 Hello and welcome to the applied improvisation network brain tank number three. This is number three in a series of what a think tank meetings to consider the current and future state of applied improvisation and the place within that of the applied improvisation network. We have a plan for a conversation of maybe 3045 minutes depending how it goes today. And if you are watching this on recording or participating in it live, you can also join in with a Google document which was promoted and posted with all the notifications about the event. I can share that as well. In the chat. There's Google starts on page 12 the session three section, though pages one to 11 are very interesting to read as well. The topic for today is how applied improvisation has developed and been tested in the humanitarian sector. And we guests on out we have guests on our panel of the Lena Rafi and Margo curl. And everyone else who's here, Frederick so far. We're very welcome. And we'll start by inviting each to say a little bit about your connection to applied improvisation and your connection to the humanitarian sector. Maybe just briefly by way of introductions. Sure. Thanks so excited to be here with you gorgeous people. In terms of applied improv. I think my first applied improv book that I read was by Robert low improvisation Inc. I started my company in 2007 met you Paul and said, please be my business partner teach me everything you know. Back I just looked it up in 2000. I started using improv for sustainability professionals and things like that because I saw that the mindsets of collaboration dealing with the emergent playfulness, even though the topics were serious that the process of playfulness was really useful. And I met the fabulous Pablo as far as from the Red Cross Climate Center in May 2012 at a D growth conference and what was really irritating was, we were put at the same time and his was like the one other session from that conference that I really wanted to see. And we ended up talking later and I sort of lovingly stopped him for two years to say please come to one of our conferences and then kind of we got to do more and more and we got this, I got to be the fabulous Marco. So maybe that's a little brief intro. That's a great start. Thank you. Margot, what's your connection to the humanitarian world and the world of applied improvisation. Well, thank you for the short introduction there, but you know, it's great to be referred to as fabulous before you even start talking. So thank you. Nice. So I have worked in the humanitarian sector for years now I work for the Red Cross Recrecent Climate Center, which is a reference center for the global Red Cross Recrecent movement. And it deals with the impacts addressing the impacts of climate change. So how can we make sure that people suffer less in a nutshell, and knowing that the climate is changing. Now, I think Belina captured it really nicely where she said, you know, it's even though we're dealing with entirely different topics, a lot of the processes that we are dealing with and can really benefit from applied improvisation. I think that's what we've seen over the last years. I was just thinking what was my first introduction. And I'm not actually really sure because I've met so many of you over the years. And I think Belina what you said is teach me everything you know I've always felt that in the presence of applied improvisation and facilitators moderators. So have had a lot of that and is of course, what you mentioned power has brought it to the climate center. And I think it's really started from, you know, working with little exercises to really shaping the way we, we moderate processes we design processes with lots of different stakeholders, you know, governments, researchers and bringing everyone together and really talking about difficult topics and doing that in a way where everyone feels energized and have an effective session. So that's a bit of my introduction. Thank you, Margot. Okay, well, my first introduction to improve, I'm going to say that first I started to learn theater to learn German, when I arrived in Germany. And then I fall in love with improve theater and I say, Oh, that's great. I'm sure we can use that professionally. So I did some research. And then I found yes, there is a group the applied in pro network and I attended one of the a and conference I can't remember if it was in 2006, seven or eight, where we met so quite a long time ago. And then I use that I was self employed I use applied improvisation for for different team building mainly but also developing skills. And then I must say I was completely dragged out of that so always interested in applied improvisation but not really using it, although I'm working in challenge and learning environment so it's really topics where we can really use it. From the amount of monetary and world, I'm not directly involved working in a big huge company, but my daughter. She worked for the for the food bank in London. So, so I'm aware and she's doing a master in political environmental or environmental politics and she's really a topic is social justice and all these topics. So, through that, I mean, I was interested before but even more now. So and when I saw your your post and it was completely by chance poll because the last few months I was not on LinkedIn a lot. And I saw that I say okay that's a good way to get back to the topic so thanks for the invitation in LinkedIn and thanks for this occasion. Welcome back. And my connection is with the applied improvisation network as a co founder back in the beginning of the century and being involved with it ever since and some of the most exciting things that we've done have been our interactions with the humanitarian sector, both AIM to Red Cross and at that organizational level, and also individual work that I've done as facilitator and designer for anything from cop climate talk sessions to working on insurance, new ideas and social justice social protection and prevention of sexual sexual exploitation and abuse so it's really profound and important things that this maybe