Just have to brag for a minute about the incredibly talented Julia Reich of Stone Soup Creative — she completely captured our vibe during our session with NCW. 🎨✨
Our team has facilitated a ton of events with amazing partners, and we genuinely hadn’t seen anything quite like this before. Watching Julia work in real time honestly blew our minds. And also, SHE’S cool!!!!
She’s a master graphic recorder — listening deeply, synthesizing fast, and turning complex conversations into visuals that are both smart and alive. We even ended up talking with her about how much improv she uses to create these pieces on the fly (turns out: a lot).
If you want to elevate an event in a truly memorable way, Julia is next-level. Way impressed. – Holly Mandel + Sarah Hicks, iMergence Corporate Improv Training
I met the amazing (and wow, thank you – complimentary!) team fromiMergence at a recent corporate summit where we were both brought in to bring value to their employees by helping them think and work in divergent ways. I was there doing live visual recording while iMergence delivered a seriously fun workshop for a few hundred employees gathered together for their annual three-day summit.
I had the privilege of capturing iMergence’s session which was one of the most raucous, noisy, dynamic, and impactful sessions I’ve ever had the pleasure of scribing. I wasn’t a participant, but scribing their session filled me with energy like I was dancing across the board with my markers, capturing sounds and movement as well as content. Afterwards I had a chance to meet these talented trainers/performers for a shared appreciation moment as we simultaneously recognized the similarities between what I was doing and what they were doing – in the moment, live in real time.
Although I have seen and enjoyed a few improv comedy acts in my time, I am no expert on the improv genre, and it made me wonder what the overlaps might be between their art form and mine. I arrived at a few similarities – and distinctions:
Encourage Collaboration
The improv team’s core purpose at the event was team-building. “Improv gets people out of their heads and into a team ‘we’ focused mindset. It cuts through silos, rewires stale dynamics, and shows teams what real collaboration feels like…using a “full-body, real-time experience.” (from www.imergenceusa.com)
Likewise, live illustration creates engagement amongst team members when people voice their opinions and ideas and then see them drawn in the moment. This invites participants in, and – instead of getting them on the same stage, gets them on the same page – and encourages sharing with the rest of the group. This can lead to trust and collaboration.
Activate Energy
I’ve felt it time and time again: when there’s an artist in the room listening intently to the discussion or presentation, there’s a palpable energy shift that brings an aesthetic dimension of joy and delight into the room. People frequently approach me to let me know how much they enjoyed watching me work and how it increased their interest and comprehension. The best possible compliment I can hear is, “you really helped me focus and understand what they were saying!”
Improv provides an energy shift because it is interactive: audience members get up, move around and respond to cues from the improv workshop facilitators, all of whom are seasoned professional performers and entertainers. I witnessed it myself – after listening to executives report on the financial state of the company, people were game to stretch their legs (and minds), share laughter and genuinely have a blast.
We also both work quickly which activates dynamic energy.
Being Open
One time there was a speaker who was standing near me at the side of the stage right before he was about to give a talk on ‘being present’. I was poised with my magic markers in hand, waiting for him to start up the steps and begin speaking. In that moment he gestured to my entirely blank white foamboard and noted, ‘now that’s being present in the moment!’ and I had to smile and nod my head in full agreement. What was he was going to say, and what would his delivery style would be like? Would it be full of stories and metaphors? Would he show slides and give examples? I didn’t know, but I just like with every session I capture, I need to be focused and self-aware as well as an unbiased listener, free from preconceptions and intrusive thoughts.
This practice is perhaps similar to the golden rule of saying “yes, and…” in an improvisational theatre context which allows actors to listen carefully, accept their fellow performers’ input, and encourage them to add their own.
In a business or even a social setting, this growth mindset could improve “the effectiveness of the brainstorming process, fostering effective communication, and encouraging the free sharing of ideas.” (Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yes,_and_…)
In order to do our work well, both graphic recorders and improv performers alike have to 1) listen carefully, then 2) synthesize what we hear, and finally, 3) respond quickly. We can’t perform our services unless we’re open to the possibilities that emerge from not knowing.
I appreciate the client who was inspired to find practitioners like us that bring different, sensory ways of thinking into a corporate environment, all towards the goal of building trust; supporting collaboration; and creating engagement.
