Tag Archives: improvisation

Oct 20

Active Listening & Collaboration

I’ve developed an Active Listening & Collaboration workshop that has proven engaging.

I’ve run this session for a ton of high school students and for multiple cohorts of college programs’ Entrepreneurs and Healthcare Execs in Training. I’ve run almost fifty sessions with accountants and insurance professionals. I’ve even run it in a communal house and with a fresh crop of McKinsey consultants – two very different experiences.

I just yesterday – thanks to my wife and her network – run one for Virginia’s Legal Aid Program.

It was awesome! (Oh, and donate to Legal Aid – they MATTER!)

What follows is my preamble to that session which I offer here as a little didactic on why we should care about Active Listening & Collaboration, and learning those skills and more through improvisation can make us, well, better people.

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Apr 24

“Tonight…” a warm up

Getting synced with your teammates is why we warm up. Give this activity a try!

Everyone in a circle.  One by one, in no particular order, we enter the circle.

“Tonight I’m…”

First we share our current mindset with the group. For example, “Tonight I’m feeling tired. I stayed up too late and woke up too early.”

“So, tonight I’m gonna…”

Second, we commit to bringing to stage a different energy than we’re currently feeling AND we make that energy incarnate with a character, sound, action, emotion, line of dialogue, etc. For example, “So, tonight I’m gonna go ape,” and I act like a gorilla, howl and beat my chest.

And “We’re with you!”

Third, everyone around the circle says, “We’re with you!” and mirrors your character, sound, action, etc. For example, we’re all acting like gorillas.

Then the next person goes. Repeat.

Simple. Easy. Quick. And it gives us a moment to let our fellow players into our heads and aware of our intentions. AND it gives us all a chance to show our commitment to enthusiastic agreement and collaboration. 

Try it!