seemingly frivolous idea of improvisation or improv can lend itself to. And it's a question that I've been thinking about recently is, is there a particular overlap of improvisation having a particularly good fit for the humanitarian sector. I would say that applied improvisation offers things like good facilitation and a neat set of activities, and that that would be useful for accountants bankers, and any other sector, they could all do with better meetings and bit more fun and ways of engaging with people and using games as a means of learning that that kind of diminishes our worth as a subset of participatory activities and experiential learning. Is there something more profound that connects applied improvisation and its possibilities with the humanitarian sector. I'm going to go to Belina again first for that. Right. Marco you catch anything I bit. I absolutely. Yes, I mean I think we're all here because yes but it specifically I think it's a mindset and a practice of under pressure, dealing with the emergent, accepting and building on what's actually happening. We're trying to navigate that with a solution focus mindset of like what can we use to move the story forward particularly tilted in a in a way that keeps people safe that that is adjusting quickly. The circumstances change so I really feel like improv in particular is beautifully suited for humanitarian is like the extreme application because it's it's designed to help us when we're afraid to be grounded connected and generous. The humanitarian sector presents very big problems, including emergencies that demand of a particular way of approaching them and dealing with them in the moment emergent adaptable and those sorts of things. I suppose we've all had some taste of that over the last year when our plans in comfortable Western world were suddenly disrupted to points that we just haven't imagined possible beforehand. And while that may not have been as extreme or difficult as many of the humanitarian crises and challenges it's given us a flavor of that. And we've all been improvisational in our response so it's foregrounded the skills and attitudes mind sets and techniques that might be best suited for us dealing with that kind of thing. Yeah. Yeah, thank you. I would agree with what Belina said. I do think that that's, you know, a subset of the humanitarian world. So that's very much sort of the the emergency work the people in not superman capes but you know, they're they're running around in in high vis vests and dealing with with with disasters as they're happening and dealing with decisions quickly having to, you know, make make the decisions very quickly and having that mindset of using everything that's going on. I think it can be extremely helpful in in that situation. And the work I'm personally involved with would be more on the longer term processes where there's less of that pressure cooking pressure cooker sort of vibe going on, even though, you know, there's obviously there's a huge overarching emergency that we need to work towards but the processes of course have the possibility of taking a bit longer. But within that, what why I think this is particularly well suited is, is is I think why I said before is that very often we're dealing with bringing different sets of stakeholders together in really complex dialogues. It's very easy for processes like that for people to stay in their own corners and, you know, not speak each other's language, not get to the core of something and really stay separate. And I think what I've understood from applied improvisation so far in the processes that we've designed, you know, using your experience and expertise and and having tools at hand. And I think really help us soften those differences bringing people together and really come to a process of co creation, and that can, you know, start to address really complex issues. So I think that's for me, especially where there's a beautiful fit. Let's talk about Pablo Suarez a bit more. Because complex process. I think he made all of us a bugs. A dangerous man in many respects. So he saw these possibilities that Berlina was in front of him and I've quoted a couple of his emails from five eight years ago in the Google Doc where he says how inspired he was by coming to the applied improvisation network conference first in Berlin. 25th, no 2014 or 13. And then again, and we'll talk about what he did in Canada in Montreal, and that he immediately saw the possibility of applying the some of the ideas that he got as a way of making better connection connection in the way that you just described. I'm getting an echo of Frederick. Yeah, there we go. And he did this by, instead of doing conventional talk, he did activities and engaged people in it so that they were speaking at least from the same experience of that activity. And by doing something different and unusual it also got the attention. And I know that the Red Cross Red Cross and Climate Center has developed both before and subsequently a suite of games and activities and exercises, which are leaning towards being more improvisational in the sense of they don't require so much kit or set up and then it was complicated. They're easier to play with different numbers on the spur of the moment and get messages across. They teach concepts, they give people the idea of what something is about, and they teach them skills while you're doing the activity you're learning how to do something like talk more clearly to your neighbor or notice more of what's going on, or change direction quickly in a physical activity can be as simple as that, or can be much more complex and layered. So that whole development of games went on. So you had the idea which he bought to the conference in Montreal, that some of the things that we thought were important stuff to say in the world of applied improvisation didn't land well in the real world. So you couldn't just go with a message of yes and without some interpretation and contextualization, but talking about failures and mistakes doesn't go down well when those failures and mistakes are failures of