Tom, Author at Spontaneity Shop


The Proven Negotiation Framework: How Improv Techniques Unlock Better Business Deals

Last Tuesday, whilst facilitating a corporate training session, I watched something fascinating unfold. A senior finance director, notorious for his rigid negotiation style, suddenly found...

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AI Can't Teach This: 7 Improv Techniques That Beat Technology for Authentic Leadership Communication

We're living through the age of artificial intelligence, chatbots, and digital communication tools. Every week brings a new platform promising to make us better communicators,...

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How to Build Authentic Communication Skills in 5 Minutes (Even on Zoom)

There's something profoundly unsettling about watching a colleague deliver what should be genuine feedback whilst staring at their own reflection in the corner of their...

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Stop Sounding Like a Corporate Robot: 7 Improv Tricks to Communicate Like a Human

Picture this: you're in a Teams meeting, and someone's presenting the quarterly figures. Their voice is flat, their language peppered with phrases like "optimise our...

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Challenging Questions

https://youtu.be/PhefmGrdGwU?si=7RBuPDIDQHdBZZLz&t=2730 This happened last night – a question in the UK election campaign to the two main party leaders, live on the BBC in front...

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Crushing advertising – Apple’s iPad Pro commercial

When I was a tiny child I would go to sleep to the sound of musicians downstairs, led by my mum. She plays the French...

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Nerdy news can be good news

I sent the screenshot above to my colleagues at the Spontaneity Shop yesterday afternoon, and was genuinely excited about it. The little network symbol in...

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Hide Self View

Top right; three dots; freedom! It's 2019. You’re having coffee with a close friend, and within seconds of putting down your chocolate éclair she’s alerted...

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Learning – with others, or alone?

Going on a course can feel slightly scary; to learn we must face and embrace our failures. At our workshops we make a virtue of...

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Zoom Impact when it matters

Here’s a screenshot from today at 1114hrs GMT; arguably one of the most important videoconferences in history. This group is discussing the preliminary results of...

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Is it Bullying?

The independent report into the UK Home Secretary’s management style reported back last week, and was instantly (and reasonably) the subject of hot debate at...

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How Do You Steer This Thing? Fundamental change under pressure

“I’m someone who owes his career to being in the room with my clients – that’s how I’ve made every sale, and grown every relationship,...

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Practical Charisma from Home

Photo: Per-Anders Pettersson/Getty Images As I was doing the washing up today I caught the first episode of Francine Stock’s excellent investigation of Charisma (repeated...

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Next slide please

Saturday’s winter lockdown TV announcement contained a host of widespread bad practices -  many of you will already have made a note to do things...

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Winners and Losers

If all goes normally, tomorrow's poll in the US will end up with a winner (and a loser). We are fascinated by stories of victory...

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