«Yes, and»

Did you know that you can boost your innovation through improvisation? In fact, a MIT study showed that a single improvisation workshop can cause a 37% increase in idea generation and output during brainstorming (Kudrowitz, MIT, 2010). Use these cards to prompt your divergent thinking with a sprinkle of improv mixed in.

How it works

• Have participants work in groups of three.
• Each group should have a handful of cards at their disposal.
• Participants start by describing their creative challenge.
• Participants will prompt their divergent thinking by picking a card at random and combining the saying on the card with «Yes, and…» to spark their ideation.
• The trio can then start to ideate, always answering with «Yes, and…» and always building on the previous thought.
• When they need another prompt, they simply pick a new card and start again.

Tips, tricks & more

• Example: participant randomly picks the card «Think Bigger!» — «Yes, idea XYZ is good and we could think bigger by trying…» — «Yes, and…»
• Timing for this activity is actually quite flexible. You can run it as long as you want, but 15 minutes is the minimum.
• This activity can also be done with more participants, but you will need more than one set of cards.