Comments on: Public Speaking — Benefits of Improv

By: Len McGrane

Len McGrane — Sun, 21 Jan 2007 21:49:16 +0000

Ah, yes … stories. Nothing will beat a good story, in my experience. A story HAS authenticity, for one thing. No-one can deny me my story … if something happened to me, then it did happen! And for another, it will be remembered .. whereas my carefully crafted three-point presentation will be lost by coffee break. This is why a well run corporate teambuilding program is effective: people remember what they did and the stories they acted out.

By: John Kinde

John Kinde — Wed, 21 Jun 2006 01:27:46 +0000

Congratulations on your improv success with young people. I’ve found that working with adults is not much different than working with kids. Most adults have the same insecurities and just hide them better. The skills we teach and learn in an improv workshop are so applicable to the workplace that the end result of training is almost always highly positive. A place to learn and share experiences with other improv trainers would be to attend the Applied Improvisation Conference this November in San Francisco. You can also exchange information and encouragement on their blog. http://www.AppliedImprov.net/blog. Keep up the great work!

By: Tammy Sweeney

Tammy Sweeney — Wed, 21 Jun 2006 00:52:13 +0000

I am a trainer and speaker and most of my time is spent working with corporate clients. I have recently incorporated improv into communication, teambuilding and leadership workshops with success (although some good natured groaning at the beginning is usually common). More exciting though is that I have tried Improv games, warmups and exercises with some “At Risk Youth” (Ages 16 - 24) in a government sponsored Tourism Careers for Youth program. It is a 3 week intensive tourism preparation course designed for young people who have a difficult time getting or keeping a job. Their backgrounds are “checkered”, their presentation is rough, and much of their experience is negative! What a challenge. I saw remarkable iimprovement over the 3 weeks and I attribute it to the improv — they were building confidence, having fun together, learning to support each other, learning to rely on each other to help them look good, and speaking out. They learned that they have valuable ideas and that other people can work with these ideas. They learned to trust a teacher to do something fun and valuable with them. They learned that it is not important to look “cool” all the time, and that sometimes you can look and sound silly and it is OK — in fact it’s pretty cool as well. It was a rewarding teaching and learning experience for me and a lot of fun for my students. I am looking at rolling out Improv speaking and training sessions for my corporate clients on a “bigger scale” this fall. Putting final plans in place this summer for a marketing blitz…..any words of encouragement would be greatly appreciated.