life and important resource systems and huge amounts of spending. And that really helped to make a differentiation between what you might do in a workshop with safety of theater environment, and what you might teach in a workshop that's supposed to apply to the real world. And that's really at the heart of what applied improvisation is about. So I've rambled a bit there. Maybe you've got some comments on any aspects of that. Ask Margot to go first this time. It's so spontaneous. Wow. Yeah, look, I recognize all of what you're seeing here and I think I was actually there at one of the AI and conferences in England, in Oxford in I don't know what year 26, maybe, where we're probably had a really impactful session bring this point across about the dangers of yes and in a career and situation that we can't say yes to everything. Sometimes it's hard to know where the safety of others can sense so that's, you know, I still almost that feeling comes to it like comes up in my chest thinking about that session thinking that there are really some things in terms of framing to think about. I hear myself double as well now. So the whole point that you're talking about using games and activities to make more impact and get messages across I think that's not something that's new that's been started to do that for years and years and years and that's, you know, evolved from all sorts of activities where we're looking at the probabilities of extreme weather events changing so really technical things and then decision making under pressure and taking people through that experience to much simpler activities where there's lower level of skill required as the facilities are much more broadly applicable and really triggers interesting thinking. I don't know if one of the things that comes to mind is a snap sort of thing yeah yeah yeah but you know it's like an imaginary deck of cards. And then you know if you say the same number the first person to say snap gets a point and gets the deck of cards and then you can sort of apply that by then bringing in content it could be any content so it could be what do you think about when you think about climate change or whatever the topic is that you want to explore in that particular meeting workshop setting at that time. And I think for for me and for the organization is being equipped with a whole lot of these tools and approaches that you can pull out of your quiver. You know, whenever applicable to soften the process to make people more engaged and has just been extremely helpful with this and people you know come back years after saying I remember that and I remember thinking what happened and at the level of engagements just really really gone up and I think especially if you're talking about something like climate change which is you know not necessarily the most exhilarating topic because we're talking about processes that go on for years or decades. And so to to to make people engage with that things really important and I think having the tools to do that. Yeah, it's been very valuable. Did you want to go second. I think that's exactly right and it's, it's not only that the climate process is so drawn out it's that it's urgent and scary and I think there's something about navigating our way together. I think it's very joyfully in connection with something that is scary and very easy to kind of block out because it's too overwhelming. There's, there's real power in that. I feel the need to backtrack and explains just quickly why Pablo made us eat bugs and which is really magical about working with Margo with Pablo with with the team is that from the AIS side and I used to be on the board of course six years working with with Paul and stuff is that is seeing how beautifully you take exercises and really embed them into the different processes so it's the how is beautifully fit with the what you're trying to do. So, so, I remember there were several kind of pilot workshops like let's play games and let's work out what are these doing because it's never about just playing a game it's always we're going to pick a specific game so that certain mindsets are triggered certain behaviors are triggered. And so the how is part of the what because the traditional, both in corporate and NGO land of death by PowerPoint is such a waste and we don't have time to waste we need more effective meetings that people are really co creating solutions. And the reason he made us eat bugs was this beautiful session he did right before lunch, so we were all really great. And he talked about we all care about the environment. Here, he had an account, somebody from the economist fell out like here's the impact of different types of meat that a lot of people eat on the environment. And here's the impact if we eat really nutritious bugs and he had this gourmet chef that he brought in to cook these delicious things and then there were like chocolates with bugs on them and stuff and he had people serve them to every single table, and basically put your mouth where your values are like, like be aligned. And I think that there's something about applied improv being very mindful of body and mindset and actions, which helps us to align the how with the what, in a particularly good way. And that's why he made us eat bugs is to say like okay if you care about this here is something that's outside of your comfort zone, which is actually applicable. Like you can do this. Yeah, and that felt very alike with him. The message is wrapped up in the design of the activity, literally in the case of bugs in chocolate. And the facilitators applied improvisers facilitating. We need to know what the game is teaching. It's very easy to take a game and think it's teaching one thing and the mechanics end up having it teach the opposite. I won't give examples now because maybe time for it, but you've brought me to think of some highlights of this relationship between the applied improvisation and the humanitarian world. For example, it's not just working with people who are the workers in the humanitarian world it's sometimes working with the populations themselves, displaced