Skip to main content

improvisation

Training: Why don't I have more ideas?
9 mins
Improvisation improvisation training

In front of this computer since hours, I’m looking for how to start this article. How the find the idea that will make it meaningful. I turn the music on and the distraction off and begin to look around me to think “outside the box”. Two hours ago I planned to write this article about the first improvisation training I did with my team. I’ve decided to train us on behavior and creativity topics. This training is about what I’m struggling with right now :

How can I have more ideas?

5 great books about creativity
5 mins
books books creativity improvisation mathematics
Here are five great books about creativity. These are very good books where you can experience different aspect of creativity: How it became a culture in a creative company like Pixar (Creativity Inc), how one person can fight to maintain it in a huge industry (Orbiting the Giant Hairball), the importance of mistakes in the creative process (The Art of Making Mistakes), how an author can make crazy idea with everyday things (H2G2) and finally in the best example of Art&Science I know, magic (Magical Mathematics).
The art of Making Mistakes, book review
5 mins
books books creativity improvisation mistakes
As a Chief Technical Officer, I see my job as trying to notice as fast as possible our new mistakes and adapt. Working in an unknown environment with new technologies, avoiding mistakes is impossible. We do mistakes, all the time. Everything fails all the time. Werner Vogels, CTO of Amazon Web Services However, even in this environment, we can be sometimes scared to try something new because of the fear of failure, this is a human reflex that probably helped our ancestor to survive while dangerous animals ate more risky individuals.
5 great books about acting
4 mins
books books acting improvisation
Here are 5 excellent books about acting. More than being only to learn how to acts, these books explore human behaviors and how to bring these behaviors on stage. Also, if you don’t perform, since improvisation is anywhere there is human communication you would be surprised how much you can learn from them. Audition: Everything an Actor Needs to Know to Get the Part # Michael Shurtleff has been casting director for Broadway, and this is his book on advice on how to succeed at an audition.
Team collaboration is hard, Improvisation training can help
8 mins
Improvisation Leadership leadership improvisation teams
When was the last time you left a meeting frustrated? My last time was every meeting. We are all working together on the same project, but it’s always the same : he can’t stop talking she always criticizes the new ideas and about minute details before we can even start building on it he brings topics that had nothing to do with the initial agenda she can’t stop cracking stupid jokes he doesn’t understand the big picture she is obsessed with her pointless ideas etc.
Humble and Demanding
5 mins
Improvisation Again! improvisation
Yesterday lunch, you were eating your usual sandwich with this fantastic ham and cheese. You were so real eating this meal. With each movement we could feel that you were enjoying it. Sometimes a simple sandwich can evoke a smile. Your co-workers around the table were not paying any particular attention to you but were unconsciously affected by you: their posture was influenced by the dirty plastic bag you left on the middle of the table and by the gestures you make when you eat.