How to Perform In The Moment with Neil Mullarkey, ImprovYourBusiness

You couldn't make it up. But Neil Mullarkey does. He co-founded the World Famous Comedy Store Players with Mike Myers, appeared in the Austin Powers films, and has spent 40 years making things up in front of live audiences. For the last 27 years, he's been sharing those skills in boardrooms, with teams, and even with cybersecurity experts.

His book In the Moment makes the case that the ability to listen, adapt, and build on what you're given isn't just good stagecraft. It's the most urgently needed skill in business. What's more, it's one that many teams and organisations struggle with. He argues, with warmth and hard‑won experience, that the same instincts that keep an improvised scene alive - listening, accepting an offer, and building on what’s been given - are the skills businesses desperately need to foster.

In this conversation, I learn about Neil's journey into improv and we get into mistakes, blame, trust, failure, permission, laughter, silos, scripts, chaos, a soda syphon, and the surprising thing a room full of cardiologists taught Neil about improvising at the sharp end.

Listen to find out:

• Why laughter matters and 'mistakes' are rich creative material
• Why the optimal team size is six, and what that has to do with improv
• What a cybersecurity crisis has in common with a night at the Comedy Store
• What cardiologists told Neil that changed his mind about improv in business
• Why AI is making this deeply human skill more valuable, not less

 

Links:

Neil's book 'In the Moment':
https://uk.bookshop.org/a/15792/9781398610767

More about Neil and ImprovYourBusiness:
https://neilmullarkey.com/

Connect with Neil on LinkedIn:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/neilmullarkey/

A rare appearance by Neil with the Comedy Store Players on Sunday May 10th: 
https://www.comedystoreplayers.com/events/comedy-store-10052026

 

Chapters:

0:01:44 - More than a jolly: when to use improv and when not to

0:05:28 - How do you make it stick?

0:08:09 - Hackathons and the improv vs. structure tension

0:12:20 - The meetings chapter: tell, decide or implement?

0:13:21 - Permission, leaders and curating questions

0:15:08 - Origin story: from soda siphon to Comedy Store Players

0:19:32 - Confidence, failure and the improv stage

0:22:07 - Do you rehearse improvisation?

0:30:11 - What business pain does improv training address?

0:33:42 - Improv and cybersecurity crisis management

0:36:23 - The show must go on: mistakes, blame and Miles Davis

0:39:21 - Two pizza teams and the optimal team size

0:46:22 - Has anything changed in 27 years? AI and the human element

0:48:55 - Silos, shadowing and equifinality

0:53:05 - Improv or Best Practice? The cardiologists story

 

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Thanks for listening.

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