villagers and so forth I think you've worked that's been done in Manila. Right, and on the borders of Mexico and America where the improvisational activity is participated in by people who have been affected by some other some humanitarian difficulty or other. So, with that whole range of things in mind what are some of your highlights of that relationship where it's, it's worked well been effective and memorable for you. It's slightly more vigorous. No, it's, I'm just thinking, you know, me personally, I have, well, I'm just thinking how I use these sort of thing has the organization use these in on the frontline and most certainly I would say yes. And we've run all sorts of training of trainer sessions using games and activities for people in in all sorts of countries and to, you know, to really get to the population level, create contingency plans for disaster preparedness using activities and really getting people's to think sharply, cleverly, quickly on what's needed rather than having a sit down process that takes a long time. So certainly have used that over the over the years. And I think one of the highlights for me that comes to mind immediately now is, in addition to, you know, having used the applied improv principles and tools in in the design and facilitation of things and supporting others to in their design and the implementation has gotten to that level. I think, partly because of the experience we've, we've learned from the network from the applied improvisation side of things so really people come to us now for Hey, and how can we do this in a more effective interesting way. So that's interesting. And we've had the pleasure of together with Molina with Paul with some other colleagues, creating an online course actually calls participate and where we look at the effective design and implementation of effective meetings in face to face meetings, and have had fantastic response to that where you really take participants for free through principles activities, things tips and lessons on what we've learned over the years of how can we do this better. And that's been a real highlight for me. For you, Belina. I think the participate program was awesome. We also did a session in the Paris conference, like a pre session that was looking at humanitarian and applied improv and, and learned a lot through delivering that as well. I always think is the one you were talking about in the Philippines, and I got to visit him several years ago and really talk about. He was working with Mary Tyskovich was at FEMA at that point and a year after the biggest typhoon, they went and work with effective, effective communities on how do we make better decisions. If it happens again. And I remember him saying very, like extremely moving things of asking the participants in the morning like if it happens again, how confident are you that you're going to make good decisions and some of the more at the level of if it happens again. This is even a year later. I don't want to make it, I want to go like that. That's how traumatized they were and by the end of it. They were saying that was brilliant and now we feel more confident that we know what to do if it happens again. And we're ready to do that. So that was an incredibly moving project that that gave in Mary did. The practice of improvisation in a workshop setting is giving people life skills to be more in touch with their resources and to improvise better responding to the needs that have so at its core it's a really important skill for anyone and everyone. Again, as we've all experienced recently, least a flavor of that, and the recognition that these are core skills that people need is going to support more of that this sort of work happening. I mentioned also the Oxford conference, the AI and conference where we had two days of meeting between the humanitarian attendees and applied improvising 10 attendees to really talk about some of these things, get to understand each other's worlds and and develop some activities together. That was one of the highlights for me. Questions and thoughts have sprung to anyone's mind Frederick included while we've been speaking. No thoughts have sprung to anyone's. I was, I'm really interested in all what you say and I mean from from my experience on applied improvisation I can really see what you what you've done. And I've seen a video from some time ago I think I don't know where it was posted but I've seen a lot of public stories which which we're talking about. And yeah. No I don't have a specific question at the moment. Oh, too many. I have a reflection of now that we've been through various levels of lockdown and third waves and for me like all these different waves of pandemic that the ambient stress for us around the world has been incredibly high. To the point where like cognitive function is beginning to fray a little bit of our ability to do zoom conferences. So there's, I'm appreciating the joyful connections, even when we're highly stressed aspect of applied improv. More and more there's something a lot of people have talking to her like beyond the point of pretending. And they really want to have real conversations and they want to have joyful connections and not like happy clapping connections but like real meaningful nurturing connections and I think applied improv also lends itself to that. I haven't gone to the pandemic for over a year. I'm curious what Margot kind of sees. If you guys work under stress normally and then you have the pandemic stress on top of that sort of with your experience. Oh, and I see we have a new participant. Hi, sorry I just finished another session in the US. It's okay. Welcome. And I'm going to mute you for the moment. That's a very warm welcome. I'm just talking quickly here we went, I think through, you know, where humanity, the humanitarian world and applied improvisation have met can meet and a quick reflection here from Belina on the extra levels of stress that causes has brought and how we've experienced that. I think it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a very interesting setting, and I