035: Bruce & Gail Montgomery - Innovating with improv and brain disruption
Gail Montgomery is CEO and Co-Founder of ExperienceYes, an innovation company that utilizes the core methodologies of improv to help companies get to solutions faster, help leaders and teams to work more efficiently and effectively, develop a foundation for a strong culture, and increased emotional intelligence.
Gail has worked with the oil and gas sector extensively in the areas of leadership development, optimization, team performance, culture and innovation. Her unique approach to company challenges has increased team performance, led to improved communication between leaders and teams and eliminated silos between functional areas.
Most recently, she built a Change Management practice and client offering for an HCM software company. She managed all facets of change management for customer implementations and customer success, including building the change management approach and organization from the ground up.
She is passionate about partnering with companies in their ongoing efforts to align their culture with their mission, vision and values and strives to maintain a sense of fun, innovation and buy-in with employees in all industries.
Bruce Montgomery, Co-Founder and President of ExperienceYes, has broad business leadership experience, ranging from leading the IT organization for one of the country’s largest non-profit theatre, to driving value through strong relationships as the leader of Key Accounts for a sports and entertainment analytics company (delighting top-tier clients such as: NHL, NFL, NASCAR, and The Shubert Organization).
Prior experience includes over 15 years in IT and Management consulting, where he focused on driving adoption through structured change management and training & development.
Bruce is passionate about business-driven creativity and innovation, focusing on driving adoption through experiential and immersive engagements. He places great importance on partnering with organizations to help develop healthy cultures that lead to measurable success.
He is involved with world-renowned researchers such as Charles Limb to better understand the inner workings of the brain while performing creative acts, and Ellen Langer to determine the best methods for increasing productivity through creativity. Much of these approaches are documented in the book he co-wrote with Gail – Brain Disruption, Radical Innovation in Business through Improv.
WIN A COPY OF THE IMPROV MINDSET
LINKS
The Improv Mindset: Change Your Brain. Change Your Business
by Bruce & Gail Montgomery (*affiliate link)
Brain Disruption: Radical Innovation in Business through Improv
by Bruce & Gail Montgomery (*affiliate link)
TRANSCRIPTION:
Gail Montgomery: 00:00:00 While they were basically playing what was on the written page. So doing something kind of by wrote, their executive judge was totally engaged and absolutely running everything. And then when they took that away and they started improvising, they saw this temporary suppression of your executive judge, which is the thing that gets in our way, right? It's like it's, it's what we need to stay alive. And it's also the thing that says, Oh, that's, that's too risky. That'll never work. We've tried that before. That's dangerous or it's stupid. It's your executive judge and it's just the one thing I believe that you can figure out how to kind of temporarily suppressed so that you can access really great ideas. You can problem solve, you can build high performing teams, all of that. Gabe Ratliff: 00:00:50 You're listening to The Artful Entrepreneur podcast, a show about living an inspired life filled with vitality, creativity, and fulfillment. My name is Gabe Ratliff, and I'll be your host as I interview fellow creative entrepreneurs from around the globe to hear their stories and learn more about their work so that you can tap into your creative purpose and live a life that's drawn, not traced on the show. We talk about things like the creative process, personal development, community equity and contribution as well as the lessons learned along the way. All right, let's get to it.
Gabe Ratliff: 00:01:32 Hey, Artfuls! How's it going out there? Check it. I am recording this from Playa La Mision, in Baja California, Mexico. I am staring at the ocean right now and I am so excited. I am so, so excited. Yes. So here we are. We have, we have initiated our trip. Tiff and I are here down in Baja before we head to LAX to fly to Phuket and begin our travels abroad. And I am recording this intro from our place here in Baja. So very excited to be in your ears. I hope you're doing well. I hope you are drawing your life and not tracing it. And without further ado, I would love to share with you two amazingly amazingly phenomenal people that I'm going to be introducing you to today. Bruce and Gail Montgomery. Gail and Bruce are hysterical. They are so much fun. They are doing some amazing work and Bruce and I used to actually work together many years ago at the Denver center, which is a theater company in Denver and we met hit it off and stayed touch and I'm so excited to have seen him leave the corporate world along with his wife and start their own company experience.
Gabe Ratliff: 00:03:08 Yes. And we are going to talk about the work that they're doing at experience. Yes. On this episode. So let me tell you a little bit about them and we'll jump right in because we have a lot of awesome content for for you to hear and for them to share about their company and the work that they're doing. Gail is CEO and co founder of their company experience. Yes. Which is an innovation company that utilizes the core methodologies of improv to help companies get to solutions faster, help leaders and teams to work more efficiently and effectively develop a foundation for a strong culture and increased emotional intelligence. She is passionate about partnering with companies and their ongoing efforts to align their culture with their mission, vision, and values, and strives to maintain a sense of fun, innovation, and buy-in with employees in all industries. Now, Bruce is also co founder and president of experience. Gabe Ratliff: 00:04:07 Yes, and has a broad business leadership experience ranging from leading the it organization for one of the country's largest nonprofit theaters to driving value through strong relationships as the leader of key accounts for a sports and entertainment analytics company, delighting top tier clients such as NHL, NFL, NASCAR, and the Shubert organization. Bruce is passionate about business driven creativity and innovation, focusing on driving at adoption through experiential and immersive engagements. He places great importance on partnering with organizations to help develop healthy cultures that lead to measurable success. He's involved with world renowned researchers such as Charles Limb, to better understand the inner workings of the brain while performing creative acts and Ellen Langer to determine the best methods for increasing productivity through their creativity. Much of these approaches are documented in the book he co-wrote with Gail brain disruption, radical innovation in business through improv, which interestingly enough, they are releasing as of this episode a new book called The Improv Mindset, which is essentially the two dot Oh version of their original book brain disruption. And I am actually at Liberty to offer a signed book to one of you lovely listeners out there. So I'm going to be doing a giveaway, which you can go to the artful.co/improv that is the artful.co/i M P R O. V. and that'll take you to the web link for being able to submit your entries for the free signed copy of The Improv Mindset. I'm very excited to offer this up to you guys and I hope you are looking forward to it as much as I am. So let's get to it. Gabe Ratliff: 00:06:20 Bruce Gail. Oh my gosh. It is so great to have you here. Thank you so much for being on the show. Bruce Montgomer: 00:06:25 Our pleasure. So much, Gabe. We're excited. Gabe Ratliff: 00:06:29 It has been a minute since we've known each other. I remember we met back at Denver Center that was like about nine or 10 years ago and how far we've come in our arc. Gail Montgomery: 00:06:41 And how many gray hairs Bruce right now has. Bruce Montgomer: 00:06:45 I'm still wearing the same pair of underwear. It hasn't changed. Gail Montgomery: 00:06:49 Right on. Right no. Gabe Ratliff: 00:06:50 Same underwear. Did you turn it inside out? Bruce Montgomer: 00:06:53 Yeah, that's what you have to do. It's microfiber. So it's really comfortable. Gail Montgomery: 00:06:56 Microbial antimicrobial antimicrobials. We don't like the microbes. Gabe Ratliff: 00:07:03 Why can't we just be antimicrobial? Why is it gotta to be our clothes? Bruce Montgomer: 00:07:07 Yeah, right. Gail Montgomery: 00:07:08 I don't know. Gabe Ratliff: 00:07:10 Where's the best place to start your story? Like where do we begin? Bruce Montgomer: 00:07:15 Oh my goodness. I don't know. Probably back to where where we met and, and kind of move forward from there. So we, we met in 1990 1990. I'm looking at him waiting for him to come up with that date on his own. Yeah, it's a little bit of a test. And he passed. So yeah, 29 years, almost, almost 30 years. And I also was good at math. Yes. I was a chorus boy and Gail was a lead in a show. She, she played a Pauline in sweet charity and I was a chorus boy. He pulled that out and couldn't stand her, could not stand her. Full disclosure. All right, well, full disclosure, I didn't really like you either. So there's that super pompous private school boy. Yeah. Yeah. And then she was just obnoxious. She, she really, she has a beautiful, stunningly beautiful voice. Bruce Montgomer: 00:08:11 And at that point she knew it. So it was a, it was tough and I mean I was confident you were confident. More confidence. And so yeah, we, we all went out to a group bowling night at what is now Meow Wolf because Meow Wolf was first built. We went to school in Santa Fe at college of Santa Fe and Meow Wolf is built in a bowling alley and we were at that bowling alley. And suddenly that looked a lot more interesting than it was. It had a few minutes earlier. Gail Montgomery: 00:08:44 He said that I think he met me and I was wearing my big, high waisted Jean and it was the early nineties. My glasses, I'm pretty sure they were acid washed jeans and I'm pretty sure I had him pegged up. I think I did with my bowling. Yeah, Bruce Montgomer: 00:08:59 Yeah. Oh yeah. So so yeah. And then, and then we, we very quickly became what was voted as the most obnoxious couple. Gail Montgomery: 00:09:08 Yeah. That's a real award. We got few years running at the college Bruce Montgomer: 00:09:13 And and then moved to New York city to be actors, Gail Montgomery: 00:09:17 Which was crazy. I'd never even been to New York city. We packed like a trunk and a suitcase and went with like a cup, few thousand dollars. Very little. And tried to be actors. No, we didn't try to be, we were, Oh yeah. Well we were, we made a living. There were some living there. We joined the union and did our schpeel and ended up actually performing together, which was very unusual. We got cast in a children's national tour of a children's show. And that was fun. Bruce Montgomer: 00:09:47 Yeah. We were three months in, so, so kind of the periods over our lives of us working together, started with us in a, in a musical together and then just continued as we did shows together and you know, continues now, which is crazy. Gail Montgomery: 00:10:01 Yeah. Super fun. And then, yeah, we were there until we had our first baby. And moved from New York to Colorado just to be closer to family. It's kind of tough having kids without family around. Bruce Montgomer: 00:10:16 Can we add a 330 square foot apartment in a brand new baby and babies have a lot of things, it turns out so. Oh man. So yeah, we lived in a tiny house. We don't, we don't really need to do the tiny home experience anymore cause we did it for seven and a half years and and then, yeah. Gail Montgomery: 00:10:34 Yeah. And then I think we both also had kind of weird corporate experiences alongside our acting in New York because as actors you kind of have to temp or supplement your income cause you're not, you know, you might make three months of decent money and then you're out of work. And so I migrated into working at a company called AIG on wall street. And their corporate HR group kind of got lured into taking the full time job with the benefits, you know, and Bruce kinda ended up in it, which I don't know why I said that. Like it's surprising cause it was surprising to me. It, yeah. Yeah. We get Bruce Montgomer: 00:11:16 The worst rap, you know, and, and you know, a self described nerd full-on. It seemed to fit my brain very well. And so I ended up doing a lot of it work and then we ended up in, I ended up in management consulting and then was at the Denver center with you, gay bleeding, the it organization and then worked for data and analytics, a data and analytics company that focused on sports and entertainment. So NASCAR and NFL on NHL were where some of the clients, so that was interesting. Super sexy. And then, and then started experience. Yes. Right then then and then realized we had something special. Let's, let's go do it again. That was kind of your brain chat, was it? Okay. I was wondering where the inception was. Was begun? Yeah. Who incepted whom. Yes. I have incepted a lot. Bruce Montgomer: 00:12:10 Is there a disclaimer to say now? Because is it