- Define key components of improvisation and connect them directly to daily personal and professional communication
- Experiment with leadership and team building skills first-hand via hands-on, interactive improv exercises in a fun, supportive, energized, and safe-to-fail environment
- Enhance cross-departmental and inter-organizational collaboration using YES, AND principles
- Apply exercise content to current leadership situations and team communication processes
- Develop an action and implementation plan of new leadership competencies
IMPROVing Team Collaboration
Embracing YES, AND to
Foster Leadership & Build Trust
The top improv performers and the strongest teams have more in common than you might think. Both rely on active listening, staying present, thinking on their feet, and building on what others bring to the table. The foundation of improv is YES, AND: accepting what your partner offers and adding to it. In a leadership and team collaboration context, that same principle is what defines teams who generate great ideas, support one another, and collaborate and implement projects with ease.
This improv-based team building and leadership communication workshop gives participants a firsthand experience of how YES, AND thinking transforms collaboration, trust, and team dynamics. Through hands-on, interactive improv exercises in a fun, supportive, and safe-to-fail environment, participants discover how active listening, in-the-moment presence, and collaborative thinking directly connect to their daily leadership and communication challenges. The result is a team with a shared language for building on each other's ideas, a stronger foundation of trust, and a genuinely memorable experience that shifts how they show up together long after the session ends.
What You'll Learn
During this improv-based leadership and team collaboration workshop, participants will:
Leadership Behaviors You'll Develop
As a result of this session, participants will be able to enhance their leadership capabilities through the following behaviors:
- Thinking on your feet during times of change and transition
- Leveraging active listening and a being-in-the-moment mindset to elevate every interaction
- Setting others up for success when executing a shared vision
- Challenging the status quo for outside-the-box thinking
- Embracing a YES, AND mentality to build trust and enhance collaboration across every level of the organization
Who Is This Workshop For?
This workshop is a natural fit for any team ready to energize their culture, spark creativity, and strengthen the trust that makes great collaboration possible. It is especially powerful for cross-functional groups, leadership teams heading into an off-site or retreat, and organizations building a more open, innovative, and connected culture. No performance experience required.
Related Workshops
Learning Objectives:
- Define the concepts of EMOTIONAL AGILITY and PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY, and explore the building blocks that allow this to prosper in an individual level and within a team environment
- Explore the five common “THINKING TRAPS” that get people stuck, and practice five communication and trust-based “ESCAPE ROUTE” strategies to help yourself and others break free
- Empower team members to speak their minds, and encourage emotional openness from others
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Psychological Safety
- Building Trust
- Effective Communication
Learning Objectives:
- Determine personal approach to conflict conversations, and discover the five differing conflict styles
- Identify benefits and potential obstacles for each style to clarify effective conflict communication strategies
- Develop an action + implementation plan for positive, long-term behavior change
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Effective Communication
- Adaptability + Assertiveness
- Building Consensus + Alignment
Learning Objectives:
- Define the concepts of EMOTIONAL AGILITY and PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY, and explore the building blocks that allow this to prosper in an individual level and within a team environment
- Explore the five common “THINKING TRAPS” that get people stuck, and practice five communication and trust-based “ESCAPE ROUTE” strategies to help yourself and others break free
- Empower team members to speak their minds, and encourage emotional openness from others
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Psychological Safety
- Building Trust
- Effective Communication
Learning Objectives:
- Determine personal approach to conflict conversations, and discover the five differing conflict styles
- Identify benefits and potential obstacles for each style to clarify effective conflict communication strategies
- Develop an action + implementation plan for positive, long-term behavior change
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Effective Communication
- Adaptability + Assertiveness
- Building Consensus + Alignment
Learning Objectives:
- Clarify leadership and communication preferences, and develop a “user’s manual” to articulate our findings
- Discover the attributes, behaviors and common blind-spots of natural preferences, and explore and understand the same attributes and behaviors of opposing types
- Highlight specific actions we can take when working with someone who leverages opposing preferences, and develop a plan to adjust our styles with at least one current colleague
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Effective Communication
- Collaboration + Trust
