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Nature’s Playbook

There's a lot we can learn from nature, especially when it comes to strategy and teamwork.

Let’s use nature’s solutions to transform your strategy and tactics.

Everywhere we look, we come face-to-face with the reality that we need to change our relationship with nature to come back into alignment and harmony.

Thankfully, nature already has the answers we need. In nature diversity, adaptability, resilience and complexity all increase over time, and we enhance our own ways of working, by following nature’s lead through a process known as biomimicry.

This active, practical programme opens up ‘nature’s playbook’ through biomimicry and applies it to strategy, leadership and teamwork.s

Let’s reimagine intelligence

In this interactive programme we’ll be rediscovering the genius of nature to guide and inspire us. We’ll explore questions at the crossroads of science, nature, spirit and organisational life, such as:

  • How we relate more intimately to everything and everyone with whom we share our planet?
  • How we can reimagine purpose, strategy and teamwork inspired by the genius of nature?
  • How we can recover sanity, magic and hope in our ways of working together?
  • How can we reclaim the spontaneous intelligence that guides action in nature?
  • How can we recast our story of the future and our place within it?

We’ll help you explore these questions with a programme that is both active and reflective. You’ll get to learn, connect, play, create, make, rest, relax, explore, reflect, reframe and try to chart a path towards a future that is less destructive and unequal and more just, kind, inclusive and generative.

How this links with Here & Now

This programme explores biomimicry in a number of ways. Some of these are more conventional forms of discussion and because we believe in learning by doing, others are more active explorations of bionics/biomimicry through group processes that involve movement and sponaneity

This approach allows for an exploration of emergence in the natural world that can deepen the process of using biomimicry to reveal powerful insights.

Bespoke learning

This is a bespoke programme that uses experiential learning along with group coaching and situational facilitation.

The core of this programme is about reimagining our relationship with our environment by changing our ecological vantage point from individualism to a connected-whole that aligns with nature to strategically foster creativity, novelty, diversity, aliveness and team spirit.

Learning content

Some of the core learning content includes:

  • skills and behaviours for self-organising teamwork using improv principles
  • reframing spontaneity as a vital and natural responsiveness
  • opening spaces for collective presence and change
  • using biomimicry for strategic thinking on real-life challenges


The active content around team dynamics will be balanced with deeper, facilitated conversations. We’ve been facilitating outbreaks of joined-up thinking for years, so you can expect lightness, laughter, learning and opportunities to lead in new directions.

To explore some of our thinking on biomimicry and improvisation take a look at some of these blogs: (more posts coming soon)

A tale of two forests
Thoughticulture

Workshop details

This is a full day in-person workshop or longer programme/retreat.

This programme can be delivered anywhere, and is ideal for green and wild spaces that cater for group learning. We’ve got a cracking place in Suffolk that provides food and accommodation in a biodiverse environment that will inspire you and your team.

If you’re interested in this – talk to us.

When it comes to the climate and ecological crisis the time and place for change is here and now.

Where this fits

  • Discover ways of working that are more agile and self-organising
  • Open up a conversation about possibilities for change beyond carbon and ‘net zero’
  • Explore intelligence in the more than human world and apply it to future-proof your strategy, story and teamwork
  • Reclaim the essential spontaneity that drives honest, present-moment engagement with what’s happening
  • Bring people together around a strategic story that connects hearts, minds, people and planet

What you’ll learn

True resilience
Practices for self-organising teamwork

Practical agility
Getting good at sensing-adapting-responding (vs predict & control)

Nature’s playbook
Using biomimicry as an intelligent source of strategy, tactics and hope

Being here & now
Using higher levels of social, emotional and ecological intelligence

How to change the world
Seriously. And playfully.

Tailored for your group

Tailored for your group
Here & Now learning experiences are tailored to meet the needs of the organisation and the group, and responsive to what’s happening in the room.

If you’d like to talk about integrating this into your leadership development programme or other wider learning strategy, we want to talk to you!

 

Let’s talk!

Improvisation is anything that happens in the moment without a fixed plan or script. In classes and shows with Here & Now this looks like games, scenes, stories and even whole plays made up on the spot.

There is a common view that improvisation is the last resort of the unprepared amateur. We see if differently.