PG 13 hold that into the whole thing. Yeah, so, so if you say about their experience. Yes. Was born out of, I got my MBA at the university of Denver and one of the things I was there while I was at the TCPA and one of the things was an entrepreneurs class that I was taking and they kept asking, what do you do well, what do you like to do? Can you turn that into a business? And at this point, Gail and I had been doing improv for eight or nine years. And you know, I, I had very, very quickly keyed into why improv was important to me and, and how it made me feel when I did it. And I, you know, it's one of the few things that I can do and Gail maybe you agree with this, is that it's, I don't think about anything else. I'm kind of, it's a very in the moment kind of present experience. And so I, I loved the concept of is there a way that I can take improv and apply that in a corporate context in a way that is measurable and not kind of fluffy. I'd always had problems in the corporate world of like, Hey, let's do a communications class. And then it just was kind of touchy feely and not that part for me. I wanted some more data behind it just to make sure. Gail Montgomery: 00:13:33 Well, and on top of that, I think we have absolutely seen and are passionate about the fact that if you do a one off, if you have a group that comes in and is like, Oh, here's how to be a great leader, and then there's no practical application after that except a little handbook or an occasional, you know, water cooler conversation, you're not going to change behavior. And so yeah. So it was important to us to kind of figure out how to, how to set a foundation of kind of applied improv methodology. Sure. Well, Bruce Montgomer: 00:14:08 So, so did some research, found some, some neuroscience that, that really spoke to what's happening, you know, kind of up to date what's happening in the brain when you, when you improvise and went, okay, so if this is what's happening in the brain, when you improvise, then this can be applied to change behavior directly in corporations. And so then started to experience, yes, I'm been kind of pounding the pavement ever since. Take me through. So you're your actors, and I know that's a part of acting, but where did the actual specific focus around improv start to come into the picture? Gail Montgomery: 00:14:40 Well, I think for, you know, what Bruce just mentioned a little earlier was this study that kind of got him really excited about the potential for putting hard results behind how to improv in increasing soft skills. Right? So there was a study that had been done by a man named Dr. Charles Limb,L I M B. And he at the time was at Johns Hopkins and he's an,uan audiologist by trade and really passionate about musical improv and music in general. Any did a study with these musicians where he put them in an FMR RI, which is the kind of MRI where you can see color, right? And where's the activity happening in the brain? And he took these,umusicians, put them in the FMR, I gave them music. And so it was like, just do this, look at this play music. And then took away the music and said, now improv. Gail Montgomery: 00:15:35 And what he discovered was that while they were basically playing what was on the written page, so doing something kind of by wrote, their executive judge was totally engaged and absolutely running everything. And then when they took that away and they started improvising, they saw this temporary suppression of your executive judge, which is the thing that gets in our way, right? It's like it's, it's what we need to stay alive. And it's also the thing that says, Oh that's, that's too risky. That'll never work. We've tried that before. That's dangerous. Or it's stupid. It's your executive judge. And it's just the one thing I believe that you can figure out how to kind of temporarily suppressed so that you can access really great ideas. You can problem solve, you can build high performing teams, all of that. So that it started with that. Yeah. And then and then we wrote a book right away cause we were really passionate about that and trying to connect improv to that. Gail Montgomery: 00:16:36 Realizing that comedic improv. Yeah. Like how you and Bruce kind of made a leap. He's like, look, I think even though there's no data to back this up, that comedic improvisation is the same. I bet it's the same. So we write this book together and just to say that we wrote a book and we're still married now, this is big. If anybody that's listening has ever tried to install a toilet in their home, or maybe even a sink Ikea boxes or there might be extra pieces at the end, it's, it's no bueno. It's not good. It's really tough. Yeah. Bruce Montgomer: 00:17:22 Yeah. So, so fast forward then to 2018 so we were actually able to get in contact with Charles Charles limb, the doctor who did that first study. And we were, Gail and I were actually looking to fund a study around comedic improvisors because we, we, I, I was so certain that the exact same thing happened. And if we could prove that, then what we could begin to do is really analyze how that can then impact teams and, and, you know, large organizations and culture. And so we flew to to San Francisco last year and had our brain stuff. Yes. So, yes, he's, he's moved and and we just actually recently saw some proof copies of something going into the journal of creativity that it appears that the assumption that we made of what happens in the brain with comedic improvise improvisers actually happens that all part of your brain that gets in the way, that that is challenging and always assessing risk can get suppressed while the rest of the part of the brain could light up and access those new ideas that we're so excited Gail Montgomery: 00:18:31 And to connect it. Kind of back to your question about how did we then pull that into develop content that we would deliver. It's basically thinking about a shared language and teaching a shared language that everyone knows. And so it's coming from a place of an improv mindset. And if that, then it doesn't matter who you throw together as a team to solve a problem or to learn something new or to, to, to be efficient and process all of that. If everyone's using the same language like yes, and listen with intent to serve, support your teammates at all costs and trust your instincts, then it reduces that form storm norm perform continuum and suddenly they can get to high performing team or efficiency much faster. And so we would just deliver sessions that would kind of teach folks those rules and engage them in experiential sessions and then laugh a whole bunch, laugh a ton. Fun comes first. That's our number one value. Gabe Ratliff: 00:19:32 Yup. Yeah. I love that. And I was watching your video. I've actually watched it several times on your website, seeing you in action. And I just, as I said at the top of the show before we even started, you guys are just adorable and I just love seeing that themes, you know, I just love seeing the way that you work together. I feel blessed to have a similar kind of young, young type of relationship with my wife. You know, where she's just like this. She just has like all a lot of these things that I don't, and then similarly, I have a lot of these other things that she doesn't, and there's just so many different things like travel and what not that we, it's like a connective tissue for us that we just love together. But there's so many other great assets that we each have that we can really bring to each other to, to, to kind of balance each other out. And instead of being this sort of like one dominating over the other or we're, we're too similar, you know? And I've just, I've found that just beautiful about you guys is that you have a similar kind of give and take to your relationship and how I can you, when you see you at work, how there's this like similar kind of like interaction with you. Gail Montgomery: 00:20:40 Ah, thanks. Do we have to pay you for that? Right? Seriously? What that cost us? Seriously. Derby. It's Bruce Montgomer: 00:20:48 Free. I'll take a copy of your book. Yeah. Well we, and we do have a new version of that coffee coming out in January. Rebranding it as The Improv Mindset with a bunch of new data and a bunch of new new exercises and case studies have kind of proven it out. So so that'll be, I will happily send you a copy of that, although it might be challenging for you to receive it since you'll be in Asia. Gabe Ratliff: 00:21:15 Yeah, no, that would be great. I, I, cause I was reading about it and I was, I was, I mean this stuff is fascinating to me. I just had an episode that came out today that is lead with Lisa Foster and she's a leadership and team development coach similarly, and she focuses around the Enneagram, Myers Briggs and Clifton strengths. And I've done all of those. I'm really big into assessment. So I'm similarly fascinated with this data, right. Like this information about ourselves and the, the, I wanted to, I want to come back to this. You spoke about the executive judge there a little bit and I, I definitely want to circle back to that. Cause as a, I'm a drummer and I, you know, I've had those moments of improv when I'm jamming with my band and I mean we've played together for years and we would have these moments of bliss right, where you're just... But then there would be this moment where I could Gabe Ratliff: 00:22:18 Feel the switch kick on of what you're calling the executive judge and I would all of a sudden like be in my body and you know, I would maybe mess something up that I hadn't, you know, cause my head got in the way of being in the, you know, the zone as they call it and the flow state. Exactly. And I have specifically felt that experience and as I feel it drift away and I feel the executive judge creep over my shoulder, I'm just like mother fucker, you know. So the work that you're doing around this brain disruption is like absolutely fascinating to me around how you can get tapped into that creativity and innovation in this way that you're supporting people with. So I'm, I'm really excited to keep unpacking this and learn more about it. Cause I just, I, I love what you're doing and I love the, the cascading effect this can have, right. Cause this is, this is something that can affect people outside of their business and their team, right? This is like life and this is life impacting about how we show up with each other and how we can engage with each other. So it's, I'm just like, let's do this. Bruce Montgomer: 00:23:33 Yeah. It's a cash to Pash egg. Yes. And life. Right? Like just kind of being able to take the risk and go with it. Yeah. The, the, the point that we really stress is around the practice. This, right? So one, I can't necessarily teach you Gabe, how to be a world-class musician that then has all of these understanding and you know, all those understanding of the framework of music, how it fits together and how keys fit together and then, and then provide a space for you to improvise in a way that allows you to use that part of your brain that you can do it. That being said, I can pretty quickly teach you how to improvise from a comedic standpoint and show those same results without, without needing years and years of experience. There was a study done at MIT where they looked at the value of idea creation and what they did was they just put a a group of people together and they said, okay, generate ideas and, and let's see what happens if we have a control group versus a group of people who take an improv class over time, over six to 12 weeks and see how IgE idea generation comes up and what they found. Bruce Montgomer: 00:24:42 They found two very interesting things. One was that the people who generated more ideas naturally were more likely to have a good idea. So so kind of the novel aspect of it. This one will work, this is more interesting. This is the one that people can, can grab onto and it's sticky. The second thing they found is that the people who took improv over time, the six to 12 weeks, we're able to raise their production of ideas and then more likely to be in that case of we're the ones who are who have good ideas, who have good ideas that work and are more likely to be more successful ideas. Gail Montgomery: 00:25:20 No. People laugh at us when we say that, Oh, we're heading to go to rehearsal for improv. Yeah. Cause they're like yeah, I thought that. And, and basically we have to tell them that what we're rehearsing and what we're doing is really practicing the rules because the rules are the same no matter what. It's the content you get from, you know, the, the gift from the audience of hairdryer or whatever. Wherever the story goes that we don't have any idea about. However, what we know is how to continually engage those rules in the way that we deal with one another and have each other's back all the time and step in and support. And that's, that takes it takes no time to learn. And the more you do it and practice it, the more it becomes just part of the mindset. And like you said, the way you show up. Right, right. So you're already ready. I mean, we've had situations even more, we've gotten into sessions and we were expecting a room that was so big with a projector and all these things that we needed and space to break out and do activities. And it's like, okay, well we're in a conference room and you have, and we'll look at each other and say, yeah, Sandy, okay, here we go. We're an improv company. Let's make it happen. We got to do it. If we, if we teach it, we got to do it. So, Bruce