January 23rd, 2012
I take improv classes when I can, always from top-flight teachers. It helps me keep my edge by putting my performance under scrutiny and review that’s much more intense than what you or I experience in a workplace environment. And it keeps me in a learning mode. You’ve probably never heard the name of my [...]
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Tags: Ego, Improv Comedy, Intellect, Issues, Listening, Miles Stroth, opportunity, Thinking
Posted in Coaching, Communication, Dialogue, Entrances, Focus, Fundamentals, Games, Initiations, Listening, Relationships, Scenes | 1 Comment »
January 19th, 2012
Tuesday night, we staged an invitation-only workshop for 25 friends, acquaintances and interested folks to let them experience the marvel that is GameChangers. After reviewing our performance, the GameChangers team’s consensus is that on this particular night we were not marvelous. We started 15 minutes late, got slow in the middle and rushed at the [...]
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Tags: Audience, Communication, Dialogue, Game, GameChangers, Issues, Kevin Wall, Marcy Hamilton, Monologue, Narrative, Objectives, Orchestral Model, Outcomes, Project Butterfly, Quantum Narrative, Ron Finley, Som, Strath Hamilton, Troubleshooting
Posted in Coaching, Communication, Education, Fundamentals, Games, Gifts, Issues, Narrative, Objectives, Problem Solving, Scenes, Social Media, Suggestions From the Audience, Uncategorized | 2 Comments »
January 12th, 2012
Not long ago, I observed a scene in a retail store where a manager requested something from a busy employee. This request was obviously unexpected. An ambush of sorts. The employee was doing something else at the time. We have all been part of a scene like this, in one role or the other.
“And when [...]
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Tags: Agreement, collaboration, Communication, Conversation, Declarative Statements, Dialogue, Employee, Information, Manager, Problem Solving, Productivity, Questions, Richard Saul Wurman, Scene, Scheduling, Yes And, Yesterday
Posted in Additions and Edits, Agreement Principle, Communication, Dialogue, Leadership, Problem Solving, Roles, Scenes | No Comments »
January 3rd, 2012
One night when my son, Alex (who’s leaving tomorrow for a job in NYC) was five years old, we watched the movie E.T. together at home. When E.T. left Elliot to return to his home planet, Alex cried. He was still sad when I tucked him into bed a little later. “Why did E.T. leave?” [...]
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Tags: 2012, Alex Bonifer, Dance, Descanso Gardens, Disney, E.T., Flintridge CA, Ken Anderson, Life is Long, Life is Short, Love, Movement, New Year, Ogden Nash, Philosophy, Poetry, Theme, Time
Posted in Emotion, Issues, Metaphor, Movement, Narrative, Problem Solving, Relationships, Themes, Uncategorized | No Comments »
December 19th, 2011
When my son, Adam, was 12 years old, his AAU basketball team played in a tournament in Las Vegas. The boys were having a hard time in the tournament, and their coaches wanted them to stay upbeat. So on the morning of the tournament’s final day, the coaches lined up a [...]
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Tags: Beverage Business, Coca-Cola, Defense, Forbes, Friendship, Gratitude, Las Vegas, Monster, Movie, Penny Stocks, Pump and Dump, Reuters, Rockstar, Rudy, Rudy Revolution, Rudy Ruettiger, SEC, Wal-Mart
Posted in Branding, Character, Entrances, Entrepreneurship, Games | No Comments »
December 12th, 2011
Our friend, Howard was the publicist on the film, Tex, which was Matt Dillon’s breakout role as a leading actor in a feature film. Young Dillon was barely out of his teens at the time, maybe even still a teenager, and was, by all accounts, a raw and rambunctious lad. He and Howard were in [...]
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Tags: 3A, Accountability, Adaptability, Authentication, Authority, Authorization, Authorship, Autonomy, Control, ERGO, Game, Leadership, Matt Dillon, Role Model, Ted Turner, Tex, The 3A Role Model
Posted in Casting, Leadership, Problem Solving, Relationships, Roles, Scenes | No Comments »
December 1st, 2011
In hierarchical organizations, leadership moves primarily from the top down. That’s its sole direction. In this model, the CEO is automatically the leader in every scene that doesn’t involve the Board of Directors. The people who report to the CEO are the leaders in every scene that does not involve the CEO or the [...]
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Tags: Communication, Following, gamechanging, Gamechanging Leadership, Innovation, Leadership, Narrative, Organizational Behavior, Roles, Scene, Teamwork
Posted in Communication, Creativity, Leadership, Narrative, Objectives, Problem Solving, Scenes, Uncategorized | No Comments »
November 21st, 2011
The old games are exactly that. Old. And like anything old, they lack sap, spine, vigor. In many ways, the Occupy Wall Street movement calls this out. Saturday’s Silent Protest against the UC Davis Chancellor, Linda Katehi, is one of the best ways yet of #OWS demonstrating the impotency of old games.
Here’s the scene breakdown:
A [...]
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Tags: Agreement, Emotion, Environment, Focus, Game, Heart, Linda Katehi, Occupy Wall Street, Old Game, Protest, Students, UC Davis Pepper Spraying
Posted in Agreement Principle, Communication, Dialogue, Education, Emotion, Entrances, Environment, Focus, Games, Initiations, Issues, Leadership, Listening, Scenes | No Comments »
November 16th, 2011
This morning, I’m wrapping up a visit with Dr. David Boje, who’s on the faculty of the business school at New Mexico State University. Boje’s work focuses on storytelling and its effect on business (huge!) I participated in two of his classes, one undergrad, one for PhD candidates, in which we explored what he calls [...]
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Tags: Boje, David Boje, Improvisation, New Mexico State University, NMSU, Quantum Physics of Storytelling, story, Storytelling, Trigger Mechanism
Posted in Education, Levels of Meaning, Movement, Narrative, Networked World, Scenes, story | No Comments »
November 13th, 2011
I’ve written about it before, and it bears repeating, because it is such a beautiful concept. After his team had won the 2011 NBA Championship, Dallas Maverick guard Jason Terry (@jasonterry31) said something truly profound.
An interviewer asked Terry one of the most cliche questions in sports (paraphrasing): “Jason, what made the difference this year? How [...]
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Tags: Dallas Mavericks, Environment, Jason Terry, Narrative, Occupy Wall Street, Penn State scandal, Quantum Narrative, Stories, Storytelling
Posted in Character, Environment, Narrative, story | No Comments »
