How Improv Can Help Your Marketing Team

By Susan Cokas

You are about to go on stage in front of 100 people. Usually this means you have studied a speech or script for hours in preparation. But this is improv and there’s no script. You have no idea what character you are playing or what the scene is about until a random audience member shouts out their suggestion. You’re hoping they suggest something you have fun with, like psychotic dentist or depressed elf, but you can’t count on that.

How you CAN prepare is a few months, or years of improve training. Practice in listening and thinking fast on your feet. In Improv, you also learn to put yourself out there, for better or worse. I remember the first time I took improv classes in Chicago. I was thrown out on stage and the suggestion was camping. I was terrified. I was also not a camper. Somehow I made it to the next level at Second City, thanks to a supportive ensemble member who moved the scene along with confidence. I was more comfortable playing the idiot who couldn’t set up the tent right and had issues with the fire. That was my comfort zone. It was a safe background character choice.

A year later, I was the one playing as crazy a character possible and actually enhancing the scene, not caring who was watching. The theme was makeup counter women and it was one of my troupe’s best skits in our show. My only struggle was not cracking up when my scene partner heightened her character to new levels of insanity and she was hysterical.

Improv teaches us to be present, in the scene, game or life.

I’m so grateful for those years of classes and performing. I think it prepared me for life in ways I didn’t even realize until much later. Improv teaches us to be present, in the scene, game or life. When you are present, you are practicing active listening. You can’t have something prepared to say next in your head because you don’t know where the scene is going and you’ll miss something critical your scene partner says.

It also teaches you to think pretty quickly. I started taking more improv classes at DSI after moving back to North Carolina and in a recent show I was trying to get off to the side of the stage during a blackout between scenes when the lights came on too soon. There I was with another teammate in the middle of the stage and the audience was expecting a funny skit. We briefly stared at each other with a look of panic and it instantly became clear he was also caught off guard and not out there by choice. Maybe it wasn’t the most optimal choice, but I quickly decided that we were both auditioning to be Disney princesses at a theme park. I started the scene by asking him which princess character he was going for in his audition. He embraced the suggestion and started twirling and a male Cinderella was born. It wasn’t our best scene but there were still a few laughs from audience. What could have been a really awkward moment turned into a weirdly funny skit. Another life lesson from improv training is don’t always go with the expected. Think in all directions and stay outside the box. Not always, but when appropriate to support scene partners or enhance a boring skit. There are times when everyday situations play perfectly too.

One of my favorite improv lessons is collaboration. Before each show, every single one of our 12-person ensemble taps everyone’s back and says “I got your back” as we are about to hit the stage. There’s no better feeling than knowing you are working as a group and win or lose, someone is there for you 110 percent. One of our cast members jumped into a dying scene and saved the day by playing a zombie back from the dead. It was a huge win and fun to watch. That’s the benefit of having no script. When necessary, you can literally jump into a scene you didn’t start off in if you are able to enhance it. Everyone always contributes in a positive manner.

“Yes and…”

Which leads to one of the most popular rules of improv… “Yes and…”

If you learn nothing else in any improv class, you learn that no matter what someone says to you during a game or a scene on stage, you agree. If they say you are 90-year-old Olympic gymnasts, then you strike a pose and that’s what you are. If they start the scene taking about you being grave diggers, you grab your imaginary shovel and get to work. Your job is to lay another brick on the foundation of the scene you are building together. You support each other and the best comedy can come from that. If you disagree or fight, the scene goes nowhere fast. I’ve seen that happen. It’s uncomfortable to watch. Seriously awkward.

Being present in the moment, listening carefully, and collaborating are skills that can be extremely useful in a work situation that’s fast paced and demands creativity. Also, when you are the person saying “yes and…” to other coworkers, that’s when you are going to get their best ideas. They are less afraid of being judged.

Employees start to see that any idea that’s brought to the table can be accepted, added upon and enhanced. Too often the pressure of having to come up with the smartest idea in the room can dampen any brainstorm from moving forward. Improv forces you to make something up on the spot with no time to think about it. For better or worse, it makes you put an idea out there into the world to see what happens.

To further support my theory that improv can help in the workplace, I got some insights from one of my many teachers, Zach Ward, owner and producer of DSI Comedy Theater and the executive director of the North Carolina Comedy Arts Festival.

“We all improvise everyday,” Zach Ward said. “Over the last 15 years in organizational development and executive coaching, I’ve seen the professional skills of improv artists dramatically impact a student’s ability to stay present, stay positive and actively listen, to see opportunities where other people might only see challenges or even insurmountable obstacles.”

According to Ward, most people stick to a script out of fear. “This could be an actual script, or a set of expectations they have had put on them or have placed on themselves. They are afraid to be vulnerable, to be judged for taking risks; they are afraid to fail,” He said. “They are afraid they may not be able to get a conversation, a project, or even a career back on track once they stray from the pre-approved acceptable script. This fear leads to normalcy and creative paralysis, the same pitfall that produces boring, uninspired comedy on stage.”

Sadly, most people act alone, even when ‘working’ together as a group. “They listen to others only for the break in conversation so they can speak themselves,” said Ward. “This makes it exceptionally difficult to create instant comedy with another person on stage. Imagine the impact of this inability to actively listen on an internal brainstorming session — you may be producing twice the work necessary simply because you and your team are not working with each other. Further, if people working with you do not feel heard they will eventually stop contributing altogether, leaving you to eventually produce twice the work anyway.”

Imagine a new client pitch has been escalated and you find yourself meeting with an executive Vice President who shifts the content of your prepared conversation and you zone out because you are not used to staying flexible in conversations, responding to big picture client needs instead of pushing your own small picture agenda. This is where improv training kicks in and saves the day.

“With every conversation we have, every pitch we deliver, every question we get asked, we find ourselves improvising. But few take time and train to improvise effectively,” Added Ward, “Yes, you can develop this muscle and you can apply improvisation to the workplace. I promise, it makes a difference.”