Montgomer: 00:26:36 But the cool thing about that framework, you know, with the, with the four rules, yes. And listen with intent to serve, support your teammates at all costs, trust her instincts. With those four rules, I can go to any improv troop around the world and step in and begin to play. And, and we often get, you know, we often get questions like, well how do you trust people? You know, how, how do you practice trusting people? And our answer is you trust them. You just do it. You just have to, there's not a lot other than just to do it. And by putting people into these, into these situations where they have to do something a little crazy, that's a lot. That's very funny. That's very fun. Gives them that level of trust to be able to try some new things and get going. Oh my gosh. Bruce Montgomer: 00:27:25 And there's nothing like failing in front of each other to break down barriers and gain instant trust and, and even respect, strangely, you have people who are willing to fall and then get back up. There's a there's another, I'm big on studies, right? I've been, both Gail and I have been reading a lot, especially as we're getting ready for this new part of the book. There was a study done with elite elite figure skaters. And what they did was took the figure skaters, they, these are people who complete compete on the world stage in Canada. And basically what they did was put the 10 of them through a series of improv classes and measured their performance over that time. And 77% of them, or seven of them saw an increase of of their overall performance. So you're talking about, you know, decimals. Yeah, everything's measured in these tiny fractions, right. And yet they're able to greatly, I should say, increase their, their overall performance with, with some very real tools because they're getting, they're more likely to enter that flow state and be able to, to perform in a way that's more impressive. So Gabe Ratliff: 00:28:39 Yeah, I wanted to ask you about the, the brain disruption itself and this executive judge. And I was wondering if you could go a little bit deeper about like how you get into that space as you're working with these new teams and you get into a place like that where you've got a conference room instead of a larger room with a projector and break out sections and things like that. Like, what does that like in the actual day to day of it? Bruce Montgomer: 00:29:08 So I'll take the first part of it and then I'll turn it over to you sweetheart. So, so what, you know what's fascinating to me, Gabe, is how many people are wired and the not wired to do this kind of work. So for example, we've done a lot of work with, you know, one of the, one of the toughest crowds that we had was a room full of psychiatrists. We have 30 psychiatrists in a room. And typically, you know, one of the common things that we'll be engaged with is they'll want to work on some kind of problem. Okay, okay. So bring this people, these people in a, in that case it was a communication problem. They felt there was a challenge between the staff and this and the psychiatrist themselves. Okay, great. So we're going to walk you through some practices on, on how to do that. Bruce Montgomer: 00:29:49 But we start with really everything that we start with starts with the brain as a system. And that system can be changed. And we talk about the data behind the brain. And, you know, you could just see the arms crossed and you know, the misery people, people sometimes when they hear improv that you could just see them pucker, they're like, Oh, please don't make me do that. I don't want to do that. So for me, and, and you know, when we were kind of designing this together, it was, it was really important to kind of set the ground rules of there's real data here. Let's, let's look at the data and then we'll build on getting you comfortable with this. Gail Montgomery: 00:30:29 Yeah. So remind me what the second part of the question was. It was around the, the, the concept of the executive judge and the, the getting into the, the, the core work around the brain disruption itself. And, and when you're working with these teams that you go into, you, you, I'm trying not to give away my next question. So just like, I'm trying to get a sense for like what this, the actual work is like when, yeah, yeah. Right on. Okay. So so basically it is that we, we have to get into improv with folks. So, yeah, we start with, here's all this awesome data behind the brain and why this matters and why an improv mindset is, is so imperative to successful teaming and to healthy cultures and to problem solving and all of that. And then we seriously get people up on their feet and we do a group activities. Gail Montgomery: 00:31:26 We do team-based activities against each other. There, we call them games. We tried to, when we first started out, we, I think we were really shy about talking about games and using the word improv. And I think, you know, now, because of all the data we know and because of the success that we've had with different teams, we're not afraid anymore to say what it is. It's games. And we have to get people out of their own way. And the way to do that is to, you know, just trapped them by putting them in a bit of ambiguity and getting them to kind of be forced into free form improv games where they're thinking of different things that go in a kitchen or where they're building a tall tower together and they have no idea what the tools are, how they're going to make it happen, or they're time boxed into something. Gail Montgomery: 00:32:18 And so they have to be incredibly creative with the time that they have. So, you know, we're forcing them to make decisions faster than they normally would, which absolutely includes this ability to collaborate and improv together because no one person can do it. And typically then, you know, we're, what we see is we might then turn their focus towards something specific that they were coming together to do. So for instance, you know, we got to fix this process. It's a bad process. And so we might spend an hour, an hour and a half on that process. Again, brainstorming, using some of the tools of improv to get there. We've already kind of primed them though, if you will. Like, you know, we've, we've gotten them all looped up and so then when we go work on the real business of what we're solving, then, you know, they're, they're, they're over time. What we see is if we stay in that place, especially if we allow them to sit or anything like that there, that judge is going to creep right back in and shut stuff out. So we intersperse a day or even a session with multiple disruptive activities to keep kind of getting them out of their own way and getting them in that space of really great problem solving and collaboration. Bruce Montgomer: 00:33:40 The thing I'd say too is, you know, the, the part of the brain that gets disrupted is the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex. So it's that, that's the part of your brain. And I know that's super sexy. I don't mean to brag wouldn't damn big brain and it doesn't it doesn't really form fully in women until the ages of between 22 and 24 and typically men somewhere between 24 and 26. So we've never, yeah, sometimes it's, it's a little slow. We've got teenagers and like there are things that they have done that were like, Jack, you're, you're in college and you're, you're going to get a cat like that. There's no, which means we're going to get a cat. That's what that means. So far he's done a very good job taking care of it. So for the record and, and we kill him, right? Because we have a deal PFC that basically engage us and keeps us from doing that. And we know his isn't fully developed so we can forgive him. That's right. That's right. Only thing keeping them alive. Truly. That's it. That's the one lesson we learned. Bruce Montgomer: 00:34:51 So putting people in the, into this space, you know, there's, there's a couple of byproducts that happened with improv. One, you know, this, this implicit trust of, you know, if, if Gail walks out and says, you know, I'm a Starbucks cup, I can't say, no, you're from Pete's coffee. Right? I have to be there to support her and say, yeah, and you know, you're gonna win the barista championship or you know, whatever, whatever it is, I've got to be there to kind of build and collaborate with her together. The byproduct is though that we laugh a whole bunch because there will be points where we fail and that that failure is not, is not something that that ends companies. It's funny, we can embrace it and then we can move on. And there, honestly, in all my business experience, all my life experience, I've never found an easier way to find a way to practice, fail, failing and failing fast and failing forward. Okay, that idea is gone, we're moving onto the next one. And you just, you just keep it going. And, and businesses don't have good ways to be able to practice that. Gail Montgomery: 00:35:55 No. And one of the things I think that we get really frustrated by is that when you think of a really great agile teams, like an improv team to me is the most agile I think of sports teams because you know they can practice and they can plan out all these plays and when they get on the field or the ice or the court, whatever, the percentage of execution is really low. So they're constantly having to come up with the next idea, anticipate movement, you know, watch each other and what do they do? They go into the locker room, they watch footage and they're not watching their success. They're watching their failure and they're pulling it apart and nobody's, you know, crying and on the floor in a big puddle right there embracing that, I mean it may SOC to be called out. They're looking at it, they're talking about how, what went wrong, how can they fix it? Gail Montgomery: 00:36:45 And then they practice, practice, practice. They create that space to do it. And in business, there just isn't that mechanism in place or that even that approach or perspective that it's needed, that you're just like, Oh, you're a warm body, let's form a team, go fix this thing and good luck. You know, and if you, if you don't already have a foundation of shared language and trust and that, that collaborative ability and the ability to be agile in the way that you tackle these roadblocks as they come up, because there will be some, then you're going to take longer than another team Bruce Montgomer: 00:37:22 Or you're going to struggle and you're going to get so mired in failure that you're, that you will stop. Right. It'll just stop and yeah. That's good. Yeah, that was really good. Thanks. Yeah. Gail Montgomery: 00:37:34 Yay. Gabe Ratliff: 00:37:36 I actually read your article on your website and your blog about the team mindset. You know, and I was reading that the meme you had of Michael Jordan, you know, and he wasn't talking through how many failures. I've actually read that before and I was like, God, love it. Cause I was huge fan and I love that that conversation is being had and I feel like that it wasn't really being had before. You know, like in pre, in previous generations around business, they weren't having this conversation around agility and shared language. And I mean, gosh, even equity, I mean equities. I've got several episodes that I've had with women doing work in equity in the workplace, like in tech and things like that. And, and all kinds of areas where it's necessary Hollywood, right? I mean it's another big after me too, and time's up. Gabe Ratliff: 00:38:36 That was another big conversation that came out of that. And I really feel like that conversation is just so great to have around failure because so many people are, have that fear constantly. And it's just like in, you might have a different name for it, right. But it's one of the things I was just speaking about this to one of my coaches today, we talked about failing forward. And even yesterday I had a discovery call with someone and we were talking about fear of success as well, you know, and like how that's also a problem and how that can also get in the way. You know, being afraid of, I, I had this same problem myself where I had to switch gears and look at different people like say sir Richard Branson. He's one of my favorite examples of somebody who has or say I'm bill Gates with hand Melinda with their foundation and the work that, that they, and so Richard Branson aren't doing where they're, they've done well but they're doing something with it for the benefit of people, the planet, what have you, and that used to be, I really recognize a while ago that that was a fear of mine too, of like I was this fear of like getting too big to fail or to getting too big and failing. Gabe Ratliff: 00:39:59 And that doing well meant that you were going to lose something, right? Like your company getting bigger and you know, starting to do well you could just as much out of the feeler failure but out of also the fear of success can hold yourself back. And so I think having these conversations are just so pivotal, right? Because it allows you to get into this space where you're not cutting yourself off with this executive judge and you're letting each other be able to just share in these experiences, develop that shared language and get to a place of equity where you can, you know, be able to tackle these things that are for the greater good of you know, your team or the business or what have you. One of the things I was curious about is say like new businesses or, cause