We like Jill Bernard and Patrick Short’s definition of improvisation as ‘A highly refined system for observing, connecting and responding.’ To put it another way it’s all about opening up, noticing more and using what’s there. 

Just like fish are the last to see the water (apparently). So human’s are the last to see that sensing-and-responding in real time is their superpower. The skill we use from the moment of birth onwards. 

It’s an incredible ability to listen and respond in the moment, and it takes a mix of knowledge, skill, openness and flexibility. Simply put, life demands that we improvise well in the boardroom, in the bedroom in the back room building a business. To do otherwise is to stop engaging and get stuck.

As an artform or a-thing-to-do it’s an enjoyable way of making your own entertainment, which is what everyone did before TV. And it’s an impermanent or transient artform. It happens in the moment and it disappears just as it arrives (like life, eh). This is a big attraction for many as you don’t have to commit to words on a page or paint on canvas to express your creativity. You do it with other people, it’s always imperfect, and it’s a great show of humanity.

Going one step further it’s using what you’ve got, where you are. It’s enough to start a revolution. Which will of course be improvised.

Best of all improvisation attracts people who are kind, generous and playful.

Of course we’re biassed but we think it’s pretty special.

In our classes (usually 10-12 people) you’ll discover the principles and techniques of improvisational play with scenes, stories and characters. Guided by our teachers you’ll discover how to make scenes that are easy and delightful with quick agreement and playful co-operation. 

It’s not stand up – so you won’t be alone on stage and you won’t be telling jokes. And no, you don’t have to be funny – just come as you are, don’t try too hard, and we’ll take care of the rest!

You might be surprised to learn that there is more to improv than ‘Whose line is it anyway?’ style games where the fun comes quickly and impulsively. Alongside these games we will introduce a style of play that is unhurried, truthful, and where characters and stories emerge naturally and bring even greater delight.

Either way we guarantee that you will be entertained and laughing out loud in a happy state of flow. Seriously, Netflix has nothing on real human connection.

You don’t need any acting, improv or comedy experience at all to join our classes. We welcome complete beginners and anyone who is just a little bit curious.

Beware: spending time with open-minded and open-hearted improvisers is seriously addictive. Most people who do a beginners improv class with us go on to do more classes!

What you will learn

You will learn principles and techniques for improvising including:

• Listening and accepting ideas

• Being present in the moment

• Creating fun stories, scenes and characters

• Self-expression and emotional connection

• Working as a group and supporting each other

• Having confidence in your own ideas

• Mental flexibility and adaptability

• Delighting your scene partners

The classes are a great way to make new friends, build confidence, gain insights into instant creative collaboration. The simple joy of spontaneous freedom is perfect for finding new inspiration in life.

Our classes are open to absolutely anyone aged 18 and over and we only use accessible venues. 

Coming to your first class or workshop can be daunting, but if you fancy trying improv, you really should! You can contact us if you want to talk about it or ask questions.

Many of the best things in life come with ‘butterflies’, so if this appeals to you at some level, we say give it a go!

Low pressure and high in fun, our improvisation classes are great for anyone curious about improvisation, collaboration and self-expression.

Absolutely anyone can improvise and it is a lot of fun. No experience necessary.

If want to make new friends and laugh while getting in touch with your spontaneous creative side, then you’ll  enjoy this.

None of us goes through life with a script telling us what to do and we wouldn’t want one even if it was available.

We like to make our own decisions, take a few risks, connect with others, explore ideas and learn as we go. In other words, we improvise everyday.

So it’s good to play with this skillset and work on the craft of improvising so we can be more present in the moment, connect and create with others more easily, and learn to respond constructively in situations that feel beyond our control.

Learning to improvise gives you a chance to:

– have fun with like-minded, warm-hearted people

– do new things and play with more of your humanity

– share and express more of your feelings 

– learn more about yourself and others

– find renewed commitment to being active and creative

– decrease social anxiety with new skills and perspectives

– increase tolerance for uncertainty

There’s lots more too but that will do for now!

You might like these other workshops

Yes, another newsletter.

But you won’t want to miss this one.

Our monthly newsletter is all about a joyful and mindful way of improvising.

Each month has a few ideas and details of what’s on.