Webpage Supplement to
Chapter 13: Applied Drama in Business
Compiled by Adam Blatner
June 1, 2007
Most Relevant Websites:
Noted in the Chapter: The Ariel Group (www.arielgroup.com) Founded in 1992, The Ariel Group specializes in training organizational
leaders in communication skills and relationship building. At the heart
of the Ariel Group’s work is the concept of “leadership presence,”
defined as “the ability to connect authentically with the thoughts and
feelings of others, in order to motivate them to a desired outcome”
(Halpern & Lubar, 2003).
Noted in the Chapter: Dramatic Diversity Company: www.dramaticdiversity.com
Dramatic Diversity, based in Chicago, has been using action-oriented,
unscripted theatre since 2001 in corporate settings, in a management
consultancy process that begins with assessment, followed by program
design, service delivery and outcome evaluation.
A professional association: www.appliedimprov.net
– This community of those applying improvisation in business has
conferences and an online discussion group.
Atieno Fisher offers business consultations and describes the use of
role playing, role training, and action techniques on her paper at : http://usoni.com/documents/Simulationarticlefinal.pdf
Further History:
In 1942 Henry Murray of Harvard University was asked to develop
and execute an assessment for the Office of Strategic Services (OSS).
The purpose of this program was to carry out special missions during
World War II. The OSS wanted a set of tools that would be uniquely
sensitive to the various demands of a special intelligence unit. Under
Murray’s leadership, a team of psychologists developed a battery of
tests that would recreate stressful situations and provide evaluative
opportunities to the observers. One of the subtests in this battery was
entitled, “Improvisations.” In this subtest a series of one hundred and
eleven scripts were written that involved quandaries of leadership. An
individual would be asked, in role, to make decisions that would
reflect on their overall management abilities. Observers would make
notes about the various leadership styles and the interpersonal
relationships that were observed. (Murray & Stein, 1943;
McReynolds and DeVoge, 1977).
McReynolds, P., and DeVoge, S., (1977). Use of improvisational
techniques in assessment. In P. McReynolds (Ed). Advances in
psychological assessment, V. 4 (222-277). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Murray, H. & Stein, M. I. (1943). Note on the selection of Combat
Officers. Psychosomatic Medicine, 5, 386-391.
Item: The president of Improv Aslyum said in an interview for the
Boston Herald, “Today, its (corporate training) is one of the fastest
growing arms of our industry.” Corporations in the past year
spent $13.6 billion in training, up 32% from last year? Across
industries, training budgets are rising. Training, a 65,000-circulation
trade monthly published by Minneapolis-based Lakewood Publications,
Inc., estimates that U.S. companies with 100 or more employees budgeted
$58.6 billion for training in 1997, a 5 percent increase over 1996--and
an all-time high in the last 15 years. In the 2002, the report notes,
the market for training-related goods and services rose 32 percent, to
$13.6 billion. No statistics are available on how much of that
training dollar actually is diverted to consultancy firms that use role
playing as a primary training tool however the vast majority of these
firms incorporate some degree of role play into their training
approaches leading one to conclude that a substantial amount of the
dollars spent in training involves some kind of role-play or unscripted
theatre.
The use of role-play as a way of training individuals for making
executive decisions is by no means a new practice. This
self-presentation or role is discussed at length in Erving Goffman’s
(1959) book the Presentation of Self in Everyday Life. According
to Goffman people engage in two kinds of communication, “expressions
given and expressions given off.” It is the communications given off
that constitute impressions that are presented by an individual. These
impressions become social roles or parts that are performed based on
the environmental context. This can therefore be constructed that the
roles that are played are in fact the sum of the contextual parts
(Goffman, 1959). Self therefore is a dramatic effect drawn from the
scene that is presented. According to Goffman (1959), “all the world is
not, of course, a stage, but the crucial ways in which it isn’t are not
easy to specify.” (p. 72).
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Assessment
Once a company has recognized that they are in need of specialized
training in the area of diversity, a team of industrial organizational
psychologists will conduct a thorough assessment or what is typically
called an “environmental assessment.” The purpose of this assessment is
to clarify and amplify the goals, needs and challenges that the company
faces. The assessment process can take several days or several
weeks depending on the size of the company and/or the complexity of the
stated problem. The assessment team will begin by interviewing top
executives. At this level of inquiry the team is seeking to
identify the core problem and identify who within the company has the
necessary influence to make changes. After the problem has been
clarified the assessment team will begin interviewing employees at all
levels. During this phase of the assessment the team is looking for
root metaphors and narratives.
Further References on Role Playing in Industry, Business, and Organizational Development
(many of these are from: Blatner, A. (1996). Applications in Business. In: Acting-In: Practical applications of psychodramatic methods. New York: Springer. Blatner’s practical guide contains numerous references to the applications of psychodrama in business.)
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http://www.tonisant.com/aitg/Training_and_Development/
The Applied
& Interactive Theater Guide contains a representative listing of
books, organizations, and other resources in the use of theater in
corporate training.
www.appliedimprov.net This is an organization of
theatre artists who
are applying drama in business, have conferences, an online discussion
group–a major resource for follow-up.
Eitington, J. E. (1989). Role playing. In The Winning Trainer (2nd Ed.) (pp. 67-93). Houston: Gulf Publishing.
Goffman, E. (1959). The presentation of self in everyday life. New York: Doubleday.
Greenberg J., & Eskew D. E. (1993). The role of role playing in organizational research. Journal of Management, 19(2), 221-241.
Hoffman, C. C., Wilcox, L., Gomez, E., & Hollander, C. (1992). Sociometric applications in a corporate environment. Journal of Group Psychotherapy, Psychodrama & Sociometry, 45(1), 3-16.
Koonce, R. (2001). Redefining diversity; It’s not just the right thing to do. It also makes good business sense. Training and Development, 12/1/01.
Lippitt, R., & Hubbell, A. (1956). Role playing for personnel and guidance workers: Review of the literature. Group Psychotherapy, 9(2), 89-114.
Lockwood, N. (2003). Diversity and Emotion: The new frontiers in organizational behavior research. Society for Human Resource Management, May 2003.
Shaw, M. E., Corsini, R., Blake, R., & Mouton, J. (1980). Role playing: A practical manual for group facilitators. San Diego, CA: University Associates. Excellent bibliography, oriented mainly to business and organizational audiences. This is a reworking of the 1961 edition entitled Role-playing in Business and Industry, with Corsini as the first author.
Swink, D. F. (1993). Role-play your way to learning. Training and Development, 47(5), 91-97.
Symonds, P. M. (1947). Role playing as a diagnostic procedure in the selection of leaders. Sociatry, 1, 43-50.
Torrance, E. P., & Wright, J. A. (1987). Sociometric audience technique as a device for maximizing creativity in problem solving in large groups. The Creative Child and Adult Quarterly, 12(3), 147-151.
Wohlking, W., & Weiner, H. (1971). Structured and spontaneous role playing: Contrast and comparison. In W. Wohlking (Ed.), Role playing: Its application in management development (pp. 1-11). New York: Cornell University Press.
Woltzer, P. (2001). Ethics as a value added service. CPA Journal, 1/1/2001