you know, this show is for is, is just as much to showcase you as it is for people who are in these spaces. Gabe Ratliff: 00:40:51 Right. And I was wondering about say like new business owners, new entrepreneurs, people that are just stepping into these leadership roles. How can they, how can they start to look at this kind of thinking and when they're, their fears are going to be S you know, they don't even make the baby. They don't even have a team yet. Right. Maybe they're really small. Do you have any advice for people like that or any things that you can maybe share as far as like exercises or things that for them to think about if they're in that space and they're like a more of a like solo preneur who wants to shift gears and get into a team? Bruce Montgomer: 00:41:24 Yeah, the first one that comes to mind is just practicing. Yes. And right. This, this concept, it is really the core of so much of improv and it is that process of um accepting the gift of what is given to you and then building upon that together collaboratively. And that can be as simple as you know, understanding and trusting your instincts that when an opportunity is there in front of you, that it's worthwhile to explore that opportunity with a, with a yes and approach rather than a, well, what if there's a risk that I lose my job? Or what if I, you know, might not be able to handle this team? Gail Montgomery: 00:42:01 Yeah. Think about blockbuster. And when Netflix came to them and they just, they pooed all over that, right. And it was like if they just, if the, if the CEO had just said, yes, this is really interesting and I don't know how this is going to work. Let's talk some more, you know, addressing the fact that it's interesting and the, and really is, you know, we need to dig deeper. I'm curious, I don't have all the answers versus the [inaudible], but I don't know. I don't know what it would look like. And so therefore it's gotta be, you know. Yeah. That sounds great. But no way. And I think, you know, to Bruce's point there's a couple things that I want to say. One is he's absolutely right saying yes, and can you get that recorded? Can you show me a sound bite? No, it's already a ringtone. Gail Montgomery: 00:42:47 Boom. Get over it. Being able, being able to say yes to things doesn't mean you're saying yes. In business and because we have a lot of clients that say that to us. So if, if you're a solopreneur and you're out there, you know, you're, you have to be agile, you have no choice, you don't have other people to rely on to, to help you through things. And oftentimes you don't even have the skills that you need. So you're going to have to be scrappy and figure it out and to do that, you, you, the yes piece is more, Ooh, I see what this is and the, and is, and here's how I'm going to, you know, approach it or it's coming from that common place of agreement and moving forward. Not always saying, sure. Right? Some things you can't say yes to. So it's more what we hear and how that, how that hits our ear or how that opens up opportunities for us. Bruce Montgomer: 00:43:45 Yeah. Things that you know, things that are illegal that say no to that right? Things that are going to put you in an unsafe place that say no to that. But I, you know, I think of, especially from a solopreneurs standpoint, you know, Hey, I realized that there is a gap for me here. You know, maybe I should go ahead and, and, and take a look at some coaching as an example. Or it's that it's that kind of thing. One of the things that I would challenge folks to do is to count the number of times that you say no in a day. Gail gave a good example. We say no one will a lot of different ways, right? We say yes, but, or we say however, or you know, if you're my kids you would say that maybe means no, no matter what, which I think is a song. Bruce Montgomer: 00:44:28 But it really is one of those things where we, we say it, we don't really realize we're saying it. And if you, if you begin to identify the times that in your day where you say, no, really analyze why you're saying no. Is that, is that something that your executive judge, because look, let's be honest, the executive judge is wired to say no, it is what keeps us alive. It does a very good job of that. But it also keeps us away from a whole bunch of really interesting things. And so if you can begin to really look and analyze how many times do you do it today and then begin to reduce that number over the course of a week or two weeks or three weeks or a month and really practice saying yes in this way of yes and, and then maneuvering you will have a very, very big shift in the way that you're showing up in the way that you're, you're doing things and getting things Gail Montgomery: 00:45:21 And actually in the way others show up with you, there's great data to support that. And when people hear no, and that comes of course in many ways, as Bruce mentioned, it takes a lot of time for them to get back to efficiency. A 60% plus time, you no longer when they hear no, so great report Bruce, but on page 23 you dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, you know? Yeah. It's you. You just, you kinda, it just tanks, the whole energy, the flow of the conversation, the ability to feel like you, you are connected and trusting each other. Bruce Montgomer: 00:45:56 I mean if you just go look at it strictly in a productivity standpoint, just from that number alone, you will see a lot more production by people hearing yes. Than hearing no. Gabe Ratliff: 00:46:08 I've heard this also when it comes from a sales standpoint too, right? Like if you're, if you get people in the habit of saying yes when you're talking to them, right, then it gets the, it's there. It's harder for them to want to switch gears to know, right. It's, it works the same way when you're trying to get people to have buy-in. What you're talking about. Which leads me to my next question around this isn't a really unique product and service that you're offering, right? Like this, you're, you've, you've written a book and you've pulled all this information together from something that was incepted by Bruce. I'm like, Leo, Leo DiCaprio, you are a handsome devil. But I was, I was wondering about, you know, as you started to roll this thing out, having such a unique offering, like what was the, what was the response to it? Because you're also able to utilize your tools that you've developed through all your years in improv and what you're developing with all this data. What was that like? Like getting into this space juxtaposed by like what it is now since you've kinda gotten it out there and people can see what it's like and get, they can read about people's results and they can read your case studies and hear about this. What is, what was that like and, and, and the, how does that show up? Bruce Montgomer: 00:47:31 Yeah, I would say that the leap that we had to take was, it was definitely a leap of faith. And, and this was the advantage, you know, we talked a little bit about, you know, when you're taking a look at yourself and you decide that you need, there's a gap and you need to go do something, you know, can you, and mine was to go to grad school. What happened was I pitched this for five months in, in front of a very warm audience of 39 people who heard about experience. Yes. And what we were trying to do because they were all a part of developing these, these new ideas as part of our, our MBA cohort. So as a result, our first client was Devita because we had somebody in class who was at DaVita in a leadership position and said, I really like what you're talking about. Can you come in and bring it to our marketing team? And we said, yes. Oh, shit. Gail Montgomery: 00:48:23 Yeah. I mean, I don't even think we had content at that point. And it was, and let me tell you this entire I guess journey for us has been improv. It's been like, let's can do this. You know, because we knew we had something and I, I don't know how many times it's happened that Bruce has turned to me. We've either been, you know, somebody just said yes to something and we're going to come in and do something for them or we read some article that further to us justifies kind of what we're doing and that we're doing the right thing. And he'll look at me and he'll say, we have something we don't mind to something. And we have felt that way. Like we're just on the top of the wave for, for five years, four or five years. And, and we're right and we know we're right because what we're starting to see now is repeat business and partnerships with companies who are seeing results. Gail Montgomery: 00:49:14 And then we have to do a lot less selling, if you will. And we're just serving them. We're out there to serve our clients, to solve problems, to help them be better, do better, make more money. Cause that's kind of a thing you have to do. And and it's been, I think really cool to see that shift. So every time we've developed new content or we say, you know what, we can do that. Let's do that. Let's talk about what that looks like. And then we sit down and we improv and we'd brainstorm and, and we develop and talk it through and let it bake a bit. And then some, sometimes it's our first time doing it out there. We won't say when it was for certain clients. And, and it works, but you know, at some point you have to do it the first time. Bruce Montgomer: 00:49:59 Even even as recently as you know, this week we had new content was that we were trying out and we did a lot of, okay, yeah, well we'll figure it out when we're up there. Right. We'll work in our own ambiguity. And we have the trust of working together for as long as we have. And just really, you know, I'm, I'm very a very fortunate human in that my wife is exceptionally funny and we get to laugh a lot. So even it goes just horribly awry. We can still be laughing and going, you know what, I'm still having a good time. So as long as we're having a good time and, and we're ups, you know, onstage doing the work that we do and, and speaking in the way that we do and laughing in the way that we do, then we're going to be successful. And, and that's what we kind of can, I have to keep reminding ourselves as we get these opportunities. Like, Oh, you want us to to speak. And we had one, one person call us and say, can you do our our keynote speech? And we said, sure, of course we can. No problem. How many people is that? 800 people. Gail Montgomery: 00:51:03 Sure, sure. We can do that. Gabe Ratliff: 00:51:05 Is it that photo that you have on the website. Gail Montgomery: 00:51:09 It might be, yeah. Yeah. And I'll tell you, it's for, for me personally, Bruce's, right? I feel like when we're together, we're definitely secret sauce to the whole magic of what we bring because obviously we're working with clients that, you know, they need to get something done. It's not about us. What we bring though is, is that secret sauce. And I also think to take it a step further, when we first started out, people would say, Oh, you're like second city. So you're coming in and you're doing really cool, you know, team-building and, and that, and, and I remember I used to bristle a little bit at that only because we really wanted to be something more than just team-building because Bruce was so dead set on pushing the data through, right? Gail Montgomery: 00:51:55 And having corporations realize that there's some hard results behind this. And so now we're at a point where we say yes in that we're fun and we love to come, you know, pull people in and get them active. And we're second city with hard results, right? We're soft skills into hard results. And that, that's been really fun to develop because I tend to be more about those soft skills. And Bruce is super analytical and so we are that yin and yang for sure. And it's been, it's been funny tempers me and I think I temper him a bit and together it's milk chocolate. It's milk, right? The temper at the top. Glut chocolate to chocolate. Dark chocolate is delicious. I don't even know what temper means when it comes to Chuck Reese's peanut butter cup. That's what I was going to say. That's exactly. Wait. Gail Montgomery: 00:52:50 Do you remember goober? Like when we were growing up there was siren jelly in a jar of goober. I was thinking of things that come that are together, like funded, funded our, wow. Yeah, this is going okay. Inception, inception, save space. The circle of trust. Friends. You're getting your money's worth here. Gabe Ratliff: 00:53:20 Hear! Hear! I am. Everyone. Are you guys listening? This is what you're in for. This is the ExperienceYES. Right now. Gail Montgomery: 00:53:29 You're experiencing. Yes. Gabe Ratliff: 00:53:31 Fun stick and sugary substance. Bruce Montgomer: 00:53:36 That's right. Gail Montgomery: 00:53:36 Separated by it. Aluminum paper sack ish. Same thing. Bruce Montgomer: 00:53:42 I think it's Paper. I don't think. Gail Montgomery: 00:53:42 There's like foil on the inside. Bruce Montgomer: 00:53:45 Well, it keeps it fresh. I think it's like when ding-dongs used to be wrapped in foil, Gail Montgomery: 00:53:50 Oh, they were the best but we digress. Gabe Ratliff: 00:53:51 We eat, we ding dong. So I'm curious about how you prepare to work with your clients. Like when you have someone approach you that wants to work with you, what is that, like, what is your, what is that onboarding process like for getting, starting with clients and then take us through that process? Gail Montgomery: 00:54:15 Well, the first thing we do is all of our, actually yeah, all of our clients