There is a form of comedy where there’s no script and every night the performance is entirely new.

Every night’s show has never been performed before and will never be seen again—because the actors are making up every single line. 

It’s called improv (short for improvisation), and the first and most important rule is: When your partner gives you an “offer,” you say yes, otherwise known as the rule of “Yes, and.” 

With that one simple rule, eight people can perform a 90-minute Shakespearean play with no script that not only makes sense, but is funny; which has a story and rising and falling action and artfully ends where it began as the crowd erupts and the curtain falls. (It all begins with a single audience suggestion—the “seed”—and an environmental agreement—everyone in the audience knows it’s made up.) 

But this sort of scenic agreement is vanishingly rare in corporate events. 

You are the keeper of the story flame

Saying “Yes, and” doesn’t always mean saying yes. It means saying “Yes” to the scene. If your improv partner decides you’re on a starship and wants to steer it into a black hole, you “Yes, and-ing” can sound like, “No, captain!” because you are accepting the artificial world. This allows everyone in the audience to suspend their disbelief and also see it as real. 

Whereas when an improviser says “No,” the magic dies. If they say, “This isn’t a starship it’s a hockey rink,” confusion reigns. It’s as if the lights flicker on and the show is over—if you can’t agree, how can the audience? 

Yet that’s how many corporate events go. There are so many stakeholders who are so concerned about their parts that they bicker and make changes without agreement. I can tell you as someone who’s staffed many, it’s a bit like the curtain going up and the audience seeing all the actors at each other’s throats. Your attendees can feel that, even when it’s hidden, and it wrecks the story.

That’s why it’s essential to get all your stakeholders to align around the purpose of the production—the seed, the story, the environment, and what you want audiences to take away. With that overall agreement, it’s harder for egos to work their way in, and easier for everyone to see that conflict over their own parts actually jeopardizes the whole show. They need to see that they must “Yes, and” each other’s offers.

Come to think of it, most improv rules also apply here: 

• Try to make your partner look good 
• Pause before responding
• Be affected by what’s happening around you
• Sense what your teammates are feeling

If you’re handed a clipboard and told you’re running the lights for a bit, do what improvisers do and pretend you know what you’re doing. Be a teammate. 

Instill those values and intentions into your event by reinforcing the seed of the idea repeatedly, as a mantra. You are its keeper, the one who holds the searing flame. 

Of course, this won’t prevent the occasional outburst or argument. But the best way to resolve those is to ask both parties what they ultimately want, and to agree that everyone wants this to be the most successful it can be. That tends to deflate those false assumptions and help the actors start accepting each other’s offers.