Episode Transcript
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0:00
[music]
0:13
We live in a world where competition
0:13
is everywhere,
0:15
but what if we broke the mold and instead
0:17
focused on making each other look good,
0:19
decentering ourselves,
0:19
and centering others?
0:23
Hi everyone, this is Jessica Beckendorf,
0:23
and welcome
0:26
to this week's Practicing
0:26
Connection practicast,
0:29
where we highlight a specific practice
0:29
you can use in your life and work.
0:32
In this series, we've been introducing
0:32
practices from applied improvisation.
0:37
During an improv performance,
0:37
making your partner look
0:40
good is an essential ingredient
0:40
to making a scene sane.
0:44
It requires us to be socially
0:44
aware of our partner's needs
0:47
and to take the focus off of ourselves,
0:50
always lifting up our team members.
0:53
Imagine if we did that
0:53
for each other in daily life.
0:55
That's what we'll be talking about today.
0:57
I'm excited to introduce
0:57
Shannon Hughes as our guest again.
1:02
Shannon and I met
1:02
through an organization we both belong
1:04
to called
1:04
the Applied Improvisation Network.
1:07
She's a facilitator and consultant
1:07
with a calling to nurture
1:11
people-first company cultures
1:11
in companies of all shapes and sizes.
1:15
In her practice, Enlivened Studios,
1:17
she brings strategic business mentorship
1:20
and experiential teaching
1:20
practices to incite easeful collaboration,
1:24
and embolden transformational leadership.
1:27
Shannon will be guiding us through the practice in a few minutes,
1:28
but first, let's learn a little bit more about it.
1:32
Hi, Shannon. I'm so glad to have you back.
1:35
This is one of my favorite
1:35
improv concepts.
1:37
It's very pro-social,
1:37
like so many improv concepts are.
1:42
I'd like to start
1:42
by asking you to describe
1:44
what it means
1:44
to make your partner look good on stage,
1:48
and how that can translate to real life.
1:50
Thank you. Thank you,
1:51
and I'm glad to be back again as well.
1:54
To me, making your partner
1:54
look good is about inclusivity,
2:01
interdependence, and even celebration.
2:04
It's recognizing that every scene
2:04
is better when we take
2:08
the time to listen to one another, to acknowledge
2:10
one another's contribution or ideas,
2:13
and to yes-and
2:13
those contributions and ideas.
2:17
It's not just about grasping
2:17
onto our own version of what's right.
2:22
Trying to tell our own story
2:22
and hold onto our own truth,
2:25
but rather saying yes and listening
2:25
to others' contributions.
2:30
By the way, when I say scene here,
2:30
I mean both scenes that are on stage,
2:36
and in real life because let's be honest,
2:36
like you said earlier,
2:41
we are all professional improvisers.
2:45
No one wakes up in the morning and finds
2:47
a script on their bedside telling
2:47
them everything they're going to say
2:50
and every breath they're going to take, and every decision
2:52
that they need to decide on that day.
2:55
We're all professional improvisers. You could also argue
2:57
that we're performing all the time,
3:01
and this is not in a performative kind
3:01
of way, so stay with me on this.
3:07
It's that we are constantly finding
3:07
ourselves in different performances,
3:11
in different scenes,
3:11
interacting with each other at home,
3:15
at work, with friends.
3:17
We even play different characters.
3:19
We might play the character
3:19
of the CEO when we're at work.
3:22
We might play the busy mom
3:22
when we're at home,
3:25
or the best friend
3:25
when we're consoling a friend.
3:28
These are all kind of
3:28
different performances
3:31
and different scenes. On stage, making your partner look good,
3:35
and in life,
3:35
making your partner look good,
3:38
is really about lifting up and elevating
3:42
and celebrating your scene
3:42
partner's contributions,
3:45
their ideas, and what that exchange
3:48
might be when you're living
3:48
and communicating,
3:50
and having dialogue,
3:50
because when we do that,
3:53
things run more smoothly. Wonderful characters
3:55
are created and story unfolds,
4:00
and everyone feels like they belong,
4:00
like they matter.
4:03
They're part of this thing
4:03
that's being co-created together.
4:06
This idea of acknowledging
4:06
one another by saying,
4:09
"I see you. Thank you, yes,"
4:12
can be a really beautiful way
4:12
of making your partner look good.
4:15
I think when we get mired
4:15
down and so busy in the work,
4:20
we forget to pause
4:20
for a second and thank people,
4:23
so I'm excited to hear about that. You started to hint at this already,
4:26
but what effect does
4:26
this principle of making each other look
4:30
good have on a team or a collaboration
4:30
or even an organizational culture?
4:37
Well, we've talked about
4:37
interdependence and belonging.
4:41
What a fabulous practice to take
4:43
into the workplace or into community
4:43
building efforts
4:47
to inspire brainstorming
4:47
or invite conversations
4:50
around how things
4:50
might be done differently,
4:52
or more innovatively and better.