have come from word of mouth or we've been at a conference and let us session or we've done a panel or a webinar and then someone just calls us out of the blue. So if we don't know the client, we research them, we do our homework, we what is going on in the news with them, what's the evolution of the company? We try to get a sense of the culture. We try to understand the particular functional area that's bringing us in, whether that's C-suite or you know, sales or ops or whatever. And then as much as we can, we work with them directly. We interview folks within the organization to get more data about what they want to get out of this. What is their pain, what are they trying to solve, what's the goal for them? And during those conversations we typically try to establish that we would like a partnership with them as opposed to some kind of a one off. If it's a keynote, obviously that's different. We try to educate them that it's not going to happen. And usually in one session you're going to see some great results. If you want to change behavior though, that's gonna take a little longer. What else do we do? We customize all our, Bruce Montgomer: 00:55:32 Yeah, we're, we're focused on trying to get their language and their examples in our brains so that we can use it and make it real to the people that are participating in the experience experiential stuff that we're leading. So it's a lot of kind of good consultant work of listening. Hey, what, what do you last? Gail said, what are you really focused on? What does success look like for you? And, and then building the, the sessions around what is going to be most effective, not only for, for what they're trying to accomplish, but also understanding some of the personalities in their group. You know, sometimes they'll give us a whole rundown of, you know, this person is like this and we need to, we really need to, one client told us recently like we've got two people who they just talk too much and we need you guys to facilitate them talking too much. Gail Montgomery: 00:56:24 Can you do that? Okay. So, or they'll give us Myers-Briggs results or insights or something. So we'll have a little indication going in what kind of personalities we're going to see, which we love because assessments are cool and, and of course really cool when you actually apply them in relationship building as opposed to just labeling people. So and, and like I said earlier, we customize everything based on all of that. Yeah. We, we have some things we can plug in like Lego blocks and reuse. Ultimately though, we believe that every client is different, that their business is different, their people are different, some of the problems have some similar, you know, pains. And so we have that and we're only as good as we can be if we can entrench with their vernacular, their co culture and in their language. Have you found any trends in the work that you've been doing now for, for all these years? Like are you seeing any, you know, as you're tracking being so data-driven, are you seeing any, when you're doing these these interviews and doing this work, are you seeing anything that's true that any kind of interesting trends that are coming out of it? Bruce Montgomer: 00:57:31 I would say the thing that the foremost is people are looking for more and more experiential content and, and it's, it's a lot more about getting up and doing something and having some impact than it is, you know, being a passive student and listening to a lecture and thinking, you know, that you're going to get something out of that. So, and not surprising. I mean, especially as our, as the the different cultures of, of age are kind of changing and, and the workplace is changing with that. Not surprising that we're seeing more demand for that kind of work. And really the shift to how can we apply, we've been asked a lot, how can we apply these things to video conferencing and conference calls? Cause so much work is getting done and, and you know, we'll, we'll be the first to say that the most impactful experience that you can have is one that you could share together physically when you're all in the same space, 100%. We are social beings and that helps. There are ways to use, you know, a zoom and other conference call technology that can help you keep engaged. It's just not as, not as easy to do the kind of work that we do when you're doing it. Gail Montgomery: 00:58:48 Yeah. And I would say the companies that we see that are finding great success today are the ones that are starting to truly understand the investment that they need to make in their people beyond AI and machine learning. And so there is a shift in, in recognition that soft skills, or I would even go further to say, emotional intelligence as a whole is a very important part of, of kind of a holistic company. And companies are seeing greater gains. Well higher retention, less turnover more engagement with their employees. They're staying on the cusp of innovation. And those businesses we love working with because that falls in line with kind of the way we think, right? Like what's next and what else can you do and, and, and what else needs fixing and how are you going to continue to evolve over time? Because gosh, technology is just incredibly fast paced and humans are less self. We're pretty predictable and, and so if we can really get to the core of how to, how to shift us and engage us and connect us those things are stickier to me and are gonna last longer I think. Yup. Gabe Ratliff: 01:00:11 Do you want to grow your creative business but don't know how to market yourself? Do you have something to say? But it felt like you don't have a voice in a world filled with noise. Are you ready to step up as a thought leader in your industry and lead the conversation about the topic you are so passionate about? If so, go to the artful dot co slash podcasting to join one of my three month virtual coaching programs and I'll help you develop your very own artful podcasts. You'll get three 90 minute virtual group coaching sessions, custom email and video support throughout the program. Support and feedback from fellow artful entrepreneurs in your group. Exclusive access to a private Facebook group for members of the program, plus a bonus coaching session where we'll celebrate you having your first three episodes of your podcast that are ready to begin promoting for your launch. I offer group coaching and one-on-one options that follow the same curriculum so that you can use whichever option fits your needs the best. If you've been looking for someone to help you get your podcast out of your head or need help getting a show you started to develop off the ground, then go to the artful.co/podcasting to find out more and schedule a free coaching call with me to talk about the possibilities for your very own artful podcast. Gabe Ratliff: 01:01:37 Speaking of which, I was wondering about the law, these, the longterm solution with these clients that you're starting to work with, right? Like we talked about at the top of the conversation we were talking about how, you know, people, a lot of times they do these sessions not with you, but they'll do these sessions right? Where they'll, they'll have their, their team bonding experience and then they kind of go off and it's been kind of the norm, right? To like they go have an experience, they may have a, you know, they may have like a conference or they may have like a you know, a retreat as they co some places call them or to go do these things. Right. I've been in the midst of those where, you know, you go and you do it, you're like, okay, cool. You know, we did our kumbaya thing. Or people are distracted, especially now, right. With, with devices, right. And people having such like Slack feeds and all these things going in, these types of environments that can have you distracted from those things. What is the longterm solution when you're working with a client where it goes beyond just that initial session that you do with them? What does that longterm play to keep them in that engagement? Bruce Montgomer: 01:02:47 Yeah, it really is. It is the process of, of setting up an innovation practice or an improv practice where people are actively use tools, one to continue the individual work of disrupting their own brains to, to collaborate as teams and work on that, that teaming, whether it's you know, what we've seen and what we've kind of worked with clients on are things like 30 day, 90 day sessions that occur over time, whether they're working on a weekly or biweekly basis. But again, we, you know, we keep talking about it. This stuff takes practice and it takes investment, not just financial investment of which of course there's, there's certainly a component, but a time investment to make people better. If you, if again, if you go back to the sports analogy, the way you get better at playing baseball or football is by playing baseball or football. I don't know. We often have a block when we set that on a, on a professional standpoint of business where you're like, well, when people are in teams all the time, so they're naturally doing great, you know, teaming and just doing it on their own and we know that's not true. So, you know, using these things in a, in a more ritualized more practiced way is, is the way to get better. Gail Montgomery: 01:04:03 And I, I would, I would add on to that and say we've had the best success when we've engaged kind of the C suite level and they're championing like the message, there are champions when we're done, right? And so the, the idea being that if, you know, John Smith is your CEO that we all understand, we went through this you know, bear hunt together and now here's our new shared language. It's anybody can call John Smith out in a meeting, you know, in a conversation, you know, in email if you see. But if you hear him say yes, but if someone shut something down, you know, everyone's accountable. And so you invite that accountability within the organization. That's one. Then I would say too is we often leave takeaways to help them as some kind of a on, whether that's a challenge coin or our book or, or some kind of quick reference guide that just reminds them of the four rules. Gail Montgomery: 01:05:02 Just like, Hey, you know, try, try to revisit this each morning. Try to be aware. Are you really listening with intent to serve or are you listening with intent to respond? Is it about you or them? And so I think those have been our Mo more pieces. And then as Bruce mentioned, we'd love the kind of 30 or 60 days to a culture of yes where you're actually putting a plan in place for a day where you are for weeks. Like Mondays you're your 15 minute standup call and Fridays are a reflection of how you applied that rule of improv throughout the week and what went well and what didn't and what aha moments you had. And so it's, it's ingraining it and threading it into the culture of the organization. Otherwise it is just some fun, fluffy thing you did like burger and bowling and a beer or whatever, which was fun, which was Bubba, which was really fun and, and also super needed and not sticky. And so you have to figure out how you're going to be sticky. And that means someone has to champion that. Bruce Montgomer: 01:06:07 We, we spoke recently to a friend of ours who was an executive leader at an oil and gas company who we, we've done work with or last several years off and on and, and to have been good partners with them. And it'd been a little while I've been, I've probably been six or eight months since we've, since we've spoken to them and sat down for lunch. And the most important thing he said to us was, yes, and has stuck. And we said, well, what do you mean by that? And he said, there are still meetings that occur where if somebody says yes, but people around the table say yes and try again. And the person has to reframe that, that statement with a yes to and, and keep it moving through. And those are the kinds of things that we get excited about if we've left, even if that is the one thing that a corporate culture has taken, like this huge success on that. Gabe Ratliff: 01:06:59 Yeah. I know how important that's been for me practicing that reframing cause that's been a transition that I've been in over the last year or two of, of recognizing how that changes the dynamic of the conversation. And I've had this talk with my wife cause she's also read the book. Yes. And as well, and we, we have it I've read it and we've been having that conversation around at bed by just how important that is to reframe the conversation in that way because we can, it's almost like we're on autopilot, you know, and we just like use language and we're not being intentional about the language that we're using. You know, and we're like saying, yes, yes, but blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Not realizing that we're actually saying no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Bruce Montgomer: 01:07:48 Fortunately for us, our kids keyed into this pretty early on and so we will hear a lot of like you know, dad, can I get a car? Yes. And we have to do this in order. Gabe Ratliff: 01:08:05 Have you have, do you happen to have a ski mask by the Wells Fargo today son? And we'll see what we can, Gail Montgomery: 01:08:14 Yes. Jail Gabe Ratliff: 01:08:16 Sucks. Let me tell you about jail. You're the, we're eliminating silos here, right? This is something that's like massive at businesses. I was wondering like what, how does this play into that when you're doing this with the