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You Can Improve Your Life and Business with Improv!
Improv. You have probably heard this term before, but do you really know what it means?
Let’s look at this definition:
Improvisation (Improv): creating something or performing something spontaneously or making something up as you go.
Actors use the tools and rules of Improv to help with auditions, to learn how to think fast, for comedic outcomes, to help with creativity, to work together, honor first thoughts, and to be truthful and in the moment.
These very things that help actors can also help you. Specifically if you want to grow personally and/or professionally, Improv may be the best place to start.
Why is this?
There are rules and principles in Improvisation that create structure. These rules can also be seen as important life skills every person should develop.
These rules are especially helpful for business professionals, and, believe it or not, many companies now host Improv classes on site to help their employees develop these important skills.
Here are some of the rules & principals of Improv:
1. Embrace Mistakes: The very rules of Improv create a safe space where making mistakes are not only OK they are celebrated. Yep, celebrated. “Mistakes” often lead to great success. Let’s look at Mrs. Tollhouse. Do you know her story? Briefly, she trusted herself enough after running out of chocolate for her chocolate cookies to place broken up bits of a chocolate bar inside her cookie batch. When the chocolate didn’t melt to create a chocolate cookie she was left with what is now the famous Chocolate Chip Cookie.
Imagine if she didn’t embrace that “mistake”?
When you make a mistake do you kick yourself, mope around, and want to hide under a rock in Yosemite? What if you were able to accept the mistake as a learning tool and build upon it to create a successful outcome? You would feel pretty good and you would take your mistake and turn it into a success.
2. Yes and with the World: The cardinal rule of Improv is “YES AND.” We use it to work in agreement with others, help the storyline stay alive, and create collaboratively. “YES AND” does not negate the idea that was suggested, it embraces it and adds on to it to create something even better together.
What if all businesses took the idea of “YES AND” and used it to facilitate all meetings with their employees? When employee’s voices feel heard and validated productivity soars. Let’s face it— people want to work with positive, solution-oriented people. No one likes a “negative Nancy.” Working in agreement does not mean you have to like the ideas that were suggested; it just means you don’t throw them away and put someone down for having that idea. All ideas can be used to create something bigger and better if they are embraced and built upon.
3. Be You! Sounds so simple right? Just be yourself. What if I told you people prefer real, honest people over people who say what others want to hear? This is especially true for sales people. People want to buy from real, honest people they like. Take actress Jennifer Lawrence for example. Like her or not, people are drawn to her realness. She just says what is on her mind, she is real, she is herself, and people love that.
So many people are afraid to be themselves. I see it time and time again at business events. People will say or do what others do just to feel accepted. I first learned how to be myself in an Improv Class in 2006. While attending the conservatory program at The Second City in Hollywood, CA, I was taught the only way to laughter, and good honest work, was being truthful to who I am. I believe this is a mantra we can all use. For years I tried to hide that I am a clumsy, absent-minded little lady for fear of being judged and not being liked by other professional women. The reality is, the things that make me, me also make me real and stand out. If you want to stand out, be you!