People Performance Lessons From a Night at the Improv

A free mid-week performance at the local improvisation club sounded like a marvelous way to forget about work and get lost in the zany world of quick thinking around absurd themes. My friend Jill’s idea quickly became a reality and I met her just as the eight o’clock show was beginning. The place was packed, mostly with young people there to support their favorite team. Jill noted the intense energy in the crowded room.

Chicago has been a center for the art of improvisation for decades, priding itself on the success of The Second City, which developed stars like Shelley Long and John Belushi. Tonight’s club, the Improv Olympic, had no stars, but was very well known for the unique improvisation form it invented called “the Harold.”

The Harold is actually a very organized performance format for the improvisation artist. It begins with the audience’s selection of a theme and is followed by a series of partner scene developments and group “rants” on the theme. The skill of the Harold is a learned, practiced skill. Tonight we would see three teams perform the Harold. The least skilled team would perform first to warm-up the crowd, then the intermediate, and last, the advanced artists.

The master of ceremonies introduced the first team to raucous applause. The lights dimmed and they energetically ran on stage and bowed. As the leader asked us to call out a theme, the group looked directly at us and we looked back at eight young men and two women, all slim “twenty-somethings” with mismatched shirts and faded jeans. Someone in the audience yelled “Terminator” and we watched as they worked this idea into the performance. It lasted about a half-hour amid some laughs and a final group pantomime of out-of-control robots.

The M.C. thanked the group and introduced the intermediate team, which appeared slightly older than the first. The theme was high school and soon the audience was transported into the world of graduation in 1994 and the foibles of life afterwards. Again, a half-hour of the Harold unveiled the team’s ability to listen and develop scenes around that event.

The first two teams now congregated around the back of the room, having finished their performances. The M.C. asked for an audience member to come up front and describe his or her day. A lively young visitor from Seattle volunteered, citing his Chicago tour and riding the “El”—the city’s ancient mass transit system. Then the advanced team walked on to thunderous applause from both the audience and the other teams. It was immediately evident that they were a more mature group: waistlines thickened a bit, gray hair appeared, movement on stage was not as frantically energetic. Their task was to turn the description of the Seattle visitor’s day into their act. And so they did, with crafted skill using current events and trends.

Watching improvisation is always a lesson in comic timing and humor, but this evening somehow brought more. The back-to-back performances of the three teams showed the difference in skill development that six or eight additional years with an art form can bring. It also provided many lessons that apply to both improvisation and people performance at work—simple truths that, in our hectic daily pace, we tend to forget.

Twenty Lessons Learned

1. Generations differ on humor, approach to challenge, and what is important to them.
2. Beginners have raw energy; experienced performers have wisdom based on years of trials and successes.
3. A new person has to think about it more. An experienced person’s performance is more seamless. Keep this in mind, managers.
4. Teams that trust each other are willing to try unusual approaches.
5. You have to listen to carefully plan the next step. If you don’t listen well the first time, the rest of the plan suffers.
6. The smart beginner watches and learns the techniques of the more skilled performer.
7. Women and men can work together with verve, using the experience of their gender to build positive results.
8. As long as the team understands the end goal, there are many creative ways to get there.
9. With experience comes trust.
10. With no experience come no habits.
11. In time people learn the best way to approach individuals with ideas.
12. A beginner will try something that won’t work.
13. An experienced person will try something that won’t work.
14. When a team member is supported by the rest of the team, he or she shines the brightest.
15. A true team member doesn’t hog the spotlight.
16. The support of the crowd inspires the performance.
17. Nonverbal communication sends the most important messages.
18. Teams that work together well are honest about mistakes and move on.
19. People who love what they do never stop learning and performing.
20. Some of the best things in life are free.