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Improvisation and Innovation

According to Wikipedia Innovation is defined simply as a “new idea, device, or method”. However, innovation is often also viewed as the application of better solutions that meet new requirements, unarticulated needs, or existing market need” While Wikipedia defines Improvisation as a “broad term referring to the process of devising an atypical method to solving…

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Improvisation and Introverts

I deliver improvisation skill sessions to a variety of corporate clients in order to support innovation and collaborative thinking within teams and departments. For the vast majority of participants it will be their first experience of improvisation. Their only frame of reference is likely to be episodes of “Whose Line is it Anyway?” and they…

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Seriously

I recently taught at a residential improvisation festival with my friends and colleagues from the Maydays One of the benefits of teaching a residential retreat is working with participants who are already in the zone when they walk in the room. There is a sparkle and an openness which means there is no need for…

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Improvisation and Recovery

The comedian Russell Brand recently launched and hosted ‘Give It Up for Comic Relief’ an all-star gig to raise money for people in the UK affected by drug and alcohol addiction. As a recovering addict himself Russell is passionate about raising the awareness of abstinence based recovery from drug or alcohol addiction and speaks candidly about his own journey.…

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Improvisation and Learning

Our mainstream education system is based on an industrial model of mass produced learning. We compel lively and inquisitive young people to sit in rows and be “educated” according to an outdated and rigid curriculum. In essence children have their minds filled with information and are regularly tested on their ability to retrieve this information…

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Improvisation and Opportunity

In our current era of information overload and instant everything it seems that our attention spans are getting shorter. Much of our mental processing gets taken up by screening out input in order to find the information that we need. Personally I find it extremely difficult to use a browser that does not have Adblock…

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Bridging The Gap

In our binary world we love to separate our experiences of life into two categories and in many ways this ability serves us. As children it is vital to make sense of our world and we are taught to differentiate right from wrong,  good from bad and safety from danger. This is a useful framework…

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Yes and

Collaboration is part of the essence of improvisation, each participant contributes and builds on the contributions of their fellows. The outcome is a mystery and the journey is delightful and surprising. The whole is greater than the sum of it’s parts. Anthropologists contend that it is the ability to pass on learning to other humans…

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The Beginning of the End of Blame

One highly valuable element of improvisation practice is the idea that it is impossible to do it wrong. This principle creates an environment that promotes creativity and invites risk taking.  The essence of improvisation is that it embraces whatever takes place in the moment. An alert improviser will gleefully seize upon any anomaly, stumble or…

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Eye of the Storm

Change is unavoidable, much as we would like things to be otherwise. Most of the circumstances of our lives are beyond our control and our comprehension. We seek to make positive changes with specific gaols in mind and then somehow reality intervenes in the shape of the unexpected. Chaos is an inevitable ingredient when we…

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