Leveraging Leadership

Running Better Meetings with Improv: Fix Wasteful Meetings and Team Disconnect

• Jessa Estenzo • Season 1 • Episode 251

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Andrew Davies shares how his theater and improv background helps teams run better meetings and build trust. He explains practical improv games like “Breaking News” and “Speech” that boost listening and support. Andrew also talks about tailoring these activities for different teams and making meetings more engaging, interactive, and productive.


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Who Am I?
If we haven’t met before - Hi👋 I’m Emily, Chief of Staff turned Executive Leadership Coach. After a thrilling ride up the corporate ladder, I’m focusing on what I love - working with people to realize their professional and personal goals. Through my videos here on this channel, books, podcast guest spots, and newsletter, I share new ideas and practical and tactical tools to help you be more productive and build the career and life you want.

 

Time Stamps:
02:30 Defining Improv and Its Impact

05:09 Improv in the Business World

07:56 Games to Enhance Team Collaboration

12:59 Building a Supportive Team Culture

18:25 The Essence of Improv: Collaboration Over Comedy

19:43 Improv for Introverts and Tech Teams

22:10 Improv and Perfectionism

24:58 The Benefits of Practicing Improv

27:30 The ABCs of Effective Meetings

29:07 The Importance of Movement and Engagement

31:18 Iterative Changes and Practical Applications

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

And your Davies. How are you doing?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Good. Emily, I'm so excited to be here and to to talk to you. Yeah,

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

I was looking forward to this one. It's good to see you again.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

too.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

We are here to talk to people about how to run a better meeting with improv, and I love this idea and I love this concept, and we'll get into it here. But first of all, can you just share a little bit about your background and the theater background and how you got to improv and how you got to where you are today?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Absolutely. Yeah. So excited to be here and to, to share some takeaways that people can use with their meetings and in their workplace. So I really fell in love with, um, with theater and comedy as a kid. Uh, whose line is it anyway, was really my introduction to improv, the British and the American version, if you haven't seen both, both amazing. And I think Monty Python was like life changing for me as a kid in terms of. The combination of like intellectual curiosity with just absurd silliness. And I think those two things still guide me today in all of my work. Um, and really, uh, after college in New York City, I discovered, long form improv, which is really the kind of deeper dive version, the who's line and things like that. What we think of is really short form improv games. And long form is really about, you get a word and you do a half hour show or an hour long

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Oh my gosh.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

I was on a musical improv team called The Commotion. So every Tuesday night for a year, would get a word from the audience, like tuna, fish, or brick or whatever it was, and then we would make up a half hour musical kind of jumping off of that initial nugget. Um, so, you know, I just fell in love with improv both as. art form as a way to connect with people, and it just felt for me that it was transformative in many areas of my life. And so for the last 15 years or so, my work has all been in, how do we use improv to learn about ourselves and to help our communities and help the people in our lives? I.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Love that. I would love to see if there's a video of how the musical went off tuna fish, then please let me know and I'll put that in the show notes. Um, but thank you for that background. And then Andrew, just for, uh, folks who like, might not know what improv is, maybe they heard about it, but they're still kind of, um, fuzzy. Can you define in improv really quickly.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, so the kind of improv that I do is really improv comedy. There's, of course, improv and other art forms, but improv, improvising is really making things up on the spot. And I think specifically in theater, it's really creating scenes and stories together. It's starting from scratch, starting from nothing. And building something together in real time, right? So as opposed to going home and having an hour to write a scene and then perform it or asking chat GPT to write a story and then perform it, it is live in the moment, uh, creation. And that's what makes it so for people when they first try it, but also transformative because it's such a powerful experience and I think has a lot to teach us. So it's really, uh, making things up in the moment.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

And there's some pretty famous actors who have. Their background in improv, like Tina Faye comes to mind, who kind of kind of built her career on that. And then obviously went on to do loads of other things. And then there's people, actors who are known for improv. Like you know, the scene, you know, in that movie wasn't the written scripted scene, they improv that and it made the final cut. So there's kind of those pieces that people might be familiar with as well.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, absolutely. You know, a lot of your favorite stars from Saturday Night Live, you know, had their start in Second City, like Tina Fey, Amy