- Openness + Awareness
Learning Objectives:
- Define the CURRENT STATE and FUTURE STATE of the team’s collective goals and objectives
- Experiment with design thinking methodology to begin ideation of creative, implementable action plans to fully realize your team’s ideal future state
- Leverage positive psychology to create future-focused, behavior-based outcomes
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Strategic Thinking + Goal Setting
- Creativity + Innovation
- Positive Psychology & Growth Mindset
Learning Objectives:
- Discover the theories and trends associated with highly effective negotiation
- Select the methodologies that best align with our personal leadership and communication style
- Experiment with effective negotiation strategies via hands-on, interactive exercises
- Develop an action + implementation plan, fit with details of specific steps to support others during times of ambiguity
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Persuasion + Influence
- Storytelling + Communication
- Increasing Assertiveness + Confidence
Learning Objectives:
- Define the CURRENT STATE and FUTURE STATE of the team’s collective goals and objectives
- Experiment with design thinking methodology to begin ideation of creative, implementable action plans to fully realize your team’s ideal future state
- Leverage positive psychology to create future-focused, behavior-based outcomes
Key Themes & Leadership Behaviors:
- Strategic Thinking + Goal Setting
- Creativity + Innovation
- Positive Psychology & Growth Mindset
View More Workshops
View More Workshops
Frequently Asked Questions
What does YES, AND mean and how does it apply to leadership and team collaboration?
YES, AND is the foundational principle of improvisation: accept what your partner offers and build on it. In a leadership context, it means creating space for ideas to develop fully before evaluating them. Teams that practice YES, AND thinking consistently generate richer ideas, stronger buy-in, and more innovative outcomes than those that default to YES, BUT or NO. This workshop gives participants the experience and language to bring that mindset into everyday work.
Do participants need any improv or performance experience for this workshop?
None at all! The exercises are designed specifically for non-performers and are focused entirely on leadership and communication skills. The environment is intentionally supportive, energized, and safe to fail, which means every participation style is welcome and every participant walks away with something they can genuinely use.
How does improv training build active listening skills in professional settings?
Improv requires you to truly hear what your partner is saying before you can respond, because you cannot plan your answer in advance. That discipline of full-attention listening is directly transferable to meetings, feedback conversations, and collaborative problem-solving. Participants consistently report that this workshop shifts how they show up in conversations long after the session ends.
How does this workshop strengthen cross-departmental collaboration?
YES, AND principles give teams a shared language for building on each other's ideas across functions, reporting lines, and areas of expertise. When people stop defaulting to skepticism and start building with curiosity, the quality and speed of collaborative thinking improves significantly. This workshop makes that shift feel natural, practical, and immediately applicable.
Can IMPROVing Team Collaboration work as a standalone team building event?
Yes, and it is one of the most memorable team building workshops available. Participants consistently describe it as the most enjoyable professional development session they have experienced, while walking away with genuine leadership insights, a shared vocabulary for stronger collaboration, and a new sense of what their team is capable of together.
Jacob Goldstein
Jacob Goldstein is the founder of The Leadership Laboratory, and leverages his experiences in education, the performing arts, and corporate learning & leadership development to his work. As a performer, Jacob has sung as a backup vocalist for musical artists such as Josh Groban, Idina Menzel, and Patti LuPone, as a recording artist for Netflix series Sense8, and at venues including The United Center, The Chicago Theater, and Chicago Symphony Center. In the education space, Jacob has served as an educator for high school, undergraduate and graduate students, and has been a Guest Lecturer at Northwestern University since 2016. As a Learning & Leadership Development Consultant, Jacob has worked as a one-on-one coach and group workshop facilitator to organizations ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies in diverse industries, including technology, healthcare, non-profit, and fashion/apparel. Jacob holds a Bachelor’s degree from The University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a Master’s of Science in Communication from Northwestern University.
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Use the contact form or email us at: hello@leadershipdevelopmentlab.com
The Leadership Laboratory works across multiple industries - including start-up and established technology firms, non-profit and government agencies, finance companies, healthcare organizations and more. We are proud to collaborate with individuals and teams of all sizes.
Contact us and say hello! We're excited to get to know you and share our ideas on learning + leadership development.
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