teams? Like how do you, cause this is a result that you're getting, right? Like, and this is extremely difficult. We even saw this, I know this is going to burn some people's ears back at Denver center, but we had a lot of siloing there when we were there. And it's really can be ingrained no matter what kind of business, whether it's old, new, agile startup, small, large, you name it, they can exist. So I'm curious like what have you found in the work in this and like that result of being able to break down these silos and what's coming up for you with that? Gail Montgomery: 01:09:05 Well I would, I mean my first instinct is to say that silos to me, the number one reason that that happens is hoarding of information or, or this weird kind of, I own this, this is ours. Right? And so, you know, while sales is in charge of this and so sales gets very personally involved with their information in the way it's parceled out and whatnot. So the first thing that new we try to work on with teams is do we even know what everybody else a is doing and how important it is to the business as a whole, right? How, what their puzzle pieces and how it fits. And then two, are you creating space to get together? Cause the other thing is it's really easy to just stay in your own lane and do your due every day. Especially, like I worked at a tech company where it was like, you know, dev ops and then, you know, sale marketing, sales, and then implementation came in. Gail Montgomery: 01:10:00 And then, you know, you're, you're moving towards customer success and, and nobody's talking to each other through that whole thing cause they're just busy doing their thing and their heads down. And all of a sudden when you create space for people to get together to, to share what it is they actually do and the pain they experience, the joy they experience, suddenly there's this huge eye-opening respect and trust that starts to be built because you don't have to hoard information and you don't have to feel alone in what you do. And, and you can also solve problems together because regardless of your skills, you're impacting each other in some way. And so when you start discovering that it's kind of an immediate cross-functional party. And, and I think that's so, so important in business, regardless of what you're doing. And especially in business where it's white collar versus blue collar, right? You got boots on ground and then folks in the corporate office, how do ya, you know, how do you bridge that gap and, and build those relationships? I think it's important to that. I mean leadership has to have some recognition that is an important thing, right? So, so yes, it is possible to breaking down Bruce Montgomer: 01:11:14 Silos from the ground. It's, it can be easier from the top down, right? So the top are recognizing that there's a challenge. A good example of that for us is we, we worked with a, an oil and gas company who basically wanted to reevaluate how they go, how they dig holes, essentially how they bring up product out of the ground and how they store it so that it's safe and that nobody gets hurt. And they asked us, they, they had, they said, Hey guys, can you get a brand new design done in two days? And us practicing our yes and experience said, yes, we can. And so they brought in, they knew instinctually they knew that they needed to bring in people from all sides of that, of that equation for, for a building. So they brought in the people who did the permits, they brought in engineering, accounting, regulations, safety, you know, all it's on the ground. Bruce Montgomer: 01:12:10 It's actually 12 people who had never worked with each other ever before. And some of them didn't know the names of others. Right? So big enough company that you know, that these people hadn't, hadn't seen or heard of each other. And you know, by using these practices and bringing them in together by, by using brain disruption and you know, disrupting the way that they thought normally really had an impact that they could then extend out to creating this new design that they estimate saved them $40 million over four years. So huge success. Right. And, and all because they were able to bring in people who act different opinions, who had, who needed to be able to give information to each other and understand, you know, what the processes really were. If I was the guy who was turning knobs on the, on the well pad versus the guy who designed those knobs, they'd never done that before. And it was a huge, a huge impact for them. Gail Montgomery: 01:13:08 They have to get vulnerable right when we're doing, when you know you're out of your comfort zone and you're doing some kind of crazy experiential activity with folks you maybe don't even know, it puts you in a very vulnerable position. And I think it's incredibly egotistical to make this assumption that, well, I'm an engineer. Nobody knows what it's like to engineer. What will I fix this? Nobody knows what it's like to fix it. Well, it may be true that people don't know. So you're doing yourself a, you know, a disservice to not as a leader put your people in a place where they can start to respect and understand what they're all responsible. Bruce Montgomer: 01:13:46 It's funny that one of the biggest ahas for them is, so they had every well pad was perfectly designed for that space. And so you had the engineering engineering group saying, I've designed it. It's perfect. It fits perfectly. And, and the guys who support it, that would say, yes, and when I go to the next one, it's totally different. So they had to have these different books of support, you know, to of evaluate, Oh you're at, you know, a station a versus station B. Then the support processes to shut it down are totally different. That, that was a big aha moment of Oh the, maybe we should try to templatize these so that our support groups can just understand the same runbook for everything. Like that was a huge thing. Nobody had ever said it out loud. Gabe Ratliff: 01:14:34 Wow. See I, Oh that stuff is so awesome. It's so fascinating to me cause you come away and like, and what a result, right? $40 million result that really can sing, especially at that C suite level. You know, and that's something that I'm constantly paying attention to when I'm looking at leaders. Cause I'm always fascinated by like how people react differently, right? And like how we show up in different ways and I've witnessed really good leaders and I've witnessed really bad leaders, you know, and seeing how that, like we were motioning too early earlier, you guys can see this, but we were motioning to when the C suite is actually honoring this kind of process and these exercises and this trans transformation that can occur in your team. It's, it's totally different, right? Cause you've got the buy in from the top and they're there, they're forcing that to go all the way down because they believe in it and so does their team. When you don't have that, it's you just got, you know, from the ground up trying to like, it's, you know, trying to fight against that non-conformity from the executive level. It's just so difficult. Gail Montgomery: 01:15:45 It's almost like you know, you need that permission granted, right? Like the green light and the door is swinging open so that everyone recognizes that this is the new narrative or new normal that we want to engage in or try to engage in. As we move forward. Bruce Montgomer: 01:16:03 It's all, it's always very telling. When we get to do like two examples, the keynote that we did for 800 people, right? Their CEO was so game for it all. You know, we said, we'd like to bring you up on stage, we're going to do some activities. And he said, yes, I'm in and I can't wait con and contrast that with another organization that we worked with where their general counsel and their COO was willing to play. But the CEO said, I'm not comfortable doing that. And, and it's just, it's, you look at the organization and the struggles that, that occur in the organizations and compare the two and you go, well, I know which one's going to be more challenged to be agile, to be a supportive, to have a trusting environment, to have equity, you know, like all of those things that we talk about from an emotional intelligence standpoint you know, just, just are, tend to be a lot less when the leadership is like that. Gail Montgomery: 01:16:57 That's actually part of our conversation when we go in and talk to them about what we're going to do is, you know, you, you don't get to leave, you don't get to introduce us and then walk out the door. You're absolutely a part of this because that engagement at that level immediately signifies to everyone in the room kind of how serious they are about it and how much they're bought in and the adoption will happen. Yeah, that was a real quick thing right away. Yeah. You're not going anywhere, Gabe Ratliff: 01:17:27 Right? Yeah. I want to ask now we're talking a lot about saying yes, right experience. Yes, yes. And what, how do you handle when it's time to say no or, or how do you set up boundaries for yourselves and with clients and how you're showing up with clients and like when they're doing this work, right? Like we're speaking to yes. And, but how do you, how do you handle when it's a time to say no or set boundaries or parameters. So you know, Bruce Bruce said it earlier, obviously Gail Montgomery: 01:18:00 Something illegal or harmful. It's, it's natural to need to say that. I like to use a great example of, we had a, a client who was at risk of losing a very, very large account and they're one of the, one of the folks within that team had said something almost ridiculous, like, well, build us a zip line between our two buildings. I wish you'd just do that. And the person on the account was just really confused and they didn't understand what it, you know, we can't build a zip line and, haha, that's really funny. And instead of asking the really good question, which is, what, what does the zip line mean to you? Why do you think you need a zip line? And you know, really what it came down to was this need to be closer and to have more communication, faster responses you know, more access to each other. Gail Montgomery: 01:18:53 And so I still to this day, believe you can always quote, say yes. And even when you're saying no. So it's this idea that, you know, if Bruce came to me and said, you know Gail, I need your help on this report and I either a don't want to help and be, I'm not the right person or just generally he smells what abs. I might say something like, I hear that this report is important to you and I bet Mary's going to have a little bit more information for you. So he didn't hear no, and he really didn't hear yes. The way that I structured it though verbally made it sound like, Oh, I'm right there with you and here's some help in solving what you're looking for. So yeah, I mean that's, that's kinda my take on it. I think you can come from a place of agreement, like, I hear you here. This is important to you or I understand what you're saying and here's what we're able to do. Gabe Ratliff: 01:19:51 Yeah. The, the other example I would give would be back to the well pad designed with the oil and gas company. One of the things that, you know, that was proposed as an idea, I remember we're in idea generation stage and so one of them was, you know, well could we do this? One thing is currently not Bruce Montgomer: 01:20:08 Allowed by regulations. And so the regulatory per person [inaudible] that's illegal 100% do that. It took us to kind of reframe it and, and, and make them challenge that and go and could you set up a team that would affect the regulations so that you could do that. You get them engaged and help solve, change the laws to, to support, you know, and assuming, you know, they weren't proposing we're going to dump gallons of crude into the ground. You know, it was something that was a very realistic thing. It's just currently not supported by regulation and, and so, Hey, you have to say no to that. You can't do it. And are there a ways that you could come around so that you could say yes in the future to that and that that really is, you know, this, this concept of how do you say yes and in the same space that you, you still need to say no. Yes, we can do that. If we went around and we did these other things. Gail Montgomery: 01:21:07 And by the way, one of my favorite questions is tell me more about that. So without saying no or yes, make sure you understand what's being asked, right. And what people are coming at you with. Because a lot of times I don't think we really fully understand and so we're, our executive judges right away is like, Nope. Or you know, [inaudible] but that's not going to happen. Whatever. And so just make sure you understand what's being, Bruce Montgomer: 01:21:36 That's, that takes us back gave you asked you know earlier like what can people do, how can they practice things? You know, one of the things that we really recommend very highly and it's a game that is a fascinating game that we play in improv. Even in performance, we'll play it called the three second rule. And the, the goal is if Gail and I were to do a scene together, she couldn't speak unless three seconds of silence have occurred. And what is amazing is a leader, if you're, if, if people are coming in and are explaining a problem or explaining an idea, you know, something that they, that they want to put out there. If you wait for three to five seconds and just sit in silence, people hate in a vacuum, they likely will