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah. Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

of other legends. And it definitely is a muscle that really helped them to be creative, to create characters. And oftentimes a lot of their famous characters or bits came out originally out of improvised moments that just were

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Oh, cool.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

they kind of brought it back, you know? And I think in film, what's interesting about comedy film is that when we switched. To digital film, mostly from physical film to digital files that allowed for directors to say, okay, go nuts, right? Like Steve Carell Will Ferrell, whoever the star is te, have a take and just go nuts. Just try things, right? Because the film wasn't so precious that they could just go off and uh, and find more fun things. So that is definitely a fun part of it for sure.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah, I remember watching a, it was like a documentary on the Disney film Aladdin, and they showed Robin Williams doing The Genie and he would go crazy and just riff off all this stuff. And sometimes they would have to pull him, pull him back,'cause Robin, this is a family show, he can't go that direction. So,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Right.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

pulling him back. But he would improv and riff in that sound booth for hours and hours. So,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

very cool. So thank you for that. How did you get into the business world and how did you get into. Running better meetings with improv.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, so my, my good friend Dave Klasko started this organization, artley Working, which is really the idea is to build stronger teams and happier people through improv and theater. So, Dave's background is really theater and improv comedy. We used to have a sketch comedy team together in New York City, and we were really just thinking about who we could help and how we could be helpful, right? And so. performing improv and, uh, thinking about how it brings people together as a team, I started to think a lot more about how we could be helpful to organizations and such a big part of it became, especially during COVID, how do teams get to know each other? How do they stay connected? How do they build trust with each other? Um, in, in times where they're disconnected, where they're remote. Right. And I think organizations and companies often have. Kind of their, their values on their webpage, or they'll say, we're all a team, or We gotta trust each other. But it's usually just words and they're not backing it up with experiences that help people build that trust. Right? You can't just say, Emily, trust Andrew, it's fine. Right? You have to like get to know each other. You have to build that trust. So improv really was a way to build that trust and then. The more conversations I had with folks who were in more traditional jobs than myself, I felt like meetings was the pain point that kept coming up. Meetings is something that people feel so sort of misused, abused their time to be wasted by meetings. The number of friends that said to me, I had meetings all day yesterday. I didn't get anything done, I said.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

This meeting could have been an email. Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

been an email. You know, I, I didn't even need to be at that meeting, right? All of these things, and it just felt to me like a wild waste of time. And crazy for me that large organizations and large companies were wasting so much people, time and what should be kind of the best part of people's day when they gather with their other employees became the worst part of people's day. And people dreaded them or missed them or avoided them. Um, and so. With improv and theater, um, Dave Klasko and I really saw an opportunity to make meetings participatory. To make them interactive, to make them collaborative. What I think improv does really well that I think makes for really impactful meetings, but is often ignored. So we try and bring some of those tools, um, to the meetings. We bring specific games, but even more so a mindset of collaboration and improv.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Very cool. And you've mentioned collaboration and team, and I've heard you say other places that improv is a team sport and so it's really bringing people together and, and playing together on the same team. So can may, can you talk about that a little bit more to get us into, like practically and tactically, what do you and your team do to help people run better meetings?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, so it really is a team sport, something you have to do together. You know, for me growing up I was very into sports. I. And then found my way to theater. And what I found was that

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Hmm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

I felt really on the spot. Like it was my moment, I could win or lose the game. It was really stressful with theater. I felt like we were winning or losing together. And I think we often use the metaphor of like sports in life. Like, oh, we, our team's gotta win. We gotta get out there and win, but that actually life is a lot more like theater, where we're gonna win or lose together as an organization,

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Hmm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

We're gonna win or lose together as a team. It's not actually Emily versus Andrew. It's actually, if Emily and Andrew work together, we're all gonna be better as a