feel that the first month or two everyone was swimming and it was all chaotic and no one knew how to organize themselves at home and there were children running around and there was just absolute chaos for about a month or two. And then to me, it felt like the work pressure just went incredibly. It just, and it's because the whole world. I mean, I've been working from home for years and years already so very used to that. And everyone else was and planning in meetings and meetings and meetings. I don't know if you recognize this but all of a sudden I seem to not be able to breathe from eight in the morning to three in the afternoon or something and then you can get to your emails and then to actually some work and there was just that constant pressure and I think people felt under pressure to keep delivering the same amount of stuff so where there's no workshop organized in real life and now it's got to be the same amount of time and online and rather than really taking a step back and seeing where it was the actual objective that we wanted to achieve and can we do that in a much shorter, different, gentler way and so I have certainly felt that in my work but I don't think that's necessarily representative for the humanitarian work and I think that's probably a bit of what everyone's experiencing. Everyone there's this opportunity to rethink what we do and rethink the ways in which we do it and that the creativity of improvisational approaches can provide some answers and some radically different ways of doing things. So we all need to be at these meetings. How can we use asynchronous communication more effectively. How does going online suddenly give us access to so much more widespread expertise, even if we're losing certain things at the same time of human communication and there's these are all, in my view, improvisational related questions with good improvisational responses from principles of collaboration and principles of taking care of ourselves and each other. So just to add to that one one thing that has certainly come about in in the organization I work for so I'm Alison I work for the recross request and climate center dealing with the impacts of climate change around the world is the whole launch of this thing called virtually amazing. I mean, Belina is I think you are probably one of the people who's coined that in Paris, your journey, who where there was an applied improvisation workshop in collaboration with the humanitarian side on how to work more effectively online. And we've really taken that virtually amazing on board as a way of working. And really, I foresee long into the future and seeing, you know, can we prevent me things like do we have to fly everywhere in the world can we reduce that we not only, you know, make better use of our time but also not fly around the world and keep polluting at the same time. So have a smarter more effective way, where we really make use of the possibilities that the internet is offering us. So that's been really cool. If improvisation at its most basic making use of what we've got in a better ways creative novel ways responding to the pressures that we're under then making use of the world's resources seems like a very good idea. So, I think we'll close in a minute or two. Final thoughts, Belina. I'm glad you're having this conversation. I think it's a beautiful application for so many reasons to bring apply to impromptu the humanitarian sector. It just to boost personal resilience of the people who are in it. And who are having, you know, like importance strategic meetings and or on the ground and everybody in between. It's a sector that's dear to my heart, like here to help as I can. I feel really honored to be part of this, you know, like the AI and that has, I feel like what you co founded poll of a million years ago, whatever it actually was. You've been, you've been training people for now and beyond. The stuff that you were planning seeds for decades ago in different forms is helping people now and is going to continue to help people through climate adaptation, you know, disaster risk reduction, all sorts of other things. So it's just a joy to be part of the conversation. Thank you. Margot final thoughts for now. Yeah, I would agree with that. I think it's been an honor and a pleasure of the last years to to work together. I think one of my highlights, I can't remember which event this was, but there was this famous Canadian man who was there as well from whose line is I think, or anyway, I was mercury. Yeah, yeah, yeah. In a recent AI and events, and that was the only event that week after a whole string of zoom meetings, teams meetings, whatever meetings that really made me laugh out loud. So, especially at the time where there's such pressure and there's so much going on felt really elated and I think giving yourself the freedom to pause and to breathe in and to be inspired literally. What was fantastic. And, and, yeah, I think this is a fantastic reminder, being here with with you guys, and to that we've done some really cool things in the past, and there's plenty to be explored in the future. So really looking forward to that. Thank you there is plenty to be explored in the future. And you can get involved if you're watching this and want to be involved with the AI and the applied improvisation network, either through our Facebook group or our LinkedIn group, or through the website, which is currently under refurbishment but if you're watching this in centuries to come it will be up and running I'm sure. It's a dedicated body of applied improvisation for humanity within the applied improvisation network which still meets from time to time and makes things like the webinar that Margot's just referred to happen. And these brain tank sessions looking at applied improvisation in its various facets and appearances happens on the first, the second Tuesday of each month at this time, whatever that time is for you. And UTC time. So thank you very much for being here today and watching this session. I'm going to pause the recording now so that we can all say what we really think.