By Ronnie Feldman
rnf@learningsentertainments.com
To start today’s blog post, I’d like to get a suggestion from the audience. Just yell out the first thing that comes to mind.
“Risk Mitigation!” “Culture!” “Leadership!”
Okay, great! We will now talk about Improvisation and Risk Mitigation, Culture & Leadership.
Hi, I’m Ronnie Feldman, President of Learnings & Entertainments, a creative services and content provider that focuses on improving corporate communication through the use of improvisation and purposeful humor. I had pleasure of leading an improv workshop at this past years SCCE Compliance & Ethics Institute, where we had 350 GRC professionals participate in some improv exercises focusing on communication, collaboration and leadership. We had lots of laughs – because improv is fun – but we also started making connections between the wonderful world of theater and improvisation and the compliance community. There are actually quite a few skills and philosophies that professional improvisers use to be successful on stage that can help the GRC professional (and leaders in general) communicate more effectively to build a culture of collaboration, transparency and trust. The fine folks at SCCE asked if I would expound upon these concepts in blog form, which we will be doing here over the next several months. We hope you enjoy.
Improvisation – An Introduction
What is Improv? It is the art of making something out of nothing. It is thinking on your feet, creating on the spot, off the top of your head. It is not, however, the art of being funny. On stage, funny is often the byproduct of good improv, because of the unexpected connections and spontaneity. Funny people who are good improvisers often get famous – Tina Fey, Stephen Colbert, Steve Carell to name a few. They tend to be great performers. They also tend to be great listeners, great supporters, great collaborators, great storytellers, and they are experts at being non-judgmental of themselves and others. They are fearless and creative and engaging. They are comfortable being uncomfortable so their natural personality and wit can come out. There are many exercises that improvisers practice (yes practice) that help them build these skills. These are muscles that can be developed…by anyone. Some lessons are philosophical and some are tactical. We’re going to introduce and unpack some of these and translate their applicability to the GRC professional.
Attitude of Gratitude
In improvisation we often talk about having an “attitude of gratitude.” We need to be grateful for information, no matter what it is. When two people get together on stage to make something up on the spot, the performers need to absorb everything. You learn that more often than not, making statements are helpful, rather than questions. Statements give information and questions draw information. To start a scene with, “Hey, where are we?” or “Who are you?” doesn’t help much. Starting with “Stan-the-man, looks like your bike chain is broken” or “Grandma, I love the smell of your banana-nut bread in the morning” is far more helpful in painting a picture and starts to set up the who, what and where for your scene partner. With that as a backdrop, no matter what is said, it’s accepted and taken to be correct. An improviser puts no judgment on that choice. It’s your job to make your partner look good. You listen, accept, decide how that makes you feel and add. And your partner responds in kind. That is how you start to build a scene. In improv, there are no mistakes, only gifts. We need information. We train ourselves to be accepting and to use all our senses and be hyper-aware of our surroundings so that we can react to all the information that is being presented to us. And this all starts with having “an attitude of gratitude.”
An Improv Exercise
There are several fun pairs and group exercises that help practice this behavior – “Red Ball” and “Thank You” are two that come to mind. Let’s discuss “Thank You” as its simple and easier to describe in blog form. In this exercise, we pair people up and let them have a conversation about anything, with the only rule being that you have to start each sentence with the words “Thank You.” The conversations can feel awkward and the sentences often don’t make any sense, but that’s okay. There aren’t any mistakes. What we are doing is forcing people into verbalizing a mindset, and that mindset is to be grateful for information, no matter what it is and how you feel about it.
Translating to GRC
This translates to the GRC space in several ways. You may know the answers to all the questions as you’ve heard them all a million times. But first you must teach the person speaking-up or coming to you with questions or requesting information, that it’s okay for them to approach you and your office. You want this to happen. You need to be grateful that they do and encourage this behavior so others will as well. People won’t go to the office of “no.” This requires the mindset of “Thank You.” You are building trust – See Improv Lesson #1 Trust and Support.
This does not mean that the answer you provide can’t be a simple no. And you might think, “that is the dumbest most obvious question I’ve ever heard. How do they not know this!” But that is judgment and that is not helpful. Putting yourself (and your leadership) in a mindset of “Thank You” helps you to delay these judgmental, emotion-based thoughts, and first be in a mindset of listening, understanding and gratefulness. You need information, both good and bad and in-between. Listen, accept and say a silent “thank you,” then pause and formulate what hopefully is a thoughtful, helpful, and collaborative response.
People are perceptive and they pick up on social cues. If you are distracted or annoyed, they notice. There are schools of thought that say you should smile before answering the phone. This is similar. When teaching “Thank You” it’s interesting to watch the tenor of the room as you see participants smiling and laughing and leaning in. The volume of the room rises. The mindset of “Thank You” puts you in a positive space and that can help the GRC professional be more approachable.
As they say in the biz….Annnnd…scene!
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