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

important that is. Right? So when we come into teams and organizations. We talk to them about how can we collaborate together. So we will jump in with really simple games to build on each other's ideas and make sure we're listening to each other, right? So a really simple game to start with the team, and we usually play in pairs so that people don't feel on the spot, they're just playing with someone they're talking to. One's just called Breaking news. And this is a really easy warmup where you just take turns making up news headlines, but then you have to use your partner a word from your partner's headline in your headline. So let's say you said breaking news. Uh, cats and dogs are now best friends. Uh, then the next person might say, breaking news friends is the number one show streaming again, right? And then the next person might say, breaking news, streaming shows 12 hours a day helps you lose weight. Whatever it is, it doesn't have to make sense. But the point is to get in the moment to start collaborating and start really listening to your teammates

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

thinking ahead about what you wanna do work-wise or maybe your grocery or shopping list for later. Right? Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

that's a big one. So you have to like actually pay attention to what they're saying.'cause you've gotta use a word I love. I love just that piece.'cause so many people, myself included, are like. He is talking, he's talking. I'm waiting till he's done so I can say my piece and tell him how he's wrong or how this really needs to happen this way or whatever. But if you have to be right there with that person, I love that game. Um, what are some other games you, you play?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, there, there's so many games that I love and I think that listening piece is so important, is a critical word, and I think is an example of how improv makes very intangible skills, very tangible, right? So we could talk as an organization about like, we need to listen to each other, we need to work together. But how do you practice that? Right? Like an improv game, like. Um, like that, like breaking news forces you to really listen and if you're not listening, it doesn't work. So, one that I love to really think about. The team and like radical support of each other so that we feel that support is called speech. So in this one, we gather in a circle and we all say speech, speech, speech. And one person steps into the middle and they always say, I know you're scared already. Right? Just hearing, stepping into the middle. Yeah. Um, and it is scary. And it feels scary, right? And so the person in the middle says, I'm sick and tired of, and then they pause. And someone from the outside of the circle suggests what they're sick and tired of, and it's a new suggestion, something they haven't heard before. so what I love about this is that, um, and then they have to give a speech. So they have to say, let's say it's sick and tired of pencils. They have to say three reasons. They're sick and tired of pencils. They're always breaking. You can never find one when you need one. And I think lead is poisonous. Whatever it is, right? No matter what the reasons are, everyone like applauds for them and cheers for them wildly. Um, and so. game really does a few things. One, it really gives you high stakes feelings for a low stakes situation, right? So when you went into the middle, like you like kind of gasped when I said, you step into the middle of the circle, right? Because it feels really high stakes. Like you're on the spot, you have to give a speech, and I gave you exactly zero seconds to prepare your speech, right? Um, but actually it's really low stakes, right? Emily? Like, if you give an amazing speech about pencils or a terrible speech about pencils, it doesn't affect anything. We're not gonna remember it. It's gonna be gone. So with improv, we get to create these moments that feel really consequential and allow us to feel what, what we're gonna feel in our body when we're put on the spot. But there's actually very low consequences, right? It's not gonna lose your job or get you a big client if you do this. So that when you are put in that situation later, like let's say, you're, you know, we've talked about a little bit, Emily, you and I, how, if you're like executive assistant for someone, right? And they're like, I actually gotta go do something. Emily, you give the presentation, right? And you aren't planning on giving it, you're put on the spot. And that might be terrifying. But if you've played games like speech with your team, recognize that even though you feel terrified right now, you're gonna be okay. Even though you're like sweating a little bit, you're a little bit nervous. You can do this. You've been in those situations and it's that support from the group and the team that's so critical. Right? And that's what we see is that the only reason people are willing to put themselves out there is if they have that support of the team. They know they're gonna get that support. So we emphasize is that in that game, your team needs to always make people feel like they're gonna have that radical support from everyone, right? That people are rooting for them. And that's so hard to. To build. And so games like that really help you build that trust.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

