#180 Second City's Kelly Leonard | Improv & The Power of "Yes And"

Improv isn’t just for comedy. If there are superfoods like blueberries that are good for your health, improv may just be a super-skill that has implications and applications that are also good for your health. No joke. And the skills are highly learnable and can measurably help you become a better person. They can make you a better collaborator in marriage, parenthood, business, and just about everywhere in life.

Many Fortune 500 companies, including Clorox, have been able to boost their bottom line by using the skills they’ve implemented from improv.

I had the pleasure of speaking with Kelly Leonard (https://www.secondcity.com/people/kelly-leonard+), the Vice President of Creative Strategy, Innovation and Business Development of Second City in Chicago, the oldest continually operating improv center in the world. The list of graduates who have come from Second City is utterly astounding. If you are a fan of any of these people, you can thank Second City: Amy Poehler, Mike Myers, Chris Farley, Tina Fey, Tim Meadows, Gilda Radner, Bill Murray, Joan Rivers, Jordan Peele, Alan Alda, John Belushi, Stephen Colbert, Cecily Strong, and so many others. All of them developed their chops under the same roof, where my guest has worked for 35 years.

Kelly is the author of an excellent book on improv called, Yes, And: How Improvisation Reverses "No, but" Thinking and Improves Creativity and Collaboration - Lessons from the Second City. I loved this book and so did a fella by the name of Stephen Colbert who said the book, “…is for anyone looking to be more creative in their work and in their life.” Other similar praise came from Dan Pink and Vanity Fair.

In this episode, you will hear how improv works, and why you should consider developing these skills. You may even find yourself bringing people like Kelly to your workplace to help improve performance and employee morale through the types of play that only improv can bring.

So, listen in as Kelly and I talk about why you need to learn improv, the super-skill in life.