4:55
If we shut our colleagues or our teammates
4:57
down by shaming them
4:57
or giving them a hard yes-but,
5:03
or even a hard no, especially
5:03
if that's done in front of others,
5:07
can feel humiliating
5:07
and definitely unmotivating.
5:12
What happens then? Well, disengagement,
5:13
lack of creative problem solving,
5:17
and retention issues, quite honestly.
5:23
The phrase is people don't leave
5:23
companies, they leave managers.
5:27
People don't leave companies,
5:27
they leave cultures.
5:30
Psychological safety,
5:30
which is the idea of creating
5:34
an environment in an organization
5:34
or in any community
5:38
where ideas are welcome
5:38
and don't have any sort
5:41
of punitive repercussion
5:41
or voices are heard.
5:45
Building that psychological safety,
5:48
which is a term that was coined
5:48
by Amy Edmondson,
5:51
this idea
5:51
of psychological safety is creating
5:54
that safe and what I call
5:54
brave space for people to be,
6:00
I don't know, it's a little cliche to say, bring their whole self to work,
6:02
but an iteration of that concept.
6:07
To show up for who they are, and to create
6:09
an environment where people feel
6:12
like they can voice
6:12
their thoughts and opinions.
6:15
Making your partner
6:15
look good only codifies that.
6:19
To say, "Wow,
6:19
I can speak up here and I'm acknowledged,
6:24
and I'm even celebrated
6:24
and shown gratitude
6:27
for what I say and how I perform
6:27
here because it's safe."
6:31
This seems like a pretty big mindset shift
6:34
in a culture that has supported
6:36
individualism and survival
6:36
of the fittest, competition.
6:41
How can we reconcile or maybe bridge
6:44
the difference between where we're at now
6:46
in this individualistic space
6:46
and what we can achieve together
6:50
through making each other look good?
6:53
Beautiful. Well, a couple things
6:55
came to mind for me on this.
6:58
The first one is transparency
6:58
and authenticity.
7:03
You could add vulnerability, the environment and the mindset shift
7:04
that you've just described.
7:07
I used to work in an environment like that
7:09
where it was pretty individual.
7:12
You kept your head down, got your work done, and it was survival of the fittest.
7:17
In that situation, it was because culture
7:17
came from the top down,
7:20
and by the time it reached the doers,
7:20
there wasn't much there.
7:24
There certainly wasn't much
7:24
transparency or authenticity,
7:27
and employees lose their sense of why.
7:32
The idea behind transparency,
7:32
authenticity,
7:35
and vulnerability as it relates to this mindset shift
7:37
is also going to be included
7:40
in my practice
7:40
that I'm going to talk about in a second,
7:43
but it's this idea of as a leader,
7:43
and when I say leader,
7:47
I don't mean somebody who's a high paying
7:50
executive in the corner office,
7:50
I believe that we're all leaders.
7:54
Whatever that means
7:54
in the context of this dialogue
7:57
between a couple of people
7:57
or a group of people,
8:00
is to pull up a chair, pull up a stool,
8:00
have a conversation with your team,
8:06
talk about the elephant in the room,
8:06
what's going right here?
8:09
Where are our opportunities
8:09
for improvement?
8:13
What's a story as,
8:13
let's say I'm the leader in that scenario,
8:16
what's a story that I can tell
8:16
with a degree of vulnerability
8:20
that then opens the door for other people
8:20
to share as well?
8:26
Even doing that, although that's not explicitly
8:27
"making your partner look good"
8:31
it kind of is because I'm saying
8:31
I'm human, listen to me and my story.
8:37
Now what about you? It's passing the microphone or opening up
8:42
the room for other people
8:42
to share their own
8:45
experiences for the sake of building
8:48
psychological safety
8:48
and a thriving culture.
8:51
Another point
8:51
that I would say for that shift is,
8:54
and this is true
8:54
of any culture building effort,
8:56
is to make it co-creative.
8:59
No employee anywhere wants
8:59
to have some flashy words on a big sign
9:06
in their entryway that says things like integrity and trust and creativity.
9:11
[laughs] Three words separated by a period.
9:14
Yes. Classic.
9:17
It's some giant brand
9:17
consultancy came up with which is,
9:23
no shade on brand consultancies,
9:23
but a good one, a good one,
9:27
and a good leader will include
9:27
the employees in that conversation.
9:31
So much of this too is the third point
9:31
I was going to make about values.
9:35
If integrity,
9:35
creativity are your corporate values,
9:39
where did they come from? What do they mean?
9:42
What are the behaviors
9:42
and the routines that back
9:44
that up on a day to day basis?
9:48
How much did you invite
9:48
the employees or the team members
9:52
to be part of that conversation
9:52
so everyone feels like
9:55
they're aligned to it and they don't lose
9:55
sense of that why,
9:59
like we mentioned before, and all of that,
10:01
you could kind of wrap in a big make
10:04
your partner look good effort
10:04
because you're saying,
10:07
"Yes, I see you. I see you.
10:07
Let's do this together."
10:10
Well, I'm excited to hear the practice,
10:13
or I think
10:13
you have a collection of practices
10:17
and some guidance for people.