I like that that game gives you reps. Being uncomfortable, like having that heightened, like when when you were starting to like speech, speech, speech. Like I was like, no, like let me run out of the room'cause I'm not gonna give a speech That's just, um, a horrifying, a horrifying prospect. And then like being in the center, everyone's looking at you and this is replicating many people's worst fear, right? Like, give a speech in front of people. Most people would rather die. Um, so I think getting reps under your belt of I felt this way, like in my body. Then it's okay. I think just raising the baseline on that is huge for people. And I also love that you train, so to speak, you train the other team members to cheer, like radically support a team member. I think that's a good thing to practice as well. So that's a, that's a very cool game. I've, I can't tell you how many people. I've worked with as a coach who feel that spotlight effect, even in a team meeting where it's like, Emily, I, I wanna say something, but I don't want everyone to look at me and I don't wanna have to say my piece and answer the question, and they don't wanna be called on, so to speak. It could be actual speeches and presentations or just relatively small moments like that that feel big for people.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think what you said about reps is absolutely right. Like sometimes people ask me if improv is something you're just good at or not, and it's, I tell people it's like a muscle, like anything else, and you have to work it right. When I see someone. Play piano or guitar amazingly. I'm like, how do you do that? And they're like, well, I've been playing for 20 years. Right? And it's like they've had so many reps that it looks easy, but it isn't. And I think these intangible skills, we feel like you just have'em or you don't. You can either give a speech or you can't. You can either speak up at meetings or you can't, but that's really not true. You need those reps and you need that culture as a team that you're gonna support people, right? So when we play that speech game. I challenge people to say, what if every time somebody spoke up at a meeting just for the fact of sharing their idea, you're like, yeah, Emily. Awesome. Right? Even if you're not into the idea, just think about how that's gonna make you wanna share your idea next time. Right?

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Hmm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

think so

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

what people don't realize with. Their meetings and their company culture is how many great ideas they're losing out on because people

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yes.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

to share them. Right? Because

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

of looking dumb of you. You know, of people, them talking about this quarter in sales and you know, Emily, you throw out there like, what if we went in person instead of doing online sales? And you're afraid to say that because you're afraid. People will be like, that's dumb, Emily, for these 10 reasons. But if you established a company culture where you're gonna cheer the idea, not that you're gonna do the idea, you can't do every idea. Obviously I. But you're gonna celebrate having the idea. Um, and that's so important I think. And gives you, gives you those reps in and failing and trying ideas that work and don't work. And you know, you mentioned like if there's video of that tuna phish show, I wanna see that. That was a real suggestion we got, but we didn't film that show. That show's gone. We performed it once. For a hundred people, and they're the only ones that ever get to see it. Right? We didn't tape it, we didn't record it. It doesn't exist later. And there's something beautiful in that too, because you learn your ideas aren't so precious, you can let them go, right? You can share an idea and not hold onto it so tightly. Um, Seth Godin, the marketing writer, has this great phrase of more bad ideas, which I really think applies to improv and comedy, which is that the only way you have good ideas is more bad ideas, right?

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

is, has their first idea, and it's brilliant. It's always, it's always your hundredth idea. That's brilliant. Right. And so you need more bad ones. Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yep. And I like that concept'cause it goes back to what you said at the beginning, which is if you have the culture and perspective of we're in this together. Like we don't, we're not against each other. Win or lose. We're on the same team. It's, if I have that lens, then. Emily speaking up in the meeting, even if I don't personally agree with that idea or think that's a good way to go, that's good for the team to have people speaking up and to share ideas. And it's bad for the team if we keep those ideas, uh, squished or quashed. So I think having it takes, it takes a different lens and I think it takes like a bigger leader to be able to have that. Broad scope versus just like, no, like why are you saying that? That's stupid. Like, no, we're gonna, we're gonna go a different direction. So, um, thank you for sharing that. And then you also kind of answered one of my other questions, which is, do you need to be funny to do improv because you, you improv, it's like in the comedy world and it's like, oh, you're kind of born funny or not. Do you have to be funny? Do you to do improv?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, no, it's a great question and we get it a lot. We, we get you. Do you need to be funny, do improv and you, do you need to be extroverted or can you be an introvert and do

