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By Gerry Murray. 07-06-2020
(Scroll down for a laugh)
“You will have bad times, but they will always wake you up to the stuff you weren’t paying attention to.” ~ Robin Williams
Imagine working in a team where the following is normal:
- Everyone trusts everyone to do the ‘right thing’ for the benefit of the team
- Whatever your colleagues do you respect it on its merits as their genuine contribution to a piece of work
- Everyone listens to each other without interrupting
- Mistakes are seen as opportunities to learn
- People build on whatever their colleague do or say as they believe the whole is greater than the sum of the parts
- Team members can deal with the unexpected with ease and accept it as normal
- People take challenges in their stride and view them as an opportunity to shine
- You are all proud of what the team as a whole achieves and know how each member has contributed to the result
- Where diversity and spontaneity are valued as part of being human and creative
Make it up as you go along
Welcome to the world of Improv Theatre. Essentially, Improv is about making it up as you go along. Isn’t that what life is like every day? When a team has adopted the philosophy of Improv and the associated skills you get the benefits outlined above and more...
A few weeks ago I wrote about the power of the Improv technique ‘Yes, AND’ as a replacement for the killer phrase ‘Yes, BUT’. I’ve found many Improv tools such as this very useful in helping teams build awareness of how they operate and being able to learn how to improve such things as communication, collaboration, trust and psychological safety, even when working remotely.
Is now the time for culture change?
The Yes, BUT/Yes, AND distinction is representative of many work cultures. The Improv examples above are Yes, AND based. When you work in a Yes, BUT world you mostly experience more unnecessary conflict, lack of motivation and low energy. The antithesis of the above. Psychological safety, therefore, tends to be low, which leads to lots of ‘elephants in the room’, back-stabbing and low levels of creativity, to name but a few of the consequences.
As you no doubt discovered, if you accepted my earlier challenge to replace Yes, BUT with Yes, AND for a week, it’s not easy. It takes a lot of practice!
The same applies to Culture Change. Behaviours have to change and before behaviours can change mindsets must change first. We need to break many unhelpful patterns. Research into Neuroplasticity demonstrates that it is possible - not necessarily easy - to change behaviours when we train our brains to recognise and use more useful behaviours.
Waking up...
As we emerge from lockdown it’s predicted that life and work will never be the same again. For many, this could bring welcome changes. In Robin Williams’ words, have we woken up to stuff we were not paying attention to?
In the workplace, change will only happen if organisations and their leaders are prepared to invest the time and effort that it takes to move from a symbolic Yes, BUT to a literal Yes, AND.
Paying lip service will not cut it. Actions will.
Contact me if you’d like to learn more about how to do this...
Gerry
Humour
What do actors do when they make a mistake?
They react.
What does an actor sing in the shower?
A soap opera
Two men were talking. Said the first "I went to the theatre last night but had to leave after Act I."
"Why was that?" asked the second.
"Well, the programme said 'Act II - one year later', and I couldn't wait that long."
A young actor calls his agent from the set of his first film. He is playing the lead role for the first time in his career.
“How’s it going?” the agent asks.
“It’s amazing!” the actor gushes. “The director told me that my performance is making him consider making two films with me.”
“Two?” the agent replies.
“Yeah,” the actor says, “my first and my last.”
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