An Improv CEO’s Guide to Growth

The Third Growth Option with Benno Duenkelsbuehler and Guests

I learned, in real time during this episode, from Joe Boyd – CEO of Rebel Pilgrim and CEO of Leadercast – how growth can come from being in the moment, being present. Joe talks about the impact of improv on business growth (14:13, below), team growth (16:03, below), and personal growth (see 7:16, below).

1:21 – “…’yes, and’ – which is our mantra – it has to be both, you are prepared, but also prepared to change, to accept what comes in front of us.”

2:09 – “The first thing they teach us is to say ‘yes, and’ and to prepare yourself, but don’t prepare the scene.”

5:54 – “It forces you in the moment, it’s so much about listening and observing and reacting and all of life is like that but we forget… the absolute worst thing that could happen is that you’re awful and not funny…and it’s fine.”

7:16 – “When you’re focused on being present, you find yourself and you accept yourself as you are.”

14:13 – on his company’s 9-year anniversary “we adapted like crazy in the first four or five years, even to find out what kind of company we were… not like most start-ups with a really clear vision of who we were.”

16:03 – “As a company it’s been okay for us to go on a journey to find out who we really are, almost like a person. How we growth together is being willing to let go, people letting go of the right things is super important.”

22:00 – “It’s those failures and misses and miscalculations that ultimately a lot of the good stuff in life comes out of.”

22:50 – “It’s about using failures as building blocks and not as concrete barriers.”