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

And the answer to both. You don't need to be funny and you can be an introvert Right. To, to be on Saturday Night Live. Right. You're gonna need to be funny for sure. I'm not saying that. If you can get there just for wanting to do improv but not being funny. Right. But improv in the way we're learning and the way we're practicing it is collaborating and about working together. It's not, the goal is not to be the funniest that you can be, and it's often leads people in the wrong direction when they start doing improv with that lens, right? Because what they start doing is just thinking, trying to think up jokes in advance and think up. What would be the funniest thing to say, rather than really listening to and supporting their partner. Which is what gets the funniest jokes in the end, right? So you can always tell when you're doing improv and someone's really trying to be funny and trying to work in a voice that they do or work in a, a knock, knock joke that they love, right? Because it just feels forced and it feels unnatural, and like they're not being in the moment. So not only do you not need to be funny, but if you're trying to be funny. You're probably doing improv wrong, and it's because you're focused more on presenting than listening. And the first step to improv is really actively listening and building on each other's ideas. But if you try and come in with, here's my hilarious scene about two clowns who became lawyers, right? If you, if I come in and impose that on you, Emily, then we don't actually build something together. I'm just throwing out jokes and you're just at a loss.'cause you're like, okay, Andrew's doing his own. Seen and I can't help. Yeah. And so it's, it's so important to listen and work together and, and you really don't need to be funny. And a lot of the organizations that we work with, with ly working with a lot of tech and health tech companies, and often they're managers, like, we'd love to bring you

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Forth.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

but our team is a lot of introverted people. I don't know if they're gonna be into this. And I tell them like, they, they need the reps too. Right? And they, They might be initially a little bit more afraid, but are gonna get a lot out of it. And we always are asking people not to like jump into being, on Saturday Night Live and Chris Farley or Adam Sandler level comedy. We're just asking them to notice where they are right now and just like turn up their discomfort one little notch. So for some people, if they speak at all in a game like speech, I'm like, hooray, bre. Right? Like just stepping in the middle. Even if they like whisper their speech, stepping into the middle for them was huge. Right. For them, that was amazing. And so it's meeting everyone where they're at. Absolutely.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah, and it sounds like you tailor it a bit, so you kind of get the backdrop, okay, where is this team coming from? Did they just come through, I don't know, like a layoff round? And they're kind of frazzled from that and you can tailor it for the different people. I'm curious if you are going into like a team of, uh, sales leaders versus a team of, I don't know, like accountants, um, just to. Paint with broad brushes here. Do you tailor it for the type of audience you have? Are you just going in with your toolkit and you're kind of seeing what's there in the moment and seeing what people are in the mood for that day and in that moment? How does that work?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah. I mean, as much as you can, you know, kind of talk to the folks beforehand and get a sense of where they are, better. Um, you know, sometimes we come in during a. Multi-day, um, retreat or something like that. And we'll ask like, what are they doing before us? Are they working a lot together? Are they struggling? Are they, are they bonding as a team? Are they, have they known each other for five years or we, we went to one that was at a retreat where they just said a third of the company was just laid off. And like, that's where we're

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Uh,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

in and people were really feeling scared, confused. Um, and so you definitely try to prepare and meet them where they're at and prepare what will be helpful to them, but also be in the moment and, uh, and be there for them.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

know if you're hearing in the background. Okay.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

That's okay. We'll do our best in post. Um,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

