I took a year of Second City Improv (with no designs on actually being discovered, tho’ it did cross my mind)…and it was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.

Yes, it was lots of fun…but the notion of saying “Yes, and…” was a difficult concept to initially embrace. And it’s equally as difficult to do in a brainstorming session.

Which is why an excellent facilitator makes all the difference. It’s the faclitator who creates those opportunities to explore “yes, and…” As a PR professional who’s participated in many a brainstorming – the great sessions are often lead by those who can truly lead and nuture the ideas to successful fruitition.

Thank you!

You should also write an article about how, if you’re on a conference call with somebody you’ve never talked to before, and you want to amuse yourself, it’s better to pick a funny voice that is based on an emotional point of view than a foreign accent, because foreign accents are hard to keep consistent across entire conference calls.

As a manager, there are always going to be times to direct and times to discuss… it seems counter-productive to do one under the guise of the other, though.

I’ve always been fascinated by comedy, particularly improvisation, as an art form. Thinking on your feet, without filters and prejudices, has the ability to open so many more possibilities during brainstorming sessions.

I had an internship at a boutique PR firm — yes, I know I was just an intern — in which our supervisor spearheaded all brainstorming sessions, without leaving ideas or concepts up for discussion. It trumped everyone’s confidence and paralyzed further creativity. During an hour that professionals usually look forward to, we let those initial flickers and flames of ideas fester inside us, and then slowly and sadly subside. It was frustrating to see.

Nurturing improve in the workplace should always be a goal.

Good post, Liz.

So many principles of improv interact with one another that it can be daunting to distill the whole thing into a statement on “what improv means in a business setting.”

I like what you’ve drawn out here, though, as a next angle to explore: how does taking care of ourselves help us take care of each other? I’ll post-it note that.

As an improvisor and professional myself, I love this article, and I’d like to add something.

In corporate discourse, people tend to get excited about the “yes” part, because it implies people will agree with them, and it hints at the possibility of getting to consensus faster and not getting stuck in conflict or roadblocks.

But the “and” part is equally important — in an improv scene, if all people do is support each other, there is no scene. If all you do is agree with each other and heighten and extend that agreement, there won’t be a lot of new ideas. Your meeting will be successful from an organizational and personal prestige standpoint, but it will not help your business very much.

One of the keys to successful improv scenes is to make especially your early “ands” very strong, fresh contributions. Tap into the point of view that each player brings into the scene — it’s the players’ responsibility to have a strong perspective or feeling about what is going on, the “Yes” issued by the second player supports and agrees with the reality of what that person is doing, but it’s up to the second player not to surrender his or her point of view in that agreement, but to adapt it. Corporate brainstorming works similarly — agree and support, but don’t give up on your own perspective or lose faith in your own talents or contributions.

For example, let’s say the first player in an improv scene comes out and starts cleaning a pool, talking about how the summer makes him feel good.

The second player comes out with a perspective before the first player speaks — let’s say the second player chooses to be a flamboyant bullfighter.

The “Yes” does not involve the second player giving up on being a bullfighter and agreeing that the summer makes her feel good too.

The “Yes” means she’s probably not a bullfighter, she’s a pool cleaner, but she can retain aspects of the bullfighter idea she brought into the scene.

Maybe the second player agrees, because summer is the most dangerous season, and danger is what excites her. This is a very different perspective from the first player.

Now you have a relationship between two coworkers, one of whom is more daring and risky than the other; they don’t disrupt the scene by getting into an argument about whether the summer is dangerous or not — they play out the relationship between these sorts of friends, which we’ve all seen before and can base our stuff off of.

The benefit of “yes and” in business settings doesn’t come from backing down (not that Liz said it did, but this is I think a pitfall people run into) — giving up on your own ideas immediately and consistently and only talking about somebody else’s ideas doesn’t tend to lead to a lot of interesting work in either improv or life.

But it does mean finding ways to get your perspective to complement and build off what your teammates are doing, rather than arguing or being in conflict.

Maintaining basic agreement and practiced reconciliation while retaining diversity of perspective can be challenging. It also requires a good team that works well together to make the most of it, in both business or improv.

But your team needs to be just as willing to offer genuine “ands” as it is to congratulate itself for the “yeses.”