LEADERSHIP ACADEMY LEARNS IMPROV: IN THE WORDS OF AGNES STAUPELYTE

Leadership Academy students started off their second day of the BAFF-funded Entrepreneurship course by with an introduction to basic improvisation skills, led by design thinker/ improv performer Dan Ryder. In this session, students would learn to make connections about how improv skills, such as thinking on your feet, pivoting quickly, and improvising, which can be useful as entrepreneurs, particularly when making a pitch presentations. Read what Agne Staupelyte thought of this fun and interactive session.

“The improvisation class was stunning. We had to come up with an original handshake, original dance and original slogan. How much imagination, energy, and freedom was in the atmosphere! It showed that many times in our work or even daily life we simply forgot one crucial thing – improvisation. The rules are given to us and we do everything the same as the successful ones did. Also, we are planning each detail in our ideas, in our presentations, in our lives, and closing the space where improvisation can do its role. I perceived that if we do things straightly from our minds without time to feel fear and without time to over-analyze, we are releasing things and talents within us that we even did not know we have!

I am an action-oriented person and over-analyzing stops me, so this class even encouraged me to not think so much logically if there is nothing to lose. When people are free to improvise, the youthful creative energy flows through them so purely and the amazing things can be done even without months of thinking.

Experiment and improvise, friends! Most of the time, there is absolutely nothing to lose, just to get.”

-Written by Agne Staupelyte