yeah. Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

let's go with, okay. And then as a recovering perfectionist, this improv seems like something that would be good for me and potentially others in the sense of, you don't have to be funny, you don't have to get it right in quotes.'cause there is no such thing. How does improv work with perfectionism or, or. Combating or helping with perfectionism.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Um, yeah, I think it really helps with perfectionism. You know, I am, um, I'm working on writing this book that I'm calling Participate, a big part of the reason I'm calling it that is because. I think participation is so much more important than perfectionism. I think perfectionism often leads us to not participate. You know, I mean, you, Emily, are putting yourself out there with your podcast, with your work, with your coaching, all the things you do. So I'm not worried about that for you personally, but I think for a lot of people, I. They struggle with the idea that until it's perfect, I can't share it with anyone until I have this idea all wrapped up. can't share it with anyone. I can't do anything. So improv forces you to share before you're ready. It forces you to just share your ideas in their raw state. You've thought about them for zero to five seconds, and then you're putting it out there so you become more, less precious with your own words and your own ideas. Right? I think comedy in general, improv and comedy in general is a numbers game in terms of putting ideas out there and seeing what's funny. You know, when I write a new comedy bit, um, to perform, I think it's funny. I hope it's funny, but I have no idea until I perform it for an audience, right? I perform it for an audience and sometimes I say, oh, I thought that made sense. I guess that didn't make sense. You didn't follow me there. And that's totally fine. And I think that that's so important for everyone in different organizations to keep in mind is that. is the enemy of participation. It's the enemy of trying things out. It's the enemy of iteration and growth because if you're waiting for things to be perfect, you're just gonna be waiting forever.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah, I like that distinction between perfectionism and and participation.'cause if you go after participation one, you have more control over that because what is perfect anyway, that's like such a subjective, nebulous thing. Uh, and I think that the benefits of participating. Of trying to participate versus trying to be perfect. So outweigh perfectionism, it's like you're setting yourself up for, for a winning, um, game or life or whatever you wanna, you wanna put there. Um, you kind of talk through some of the things that you might get from getting good at improv, from participating, from being in the moment, from just putting your raw thoughts out there without thinking of them through. All the way or however long you would want to think them through for. So if and when someone practices improv over and over and over again for years and gets good at it builds that skill up, what types of things do you tend to see in those folks?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

When people get great at improv and those skills, you see that they are collaborators, that they can work with anyone, and that they put the group's mission. Above their own ideas, right? We

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Hmm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

about when you're doing improv in a scene, that you are serving the group, that you have an attitude of service. That when we perform improv, it's often with the performers on stage. Let's say Andrew and Emily are in a scene and the other five performers are just against the back wall standing there, and they are ready to help at a moment's notice, and their whole

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Ah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

is to jump in and help. So what I see with teams that great at improv and get great at this mindset. Is that they are always thinking about, how can I help my team? They're not thinking about, did I do an amazing job today or not, or did I finish my work or not? they're also thinking, how can I help you know, this person with their work? How can I help my boss with this new project? I've got an idea for this project, even though it's not mine, but I'm gonna throw it out to them. So it's going above and beyond because you're seeing the, the goal as, as supporting the group. Um, you know, for, for meetings specifically and like the company culture, I feel like I see that meetings really set the tone. And my main gauge that I say to folks is that. If you're, if more people didn't participate than not, it wasn't really a meeting, right? You didn't really have a good meeting. That's my main metric that I

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

You just monologue someone.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

You just monologued at someone, or you had like a dialogue with one other person, right? And everyone else just sat there. And there could be a lot of reasons why that happens, right? It might be a power imbalance where they're afraid to speak. It might be that. You didn't really have an agenda for the meeting, so you just kind of came in and talked.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Mm-hmm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

folks and companies to see that as a waste of, of their most precious research, which is their team, right? When they bring in 10 people and only three of them talked in a meeting, that was a waste, right? So to, to challenge themselves. If, you know, Andrew hasn't talked to, while Emily hasn't talked to, while I said like, Emily, what are your thoughts on all this? Right? Because if this person's on your team. You want their thoughts, they're there for a reason. Right? And if you don't think they have anything to contribute, then you probably didn't really want them on your team or you don't need them at this meeting. It doesn't concern them. So that's an important metric. And then I can also talk about, I have sort of an ABCs of meetings that I challenge people and we have a worksheet that we give people to help them think about that. Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah, we can go into that. Um, I'm also curious, you mentioned some of the games you present and work with teams on. Do you actually. Help facilitate like an actual meeting they're having. So like have your normal meeting, get, get the agenda you want across, like cover the items you wanna cover, but do it in a different way or do it in an improvy way. Is that, um, a thing or is like, no, we have have the tools and backdrop of improv and then you just bring the spirit and sentiment of that into the actual meetings.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, so it can be either one. Most often we're helping folks kind of design a meeting. So when I'm leading a session, I ask them to think about what is your next meeting coming up? Because I'm a very practical person, so I'm always like, don't think about your big company meeting. That's at the end of the quarter in two months. What's the next thing you have? You know, if it's on this Friday or next Monday, and I ask them to kind of create it. some of these parameters we've, we've talked about like having participation from the team, making it engaging and interesting. It doesn't mean that you need to play improv games at every meeting, right? That's not our goal is that like you set aside the first 15 minutes for improv games. That's not the purpose of every meeting, but these are to be tools that you can use to either spark brainstorming and participation from your team that wouldn't have come otherwise to re-energize yourselves like that game speech. A lot of companies have told us they use it in the middle of like a three hour meeting to like wake