then start to fill in more information and get back down to the heart of the problem, the heart of the idea if you just give them the space to do it. Bruce Montgomer: 01:22:26 So it's, it's this really, I say this in, in in just with some of our with some of our fellow team members on an improv where there are a couple of our guys who are initiators, they just come out and man, there's just word vomit coming out. They just can't. And, and you'll wait and we'll be playing the three second rule game. And you can't get a word in edgewise because they're just going and going and going. It's very funny to see see what happens. So from a self reflection standpoint, just sitting in silence and letting it really develop or let me have that conversation occur, it can be very powerful. And I think it's two fold too. It's not Gail Montgomery: 01:23:06 Only on behalf of the person who's speaking to get more context and information about what they're talking about, about what they're about, that's myself, introduce myself and all of whom I speak. You know, it's, it's the fact that you as a listener really can engage in that rule of listening with intent to serve, right? And it gives you time to process and to make sure from again, an emotional intelligence standpoint, self-awareness and self regulation. How does that make me feel? Or what do I think they're really asking me? Or what, what is this about? And so I think it's just such a magnificent tool and thing to practice. Bruce Montgomer: 01:23:52 A lot of the, a lot of the games that we ended up playing in sessions are around active listening because when you're improvising you have no choice but to sit there in order to support my teammate at all costs, I have to be listening to what they're saying I have to. And so it's really obvious when we play games, when that listening drops and what occurs and how everybody in the audience can immediately identify like, Oh they didn't listen cause they didn't do, they didn't follow though. Well we'll do a game that is conducted. Story conducted story is a game where you have five people who are going to tell a story together. And essentially what happens is a conductor points at one person, if I were to point at you gave, you would have to speak until I took my finger away and wasn't pointing you anymore. And then I point to somebody else and they continue that story. And that may be mid syllable, mid word, mid sentence. It doesn't matter. But I have to be listening so hard. So when the finger comes to me and points at me, then I can pick up that story right when they left off. Many people will only be thinking about how they can control the story to move it in a direction that they're comfortable with. And that's, that's what we're trying to get people out of the habit of doing. Gabe Ratliff: 01:25:02 Wow. I love you guys. I seriously, I'm just like, God, I love this amazing, you know, this is like something that just so many people should be doing, right? I mean that's, that's why you're doing it, but it's, I mean, it's just such a, I mean, you're having fun. You're getting people to like turn off this, this, this, just judge in their brain. Right. That's like, it's taxing. It's on all the time. You know, unless you're doing this kind of intention, it's so fascinating that you're bringing some of that up because that came up recently in my cohort where, you know, it came to my attention that some people can feel like I can leave them feeling dominated. Like I'm, I'm dominating the conversation, right? Because I'm, I'm a, I'm really communicative. I get really excited. I'm really passionate. I love talking period, full stop. But I also love, I love engaging with people. Gabe Ratliff: 01:26:01 I love you know, I love getting into these kinds of conversations. That's why I do this. But part of the reason I also started doing podcasting is because a, I can record it and I can go back and I can listen to myself, right? And I can do that work of like we were talking about earlier of like being able to kind of like investigate how am I showing up? How can I, you know, what am I doing? Well? What can I change? Am I doing those things? Am I making people feel that way? But it's also driven me to be a better listener. To just ask questions and sit back and let you talk and to really listen to people. But one of the things that also came up in that conversation is around this similar kind of active listening, right? Where you repeat things back to people and say, this is what I heard. Gabe Ratliff: 01:26:52 Or to even ask people, like, when I'm coaching, what did you hear from this? What did you get from me that I am saying and I, I, I love this type of engaged listening and active listening because a, the, this kind of work that you're doing, it helps get you out of that taxing, just brain strain, right? To just constantly be in this place of control, which a lot of people want but don't realize the detriment that it has in their relationships. But then similarly these other types of active listening where, you know, whether it's improv or it's, it's the, you know, the conducted story, right? Or just asking people what are you hearing or this is what I heard that you said. And I've, in the practice of it, I've totally gained this insight even more than what I've been doing. Even though I've been doing this with intention, I realized that I can, I can, if people are left feeling that way sometimes in conversations with me because I get so excited and passionate and engaged. Gabe Ratliff: 01:27:59 That if I'm having to listen to what they're saying and respond back to them like about conducted story, you know, I'm having to pay attention to like what did they call it? Okay. That's what that is. Okay. And that you can only talk while you have the finger pointed at you until they pulled away, you know, and like this is what I heard in like having that kind of an interaction with people. You don't really practice that a lot unless you're practicing it. Right. And a lot of people don't do that and they're in their interactions and it's just so fascinating to me this work because of how impactful it can be. Like we said earlier, it's not just in your business, it's not just with your team. I mean this is like relationship building across the, you know, anyone that you have a relationship with. I, I just love it. Gail Montgomery: 01:28:42 Include including yourself. Right. You just said it. So it's not just external. I mean, I will, I'll be perfectly Frank with you and telling you that this journey in, in developing our business has been like an eyeopener for me personally because I've also been able to stretch and practice what I preach and, you know, make sure that I'm honoring all of those rules, if you will in the way that I share them and teach them so I can show up more authentically. And I think that's been so valuable for me and painful. I'll be honest. You know, sometimes learning things about yourself that, that aren't pretty right, seeing the, not pretty sides, like you just said, when someone gives you feedback that makes you cringe a little bit. If you can move through that to the actual, you know, modification or adjustment and to how you show up, then that's the good stuff. Right? That's the good stuff. Gabe Ratliff: 01:29:42 It is. And I, I'll be honest, I mean, when I first heard that it really hurt, right? Cause I'm like, I don't want people feeling that way. I'm actually like self-aware and I'm doing this with intention of wanting to have these engaging conversations. I'm wanting to have this dialogue. I wanting deeper connection with people who connections really important for me and community. And that's part of what the show is about. And, and supporting you, supporting the people, listening, supporting this environment of people who are wanting to make a difference in the world. And so it was really hard to hear that because I also have a big issue with bullies. And I realized today with my coach that that's exactly what that is, right? If people are feeling dominated in a conversation, that's a type of bullying. And I was like, Whoa, that was like super powerful. Gabe Ratliff: 01:30:30 And so, but, but I didn't, you know, I've, I've you read the four agreements, are you familiar with the four agreements? So that's part of my mantra and my journal that I do everyday is just to, you know, be impeccable to not take things personally. Yeah. Not make assumptions, do your best. And that's something I constantly have to remind myself. Like, don't take it personally. Just listen to the feedback and think about it and like use it to better yourself and to not like make it a game. Right. Make that be the game. Where can I, how long can I go without that being how people feel, you know, or, or, you know, how long, how many interactions can I have where I, I do not make people feel that way and aware. How many times can I ask, this is what I heard or, or tell people, this is what I heard her ask. What did you hear from me? Or, or, you know, however it is that we're working in that way. I just, it's, it's, I find it so powerful to get deeper on these levels with ourselves and with each other because it, you, as you said, $40 million for that one client that they were able to, to, to come away with from doing that work and realize the result of that. I mean, that's massive. Yeah. We really should've bid that on contingency. Gabe Ratliff: 01:31:46 That another learning lesson. We'll take 10%. That's it. We got you. So I want to switch gears now as we start to wind down. I thank you again for this lovely conversation. I want to talk about your two things. I want to talk about you guys working together as a couple of being together so long. What are the key factors that have allowed you to maintain that as, as a couple and as, as you know, business as co-founders and business owners together? Gail Montgomery: 01:32:17 Well, and I think we kind of have an unusual experience in that we, we waited tables together when we were in college, right. And then we we worked together at Tavern on the green in New York city and then we also got cast in a couple of things together in New York, which was really unusual, AIG together. And, and I mean, I, so we already kind of had this established, yes, we can spend more than just the evening and morning hours together. Already what I think is really interesting, at least from my perspective is, you know, I went off the radar for making a paycheck, if you will, while I raised our kids. And, and at one point, I was an executive director for, for a nonprofit theater company here alongside being a mom as well. And of course once once a mom, what was the mom but coming, you know, coming when Bruce kind of came up with this brainchild of ExperienceYES. Gail Montgomery: 01:33:18 And then it was like, okay, we're going to do this together. And, and, and he's pulling me in and I had all these crazy feelings of like, no, I'm not worthy and I don't want, I have not been in the industry. I don't know. You know, there's consultant speak and I don't know what it is and you know please God, don't say at the end of the day any more songs on there, stop saying at the end of the day, so, so true. Or leveraging, leveraging. So optimization. Okay. I've done. So it took me a little while to gain myself competence and it was very clear that Bruce's lane was content and my lane was kind of sales and marketing and trying to deliver the message. And after a while that that line got a little more fuzzy and then kind of eliminated. And then Bruce got a little bit more heavy into his, you know, into working. Gail Montgomery: 01:34:13 And I got more into, you know, basically doing experience just by myself for several months. And so I was doing all of it, writing contracts and trying to work with him to develop content and sales and marketing and leading panels by myself. And, and that went a long way to making me, helping me realize that you know, I had a lot to offer and I think it also can showed Bruce that I was capable as well without just saying, well this is my lane. And cause I think when you're in a small business like we are, we don't have the luxury of kind of picking lanes and staying in them. We have to swim all over the place. And so that leads me to my main point, which is our greatest challenge is on each other's toes and feeling this ownership of stuff where you know, if we judge each other, if we question or pick apart something, there's so much of our ego involved in it that I know, at least for me, I've had times where I've reacted very poorly to Bruce calling something out and then we just talk through it. Gail Montgomery: 01:35:17 It's not, I mean we're, we happen to be very good communicators, not 100% of the time, most of the time. And we diffuse with humor often and like, he'll call me out on some bullshit and I, I might initially be pissed off and just rail a little bit and then he'll get me laughing and I get over myself. And I feel like the same is true kind of in the reverse. But that's my perspective I think. I think we use humor and we communicate a lot. And sometimes even when we make mistakes, we say, you know what? I think I responded this way because I felt like blah, like we get it out. And there's no hiding that shit anywhere. Bruce Montgomer: 01:36:02 Well, we don't have the luxury of being able to do that. Right. In order for us to be successful, we have to, we know, we say it out loud that the reason why we're successful is because we're doing it together and, and could we both go off and do