LEARNING BUSINESS SKILLS THROUGH COMEDY

- more than just being funny.

Gerry Maguire Thompson, Positive Comedy

This article introduces some key principles for learning through comedy, and shows how to apply them in the world of business and organisational life - in such important areas as presentation skills, team building, creativity and problem-solving - not to mention making work more enjoyable..

first discovered the power of comedy as a form of training through my own early life experience. As a child at school in Ireland I was extremely shy, and suffered inordinately when people laughed at me. But as the years passed, it dawned on me that 'making people laugh' was a highly prized ability in our society. I realised that it can make you more confident, more popular and even more sexually desirable - something I could certainly do with. I gradually learned to take charge of the whole process, and by my university years had built up a bit of a reputation for jokes, pranks and general 'craic'. Nowadays I positively relish getting up in front of a thousand people and having them laugh at me.

I qualified as an architect and embarked on that career, but eventually realised that I was more interested in how people can get their lives to work better. And what had been most beneficial to me in that respect, I reckoned, was using the power of humour, laughter and comedy in everyday life. So I made it my business to share with others what has worked for me.

It's widely recognised, of course, that humour is a very powerful agent of transformation. Laughter is hugely beneficial to physical and emotional health - helping all the main organ systems, releasing tension and reducing stress, and producing endorphins and other helpful hormones. Humour aids social interaction and communication, often permitting us to address subjects that would be too sensitive to treat seriously. But I believe that the lessons from comedy go much further than just learning how to be funny. And the key to this much wider range of benefits is the core concept of improvisation.

Improvisation simply means making something up on the spot, rather than fully relying on what has been prepared already. So improvisation is a key factor in comedy, the creative spark - all comedy, after all, has been 'made up' at some point, even if it is subsequently practised and repeated. And this improvisational ability is the key to a whole range of other desirable human capabilities.

Just as some people think they cannot be funny, you may think you can't improvise. But this isn't true - we're all born improvisers, and we improvise our way through life; no-one handed us a script at birth. You may just need to practice and become more confident in its use. If you're giving a presentation, for instance, you'll generally have a plan and you'll want to have things go according to that plan. Yet the best presenters - and often the best moments in their presentations - depend on something unexpected happening, and a creative response to that. The rest of us really admire these masters, who can turn something going 'wrong' into an exciting opportunity. We are riveted by a performer when we know that they don't quite know what's going to happen next - it's a great way of holding an audience spellbound. This is rather primeval stuff; it's all about basic instinct and animal survival. Once you get the hang of the game and realise you can play it too, it's a real buzz.

Improvisation depends on two fundamental factors that enable you not only to be funnier but to be more compelling, more creative, more charismatic and more responsive to situations and people. In fact these qualities are helpful for doing almost anything in life better. They are:

1 being yourself, and

2 being in the present moment

I've discovered that most people don't fully use their true communicative and expressive strengths at all - and especially so when they're in a tight spot, which is when they are needed them most. When you practice the skill of confident improvisation, however, you naturally learn to fall back on your own true characteristics, your expression and unique 'style', and these will be more powerful than other habits you may have learned, imitated or become conditioned to. That's 'being yourself'. And when you learn to respond more fully to the present moment, you're in the place of power. In this mode you're not beleaguered by those inner voices and mental habits that limit you - worrying about something that might happen, dwelling on something that has already happened but is no longer an issue, comparing your own performance with someone else's, and generally making all kinds of judgements that may not be helpful or relevant.

When you learn that you have the capacity to respond in these two realms, and begin to trust that you can do so dependably, magic happens. You realise that you have within you an infinite source of creative and imaginative responses, resources, ideas and possibilities. You'll be free of that fearful feeling of the brain freezing, of not being able to come up with something at a crucial moment. You're coming as much from instinct as from intellect here - from the gut rather than the head. So when you're doing that presentation, you'll be connecting with the audience at this level of gut reaction. In terms of the effect you'll create, this is about as far as you can get from the dreaded numbing of 'death by Powerpoint' presentations.

The same principles apply to humour itself. Humour is like yoghurt - the best kind is live, natural and organic - humour that arises out of whatever's happening right now rather than always relying on the pre-prepared, the formulaic or the imitative. As children, of course, we did all this stuff quite naturally; so we need to re-awaken that fresh, spontaneous, playful, inventive and adventurous spirit that we still have dormant within us.

So how can this be put into practice in the cut-and-thrust world of business and organisational life? Well, livelier self-presentation to an audience will be of benefit to almost everyone in one way or another, and the same qualities can add value in one-to-one interactions and functioning in a group context. Teams or groups can practise these skills together and so find new ways of relating - diagnosing a problem, reaching a decision, combining skills or resolving issues. Individual creativity is also vital in the competitive business world - every organisation needs people who can reliably come up with abundant and imaginative breakthroughs and innovations. Appropriate use of humour is in itself a priceless business tool. And staff are less likely to be head-hunted if they're having fun where they are. Furthermore, when individuals develop these skills there will be benefit in terms of personal as well as professional development, not to mention work-life balance.

We can all find simple starting points for becoming more improvisational and thus vitalising our work experience in these areas. If you're still working on that presentation, for instance, perhaps you could take some steps in this direction. Meticulous preparation, of course, remains paramount, but if you're used to reading from a full script perhaps you could experiment with synopsised notes or even bullet points. This way, you choose the actual words to use as you go along, to suit that particular audience at that particular moment, embracing whatever has already come up on that particular occasion. You'll have more eye contact and sense of connexion with the audience, and if something unexpected happens you'll be in a far better space to deal with it.

Or at meetings intended to come up with ideas and solutions, you might suggest more use of the brainstorm principle, at least as a way to get creativity going. This encourages participants to throw out free-flowing ideas and possibilities on the spot without immediately evaluating them or being 'realistic'. These invariably spark off other ideas, and the method can be relied upon to generate co-created solutions which no amount of formal thinking would have come up with.

I have learned, from many thousands of cases, that every single individual can be funny and creative when applying these principles - not just the chosen few, as our society seems to suggest. It's all about demonstrating to yourself that you have these capabilities, practising them, and then trusting that you can depend on them when needed. This is what transforms fearfulness, dullness and 'playing safe' into confident brilliance. Yes - you can do this.

PS: Sorry this article isn't very funny..

Gerry Maguire Thompson is a learning facilitator, comedian, novelist and author of thirteen books. Positive Comedy runs in-company and open registration trainings in UK, Europe and USA. For further information telephone +44 (0)1273 463611 or visit the training pages at www.positivecomedy.com

A radio interview with Gerry is available on CD, by request.

Positive Comedy Training
57 Connaught Avenue
Shoreham by Sea
BN43 5WL UK
+44 (0)1273 463611

www.positivecomedy.com/business_training