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Oh.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

up again. Right. So I'm like, improv is a great way to get everybody moving and up, especially if your team is remote. Like, I can't how often we ask a remote team to sit still for a two hour meeting, right? And like no wonder people turn their cameras off'cause they have to go to walk, they have to like walk around or do something. Right? So if we can build movement in like a really. Silly. Simple thing I love to do on like virtual meetings, um, is just called emotional entrances. And so we just put in the chat the name of an emotion, and then everyone leaves their screen and has to come back acting out that emotion. Right?

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

gosh.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

it's silly. It's fun. It takes like two minutes. It's everyone gets to, you know, to express themselves, but it like wakes everyone up and gets them reengaged, right? So

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

The first thing that popped into my mind when you said that was strut, and I was like, Emily, that's not an emotion, but it's kind of like a swagger. Like if you come back and I'm like, Hey.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

would be a great suggestion. Totally strut across the street. That could be a variation on the game of like walk across in a different style. Like canoe across or like ski across or strut across. Yeah, so you know, to incorporate movement to like not allow people to sit still. Even if it's just literally everybody get up and find a new chair, like musical chairs, style

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Mm.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

that can like wake people up. I think we so often just get stuck sitting and thinking and. We need to like, recognize the, the importance of movement and staying awake and, and being engaged in that way. So it's not that, you know, their meetings become all improv, but that they're thinking about those principles, you know, that I think are so important.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

so you kind of go through a couple classes or sessions or meetings where you do the improv games and then you maybe talk through, hey, like what is an actual upcoming meeting, your leadership meeting coming up, or the product meeting or whatever, and you ask them like, what are some good ways to incorporate what you've learned here into that next meeting?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

exactly. And then we often will have them try it out, like have them try and lead one of these games and see how it feels or, uh, lead something that feels relevant to their team or to their meeting. I. And then

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

gather again later and kind of reflect on like, how did it go? Did you do anything different? Um, and how did that feel? And I often, when I'm leading, I, I want to people to change iteratively, like one small step at a time, right? Like in the spirit of improv, not to say, throw out everything you've ever done with meetings and do it this way. Instead, I want to say, here's an offering. Here's some tools I think could be helpful and some frameworks that could be helpful. Whichever ones are resonating with you, try those out. Right? Because I think that's also another problem we have with change is that and go all or nothing. As a company, we say, okay, our company's not having in-person meetings anymore. They're all remote, and here's how we're gonna do them. And so instead of making small changes in a way that we can reflect on and say, did that work or didn't that work? We changed 10 things at once, after a year of thinking about it, and then it doesn't work and we're not sure why. Right? We're not sure which of those. New 10 things worked and which didn't. Um, so I think those small changes, I heard you in a recent podcast talking about just changing the name of your weekly meeting or your weekly gathering and how powerful that can be for people and just resetting their

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yes.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

And I thought that was so beautiful. And that's an example of a seemingly small thing that can have a big impact, right? If you allow people to rethink. So in the same way I tell people, we give them our framework, we give them these principles and these ABCs and these games.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

What are the ABCs? Briefly, if you,

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

yeah, I keep mentioning that. So they're, um, affective. How do you want people to feel? Uh, behavioral, how do, what do you want people to do during and after the meeting? And C is cognitive. What do you want people to know during your meeting? And they're

