provides a body of knowledge and practice that can give life to each of them.
Finally, to clear up a common misconception: Improv is not about being funny! It’s about being honest and authentic – reacting to who and what is right in front of you, this very second, and working together to meet a shared goal.
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