10:21
Let's get into that. As I had just mentioned a minute ago,
10:26
culture and values are just
10:26
concepts until there are systems,
10:32
practices, rituals, routines,
10:35
norms that are put
10:35
behind those values and that culture.
10:41
And so often, and so unfortunately often,
10:41
organizations do half the work,
10:45
and then some of it just sits
10:45
on a shelf or on a website somewhere.
10:49
It's that operationalizing
10:49
and systematizing
10:53
that really upholds
10:53
that very important work.
10:59
I use the word system intentionally here,
11:02
especially with this first
11:02
point I'm going to make,
11:04
which is to set up
11:04
a system for recognition and celebration.
11:08
Where does recognition and celebration
11:08
show up in your mid-year review?
11:14
Where does it show up
11:14
in your weekly Tuesday all-staff meeting?
11:19
When does the CEO
11:19
or the team leader come out
11:22
from behind their office door
11:22
and sit amongst the team and grab
11:26
lunch together and talk
11:26
about the highlights
11:28
of what the team has succeeded
11:28
in doing versus,
11:32
we often gravitate
11:32
towards what's gone wrong.
11:35
It's really systematizing
11:35
some of that and putting it into practice.
11:38
I make this silly joke
11:38
that leaders are supermodels.
11:45
What I mean by that is, as a leader,
11:47
it's so important to model
11:47
the behavior that you want to see.
11:51
You have to be the change you want to see.
11:53
It starts with you.
11:57
You, maybe it's even setting
11:57
an alarm on your phone to do these things,
12:01
to make sure that recognition,
12:01
feedback, celebration is pervasive,
12:07
and that you invite employees
12:07
to do that for one another, too.
12:10
The other one is check-ins,
12:10
because so often, meetings, especially,
12:15
people have had a whole day before them
12:18
and probably
12:18
have a whole evening ahead of them.
12:20
Taking a moment to check in and not just,
12:20
"How's everybody doing,"
12:25
but come up with maybe
12:25
a short list of five exercises
12:29
or prompts to get people
12:29
in their body and in the moment
12:34
so that they feel like they're present
12:34
to what's happening there,
12:37
and allow that too, to potentially
12:37
include shoutouts to people,
12:44
to congratulate people. I have a practice that I use
12:46
in my morning journaling.
12:49
Not every day, but every now and again,
12:51
I just write down things
12:51
that I'm proud of,
12:54
things that I'm celebrating. Because again, we're so wired to think
12:55
about the things that haven't gotten done.
13:00
All of those can be seen
13:00
as making your partner look good,
13:03
because you're really patting
13:03
the back of people
13:06
that you work with and saying,
13:06
"I've got you. I see you. Well done."
13:11
One more thing that just came to me. Don't be afraid to talk to strangers.
13:16
What I mean by that is,
13:16
the person bagging your grocery,
13:21
the gentleman walking
13:21
down the street whose shoes you like,
13:24
the children who are very clearly behaving
13:27
while their mom is at the grocery store.
13:30
Just that one second to say,
13:30
"Hey, man, I love your shoes.
13:35
You're looking really dapper today." Oh, my gosh,
13:37
that can change someone's entire day.
13:42
As humans, we get embarrassed. "Oh, I don't want to say anything,"
13:45
but imagine the impact if you just say,
13:45
"I really like your haircut,"
13:49
or, "Thank you for your work today."
13:52
That's making your partner look
13:52
good because we're all partners, right?
13:55
We're all just same
13:55
partners living the dream, right?
13:59
To see somebody and say something
13:59
that's nice about them is so uplifting,
14:04
and it can have huge ripple effect.
14:08
I love that. Thank you so much.
14:10
This collection
14:10
of practices that you shared
14:12
with us today
14:12
are all super simple to implement.
14:16
As I mentioned before, this is one of my favorite
14:17
improv principles,
14:20
and I really enjoyed your perspective
14:20
on it in our conversation today.
14:24
Thank you, Jessica. I loved sharing.
14:26
Well, that's it for this episode.
14:28
Thanks so much for joining us. You can keep up
14:30
with Practicing Connection by subscribing
14:33
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14:33
app, and by joining
14:36
the Practicing Connection community
14:36
on LinkedIn.
14:39
Visit oneop.org/practicingconnection
14:39
to subscribe and join.
14:43
If you have questions, ideas,
14:43
or feedback for the show,
14:46
you can email us
14:46
14:50
We'll be back next week with another applied
14:51
improvisation practice
14:53
to help you break the mold called Noticing Offers and Seeing Them as Gifts.
14:58
Until then, keep practicing.
15:01
The Practicing Connection
15:01
Podcast is a production
15:04
of OneOp and is supported by the National Institute
15:05
of Food and Agriculture,
15:08
US Department of Agriculture, and the Office of Military
15:10
Family Readiness Policy,
15:13
US Department of Defense,
15:13
under award numbers
15:16
2019-48770-30366,
15:21
and 2023-48770-41333.
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