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

in that order, because I think if we do any of them, it's the other way around, right? So most people have the C where they're like, here's what I want people to know. I want people to know that our new, you know, pipeline in our CRM is this. Maybe they think about the B the behavioral, like, what do I want people to do? Am I gonna have them practice like this new CRM thing? Am I gonna let them ask questions or give ideas? and then very few people think about the A, like how do I want people to feel? And that's really where this mindset and improv mindset can come in because it really matters how you want people to feel to make sure your meeting's effective if the point of your meeting. Is to get people celebrating this quarter's accomplishments. That's gonna be one feeling, right? Celebration, like joy. That's what I want my team to be feeling. If this quarter was your worst one yet and you want people to be like, panicked about where we're going, right? Maybe you're, you're, you're a is like fear. I want them to be afraid that like, if we don't

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Sense of urgency. Let's go.

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Like if we don't shape up as a group, like our jobs are gone guys, or like our team is gone, right? So those two. As are gonna very much change your meeting, like the affective, how you want your team to feel. So I encourage people like, take an hour or even just take five minutes and clarify for yourself what those ABCs are. And it helps so much because then when you start the meeting and it gets off track for good and bad reasons, you can come back to your ABCs where so often people don't really plan. So then when you get off track, it's hard to remember, wait, what was the key thing for this meeting? Or why were we meeting or. What's important in this meeting and what can wait for later, you know? So those ABCs I think are really helpful in, in clarifying that.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

And you mentioned something there just really quickly, if the meeting gets off, off track in a good way. So as part of improv, like, Hey, we have a set agenda. We have a plan, but. This new thing is unfolding. This is kind of cool. Let's let this play out. Is there a space for that?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Yeah, absolutely. Right. And that is part of the mindset of, of Yes and right, a classic idea. And improv is saying yes and. new ideas that come up and it takes a judgment call, obviously in the business context, if this is going down a great rabbit hole, or we're like talking about salads now for 15 minutes, right? And I'm like, guys, okay, we need to pause the salad talk. We'll we'll come back to it at lunch. Um, but yeah, sometimes there's a tangent that's really valuable. Like sometimes someone says something outta left field, which is like, guys, I think we're thinking about this all wrong. I kind of think we need to rethink the whole t-shirt idea in the first place, or whatever it is. And if you're willing to go on that tangent, great. And if you have your ABCs and you say to yourself, okay, we covered that thing. I wanted them to know, they learned the CRM thing. I wanted them to learn. use this time to go on that tangent, see if this leads somewhere valuable. Right. So there could be good, good sidetracks and bad sidetracks. And I think, um, it's important to be open to the good ones. Absolutely.

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Yeah. Very cool. So Angela, I mean, you've dropped some practical and tactical tips that people can go apply right now. Which I always love. So thank you for that. And if people want to know more about how you work in workshops or on sites or on Zoom or whatever with their teams and meetings, what is the best place to find you?

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

so they can just find us on the worldwide web at, uh, artley working.com, A-R-T-L-Y, Artley working. Um, and they can email me andrew@artleyworking.com. And there you can see some like videos and testimonials. We've worked with hundreds of big organizations, uh, teams from Netflix and Google and Pinterest and all kinds of places, um, and would love to talk about the different offerings we have. We also do onboarding with teams so that the values. Are kind of playfully presented at the moment. People join a new organization and so they're really connected with the values in a, in a fun way through improv. Um, and we also do, you know, just simple team bonding things, especially for remote teams, I think so valuable. Too often it's like. just all, you know, grab a beer or a tea and meet online and that just doesn't work. Um, or let's do trivia night or watch a movie together, which is fine, but you're not really getting to know each other, you're not really playing or building trust or those good things. And we love to do those team building, uh, experiences as well. So you can find all that

emily-sander_1_06-19-2025_123730:

Beautiful. Well, beautiful. We will have, uh, your interweb link for people to find you on the worldwide web and uh, your email. But Andrew, thank you so much for being on. Appreciate it

squadcaster-gbe2_1_06-19-2025_153729:

Thanks Emily. This was great.