this alone. Yeah. And there are some times somewhere though, you know, that's, that's the way the client stacks up and one of us has to go do it. I can promise you that the two of us together are better than this. You know, the, the, some of the parts are better than the cost of whatever that phrase is. Right. And whenever that is, yeah. I love this story. There is we, we were vacationing with my sister and brother in law down in down in Destin, Florida. And the brother-in-law, Aaron and I had walked ahead and, and there was a, there was a wedding party, like a bachelorette party happening at the base of this. And we said, Hey, we'll go up and get drinks. You know, you guys hang down here. And so I'll, I'll turn and let Gail tell perhaps the story Gail Montgomery: 01:36:59 Bachelorette was, you know, they weren't so drunk that they couldn't actually have conversations yet. So the gal who was getting married, she was like, Oh, how long have you all been married? And both Laura and my sister in law and I shared how long we'd been married. Just how, Oh my gosh, that's so long. Like, what's, what's your one word that you would say is your secret? And Laura said, respect. And I said, humor. And we laughed and we thought, Oh yeah, that's, that's about right. When we think about us as couples. And the guys came down with, with beverages and the girl asked the same question to the guys and no kidding. The exact thing came out of both of their mouths. Aaron said, trust or respect, excuse me. And Bruce said, humor, fun, laughter. And I think that's just been the core of our marriage for almost 25 years. Not Bruce Montgomer: 01:37:53 Fun. It's not worth it. And that's, you know, that's definitely the, the way that, you know, I, I, I've tried to leave jobs with that in mind of, Hey, this job is no longer fun. So it's time for, it's now time for me to leave and and now we get to do this full time. And so we're very, very, very fortunate and very grateful and we can do it. So am I, I wanted to circle back, we talked about your book. You've got the 2.0 coming out the new version. It's not brain disruption. Two. Dot. O is it's improv mindset, is that right? Yeah, yeah. The Improv Mindset. That's right. And that's coming out January, January. Yup. We'll have an audio book. So you actually get to hear if you, if you want, you'll get to hear a, me and Gail speak on it. So, which will be cool. I, I'm a, I'm, I'm actually really looking forward to doing that because I think we'll have a lot of fun. Some of the extras modeling, some of the exercises I think will be a lot of fun. It's very much written in the style of voice that both of us do anyway. So it's very conversational at the beginning. Oh my God, Gabe Ratliff: 01:38:57 I can't wait. I'm so excited for that. I can do accents, Gabe. So we might have to pull some accents. There's going to be so many accents. You won't even know. Fabrice forces me to do a Scottish one. We're screwed. Bruce Montgomer: 01:39:09 Oh, I don't do that one very well. It's fun though. We'd like to see here her fail. Gabe Ratliff: 01:39:18 I mean, that's pretty good. That's very good. Bruce Montgomer: 01:39:22 Oh, so nice. Gabe Ratliff: 01:39:29 That is hilarious. Bruce Montgomer: 01:39:33 I can do, I can do all of them. I can do smuggle and call them. I can't do that. Awesome. Took me awhile. I know it's, what am I, what am I claims to fame or some kind of something. So I was curious about the book itself. So you've got the first version. What can people expect about this new version that's about to come out? The new version will be it'll be some of the same. So some of the content will remain very similar, but, but mostly what will, and thank you. And what we'll be adding to it is just a lot more data. We, we published the book in 2016 and in the last four years including a study that we were a part of. There's just more data about why this stuff really matters and why we, you know, why exercising that creative part of our brain is, is something that is valuable that has that as real end results and can be measured. Bruce Montgomer: 01:40:32 And that's where we want to, we really want to kind of put that in to help land some of the messaging that I think I think is important. The other thing you know, changing the title I think from, from brain disruption, which I think people generally have had a good response to, but it kinda was like, wait, what are we doing? The whole idea of a fixed mindset versus a growth. What we're, what we've done, at least in our analysis is that The Improv Mindset sits below that. So this concept of prey, you know, practicing yes. And, and listening and building an emotional intelligence and kind of flexing that muscle is what allows the growth mindset to come about. And so that's, that's kind of what we're, we're, we're injecting into the world and kind of releasing to the world as this concept of, Hey, use this if you want to get these results. Gabe Ratliff: 01:41:21 Well, I think we're also going to include some of the results we've seen with clients that we've worked with because it's exciting and people care about that, right? Like, Oh yeah, it's all sounds great and what's it going to mean for my bottom line, right? Or how, how's it going to impact or fix or change what's going on? So we'll definitely be including some of that as well. Nice. Well, it's time for some fun wrap up questions, kids. Ooh, is it a speed round? I'm a Gemini. Me too. Actually five of us here. What's your birthday? June 16th all right. Versus a cusp May 23rd. Oh you're at [inaudible]. You're at the early side. Is the cast piece on the costume. The cuff. You're a customer. So what is your, the first question is, what is your favorite documentary or movie? Bruce Montgomer: 01:42:16 I mean, I movies, I'm a big star Wars buff. I always have been and so I'll, I'll probably say that the star, the original star Wars trilogy, which is, you know, Seminole period for me as I was growing up is probably up there. And I'm really enjoying the Mandalorian, which if you haven't seen, it's pretty awesome. I haven't yet. I was trying to, I was fighting the new subscription. It's pretty great to pay the six 99 paid for a month, watch the Mandalorian and then, and hop off. Gabe Ratliff: 01:42:44 That's true. I thought about that. You didn't hear that Disney I'm super into like all the Marvel stuff and we just got Disney plus, so we've been watching some of that and totally digging it. I love it. Ragnar rock. Come on. Yeah, when you bring the funny in with all the action and whatnot, I'm totally down with that. Yeah. That in guardians was such a smart place. The music. I mean when they, I mean guardians is one of the best soundtracks ever, but when they kicked in led Zeppelin for Ragnar rock, I was like, you guys had not sold. Yup. Yeah. We're, we're big. We're big scifi fantasy nuts here. The expanse is about to come back out on Amazon the fourth season. So yeah, we're, I haven't, we haven't watched it. The expanse. All right, I'll put it on the list. Okay. Now this may be a trick question. We'll see. What is the book or books you've given most as a gift? Bruce Montgomer: 01:43:48 Probably brain disruption at this point. I mean, Gabe Ratliff: 01:43:52 I know it's kind of a, it's an our eight ounce business cards, so it is, it is very much probably the, the most but if we're looking for something that is not our business book, I would say for me it's the stand by Stephen King medium. The ICAP version that, Gail Montgomery: 01:44:10 Or prayer from one meeting or from one meeting was big when we were in our twenties. And then pillars of the earth is one of my all time favorite. I mean, I was sad. I was crying at the end that we had to say goodbye to those characters. Gabe Ratliff: 01:44:22 Oh wow. You know, it was one I didn't expect for me. It's kind of in that realm of, of at least the stand, but was a ready player ready or ready man. I read that in like a day and a half hour, that book. I was like, Oh my God, Ernie Klein, you are like my kindred. Yup. I could read anything. I wish I had written that book. That's what I wish. I was like, Oh, such a great idea. Like how did I not think of this? This is amazing. The entire time I read that book I was like, this guy's brilliant. Yeah. And it was his debut novel. I was like, man, you're seriously, you're just no fair, right? Yeah. I'm right there with you. Kindred's yay. What obsessions do you explore on the evenings and weekends? Gail Montgomery: 01:45:13 Wow, that's tough. Well, we love, we love good. I love good food, Bruce. I think Bruce would be like the Jetsons. He would totally just like take a pill. That would be like the roast beef and the mashed potatoes and the gravy just in a little pill. I love great food. And then we love traveling. Love traveling. What else? Well, I mean watching, Gabe Ratliff: 01:45:34 Yeah, we watch w we're bingeing Bosch right now on Amazon. So we, we tend to like good stories. So we'd like to settle in with a glass of wine and Gail Montgomery: 01:45:44 Watching a good story. So are two or three glasses? Gabe Ratliff: 01:45:50 Yeah. Yes. It's why they come in boxes. That's right. Yeah. Thank you. Boda yeah, I was like, there's four in a box. What? Yes. Yeah, we've been bingeing house. We've been going back, row, back. Q Lord is really good. Have you seen any of his kids, comedian days, like back in the early days, he and Hugh Laurie and I can't think of his, his comedy partner, but like he was a very, very funny, almost clown. He's, he's really good. Yeah. I actually, when it came out and I learned that he was not American, that he was English, I was like, wait, what? And then I also found out he was a hysterical English comedian doing our parts Gail Montgomery: 01:46:39 Brits. I'm telling you. Gabe Ratliff: 01:46:43 That's right. If we're going to do English, let's just do it. All right. I'll be your foggy. Wonderful. Gabe Ratliff: 01:46:51 Harry Potter. Gabe Ratliff: 01:46:53 Nice. It's about that time of year too. Oh, time to go back to Hogwarts. We read all of those books out loud to our children with accents. We actually got to do the a, we were in London last Christmas and we got to do the, the [inaudible], the universal studios tour of the actual filming or like where do they film it and to see the sets and like what they did. It was really, really cool. Oh man. Yeah. We took the nephew and niece to the universal in Florida. Todd Watson. Nice. Yeah, that was, I was like, why couldn't we have had this when we were kids? Right. Seriously. I didn't matter if we did it as adults. We're like, this is fine. What is the, what is the number one thing that you'd like listeners to take away from this interview? Gail Montgomery: 01:47:43 I would say for me it's, you know, regardless of whether it's your personal life and especially if it's your business life, you cannot expect to change behavior and fix problems with some magic pill or some like Hocus Pocus. It takes time. It takes intention and it takes commitment from more than just one person and more specifically commitment from leadership and and that you, you know, you gotta be open to putting the time in to practice and to to be okay with failing and pick yourself up and move along. It's not about you. Gabe Ratliff: 01:48:29 And I would say just the power of yes and the, the ability to use that tool going forward. Even if you, you know, go forth and just try it. Just try to see how many times you say no and try to change a percentage of those to saying yes and see what happens. Gail Montgomery: 01:48:47 I like it. I like it too. Gabe Ratliff: 01:48:50 I love it. I love you both. Gail Montgomery: 01:48:55 Aww. Bruce Montgomer: 01:48:55 Back at ya, Gabe. Gabe Ratliff: 01:48:57 So last question, where can people find you on the interwebs? Gail Montgomery: 01:49:01 Oh, experience, yes. Dot com. Yup. And we're both on LinkedIn. Bruce Montgomery, Gail Montgomery. We do, we do have a Twitter account and I'm, you know, trying to figure that out. So I can't really say much about that. Yeah, we're on Facebook. We don't have tic talk or Instagram or sneered shirt or that you're the shoes. Our kids are way cooler than we are. Bruce Montgomer: 01:49:26 And we tried to hire our daughter to be our social media expert and Maven Maven, but it didn't, she was like, yes. And, and that's the lane well, Bruce scale. Oh my gosh. You guys, this has been an absolute treat. Thank you so much for sharing you for the work you're doing and I love you guys. I love the work and keep it up and everybody out there. You ready for The Improv Mindset? January, 2020 and we've got the book and we've got an audio book coming soon. I get to hear you guys in all your glory. Do this with accents. That's right. We'll get into it all in Scottish. It's going to be great. Maybe for a swell. Sloppy be me. It'll be all Scottish last name. Like Montgomery. You got to do something. Gabe Ratliff: 01:50:27 Well, that's it for this episode. If this is your first time listening, thank you so much for being here. I really hope you enjoyed the show. The Artful Entrepreneur podcast comes out bi-weekly and is available every other Thursday for your enjoyment and all links and show notes for this episode can be found at theartful dot co if you haven't yet, please subscribe to the show and leave a rating or review on iTunes, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. If you'd like to be a guest or know someone, that would be a great fit, please go to theartful dot co slash guest and thanks again for listening. Until next time.
