Improvisational Theatre - Applying Improv Principles in Life

Applying Improv Principles in Life

Many people who have studied improv have noted that the guiding principles of improv are useful not just on stage but in everyday life. For example, Stephen Colbert in a commencement address said,

Well, you are about to start the greatest improvisation of all. With no script. No idea what's going to happen, often with people and places you have never seen before. And you are not in control. So say "yes." And if you're lucky, you'll find people who will say "yes" back.

Tina Fey in her book Bossypants lists several rules of improv that apply in the workplace. There has been much interest in bringing lessons from improv into the corporate world. In a New York Times article titled "Can Executives Learn to Ignore the Script?", Stanford professor and author, Patricia Ryan Madson notes, "executives and engineers and people in transition are looking for support in saying yes to their own voice. Often, the systems we put in place to keep us secure are keeping us from our more creative selves." Madson explores the application of thirteen "maxims of improvisational theater" to real-life in the book Improv Wisdom: Don’t Prepare, Just Show Up.