How do you start the day in a motivating way so you finish the week inspired?
Motivation really is the effect I felt Friday morning after taking in that bundle of energy, Sophie Caron, at Théâtre Paradoxe. This improv pro won me over in the first few minutes, and I walked into work fully charged to finish the week in style!
With a loud Hallelujah, the professional player expressed the flash of insight she felt watching the very first LNI improv match, when she was only a teenager. She has practised the activity without a break ever since and now holds several records in the Ligue Nationale d’Improvisation, where she has played professionally since 1995.
"Collaboration: improv is nothing but that"
This month’s theme, collaboration, fits our speaker’s favourite activity very well. As Sophie exclaims, "Collaboration: improv is nothing but that"! She goes on to describe the 5 vital elements that make for good collaboration in every improvisation:
- Listening
- The other person
- Knowing yourself
- Accepting
- Trusting
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Illustration by Stefano Di Lollo[/caption]
By explaining the particular approaches of certain well-known players, Sophie explains how you have to know how to adapt your game to other people’s worlds without losing your own nature. With Réal Bossé, expect action and acrobatics, while Salomé Corbo’s improvisations are more cerebral and Laurent Paquin’s call for a very nimble tongue, because the wordplay flies in from everywhere.
And in my team?
The same principle applies at the office and to all sorts of teams. Since each person has their own rhythm and their own ways of doing things, you have to listen to one another to collaborate better, which opens the door to learning your colleagues’ tips and tricks and also to constructive exchanges.
Trusting your teammates leads the team and each of its members to go further. The better the team knows itself, the more its processes are settled and the more collaboration becomes second nature. Even so, you must never lose sight of the shared objective and you should not hesitate to correct course when needed. Like each member, the organization is not something static; it has to be allowed to evolve and grow through the strengths of its team.
The 3 enemies: doubt, refusal and judgment
These things get in the way of the story developing properly during an improv match, because a solid context has to be established quickly and every word spoken becomes an absolute truth that cannot be called into question.
At work, well-phrased questions can take an employee further, letting them think through all the possible options to propose the best solution, which turns out to be very positive. Even so, when those questions are asked in order to destabilize and to elevate one’s own opinion at the other person’s expense, that person can feel put down and the relationship suffers.
AQTC and biorhythm
Sophie goes on to a project close to her heart, improv workshops run with the Association Québécoise des Traumatisés Crâniens. At first glance, adapting this very physical and cerebral activity to people whose rhythms of play and of understanding are very different from one another can seem complex, but with the notion of "biorhythm" developed through the workshops, that challenge is overcome.
The professional improviser explains with examples how she got a very talkative hyperactive person to collaborate with a person in a wheelchair who has speech difficulties. By comparing the first person’s biorhythm to very fast techno music and the second person’s to a quiet reggae song, Sophie brings out the need to adapt your rhythm of play to the other person so they can express themselves fully. She also witnessed that second player blossom through an improv match where she was able to take all the time she needed to articulate her thoughts, at her own pace.
So it matters, in every sphere of collaboration, to let the other person express themselves properly and to take the time to listen closely without constantly needing to add something in their place. The notion of biorhythm can therefore be applied in a variety of contexts.
A closing improvisation, sung, on the theme of: answering questions from the audience!
This presentation ends in improvised fashion as the speaker, who has quite a voice and several awards to prove it, answers a question from the audience by singing, at the request of our host and referee, Louis-Félix Binette.
A few notes on the concept
How CreativeMornings works stays fairly simple: a short talk and a breakfast, from 8:00 to 9:30, one Friday a month. This free event, open to everyone, is ideal for finishing the week on a creative note without missing too much work! Each month a different theme is provided by head office, and each city has to draw on it to find its guest.
120 creative cities
CreativeMornings has grown since it was created in 2008 in New York. Tina Roth Eisenberg had a very specific wish in launching these events: an activity that brings people together and is open to every member of the creative community. Since then, more than 120 cities across the 6 continents have followed suit, and Montreal has proudly been one of them since May 2013.
See you there on August 28? Theme: action!