Psychological Safety: Taking Care of Each Other with Prescott Gaylord

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So hello everyone and thank you for joining Every Moment is a Choice. My name is Erika

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Behl and this is a podcast for people who are looking to understand their own unique

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courage. I talk with people who have inspired me with the choices they've made in both in

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their career and in their personal lives.

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And I am delighted today to have Prescott Gaylord with me. Hello Prescott.

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Hi Erika, how are you?

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I'm doing quite well.

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Oh good.

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Before I talk more with Prescott about what he does, I wanted to share how I met Prescott.

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So a few months ago, I was actually invited to become part of a improv show. And this

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was something that scared me, to be honest. But I was excited to do it, however. So I

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had spoken on stage a few times and gotten used to telling a story or speaking to an

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audience and I've done lots of presentations in my corporate career, but I have never spoken

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extemporaneously on stage or improvised anything. So when I was asked, I said, of course said,

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sure. It sounded like a great opportunity. And then I went and freaked out. So I was

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actually preparing for this show by creating a few stories. So a guest monologist is actually

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their role in an improv of this sort is actually to take some suggestions from the audience

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and create a story on the spot, which the improv group then uses as kind of a starter

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for their set. So I'm a I'm a preparer. So I had actually prepared three or four stories

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in my head. And I thought, you know what, I could buy like two degrees of separation,

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create, you know, use any word that the audience could shout out and I could get to one of

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these stories. So I showed up the night of the show, still freaking out a bit. And I

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met Prescott and the rest of his improv team, who we'll talk about later. And they're all

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fantastic professionals. They've been doing this for a long time. And and Prescott said,

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you know what, you don't need these pre pre made stories. We'll just do some warm ups

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and we'll do some word associations. So over the course of maybe 10 minutes, I I was part

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of the overall warm up for the show that the improv group did. And and we did some word

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associations and kind of put together a way of thinking that allowed me to create a story

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on the spot that night. And the improv team did a great job. They did a fantastic set.

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And what I noticed I observed actually, from taking part in this show is that it was it

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was very deliberate. Right. So I felt that Prescott created a bit of I would call it

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psychological safety for the other performers on stage, no matter if they're in his improv

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group or in one of the other improv groups to perform to their best to know that they

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were supported, that they could take some risks. And I thought, you know what, upon

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reflecting upon this, I thought this is what teams need all over the place. Right. So this

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is in the corporate world. This is a great way for teams to work together because so

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many companies and teams are in the process of transformation in terms of doing new things.

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And you know, working through change, you have to have a team that is comfortable. Psychological

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safety is a way to bring out the best in the team. So that's what I wanted to talk about

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with Prescott today. And before we kind of talk a little bit more about your improv career,

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tell us about yourself and what you care about, Prescott.

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Sure. First of all, I like that you called it a career. I have an improv career. I sort

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of have an improv habit that I have to feed with a career. Yeah. Yeah. So I do improv.

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I love improv, as you saw. And what a lovely story. It's interesting to kind of hear what

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was in your head that night and how you prepared and everything. By day, I work in corporate

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sustainability. So I manage operational portfolios and I get to build renewable energy on buildings

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and make sustainable buildings and try to make us carbon neutral and all that kind of

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thing. So I very much enjoy that as well. I'm not trying to quit my corporate job in

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order to do improv full time. I kind of love everything I do. So yeah, that's, there's

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me in a nutshell. Sustainability and comedy. I love the combination. And it's really interesting

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to me that you are, what I've heard the term is, is creative double lifer, where you have

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a corporate career, but also have on the side something that feeds your passion, your need

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to express yourself as well. So I think that's very cool. How did you get into improv? We'll

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get back to the sustainability part, but I'm really curious about how you got into improv.

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Well, I was 30. So I got into improv a lot later than a lot of people did. But I had

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remember seeing several improv shows, just silly college shows, you know, just little

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improv shows. And I was so enthralled with what and I'd like laughed until my stomach

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hurt watching an improv show. So then I had an acquaintance one time send me an audition

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notice that said improv troupe, no experience necessary. And so as we were going, so we

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went and we auditioned for an improv troupe. And it was bizarre, not knowing anything about

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it, never had a class, never did anything. And so I was put in this improv troupe, I

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had to go take classes to learn various techniques and such, but I was hooked from there. And

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I started to perform, I started to teach, I started to direct troops, I started to coach

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troops and started to find the pieces I loved within improv. And as of now, I just like

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hanging out with the other comedians and making wonderful safe space. As you noted, it's one

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of my favorite things to do and to just have good shows.

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Very interesting. So what what was those first few times like in terms of you obviously said

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you were learning, you had never taken a class. Did you experience something like that of

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the safety created by someone else who is more experienced? Or is that something that

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was you kind of learned to do over time?

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Mostly the latter. Now, for sure, there were people in those early days who were trying

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to create safe space. And there's a lot of technique around improv, about it being very

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positive about support of each other that are that was created in that early troupe.

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And I will be forever grateful to the people who made that. I have also been in there's

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lots in improv that is not safe, or at least doesn't feel safe. Which is hard, because

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at the beginning, you're you're usually terrible. And I was. So you have to be terrible for

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a little while. Yeah. And be willing to leave the stage and say, That was great. Let me

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come back and do that again. And be maybe less terrible until you're not or until you

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forget and don't care anymore. And you're just in that flow of kind of improvisational

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scene work and nothing matters.

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Yeah. Because I mean, in improv to me, it's it's a team effort, right? You have to be

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you're not up there on your own, at least in your type of improv. So understanding that

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your your partners up there are going to take something that you started and seamlessly

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connected and add their own ideas. It takes a lot of it seems like it takes a lot of trust

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amongst them, not just safety. And I'm really curious about how that develops in an improv

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group. Like does it does it somehow just start to click? Or do you deliberately make some

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effort to bring in new improv group partners or like how does that work?

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Yes, I think it's extremely important to create a level of trust and a feeling of we're all

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in this together. And I think you noted that in your story, because you showed up for a

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cage match. And it's the one thing I didn't like about that particular show or those that

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particular series of shows is I think competitive improv is is bizarre at best. I have other

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words for it, but it's very strange because it feels to me I'm going to go ahead and say

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wrong because I don't want to be competing against the other improv troops. You'll know

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we wanted to support them. We wanted to give them as much as much positive feedback as

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possible. For the most part, they were not as experienced as we were the other troops.

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So we wanted to bring them along for that safe space because it's a very vulnerable

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thing they're doing. They're walking up on stage with nothing. And then technically competing,

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having people vote on whether people like a more experienced troop better or them better,

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which is an insane thing to do, in my opinion. And I sort of wish we didn't have to do it.

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But we I don't know, we thought it was fun. Well, it was a fun competition. Yeah. So we

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had to we went out of our way to to take care of everybody. And it's if you see any of my

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workshops or any of my training, I say over and over again, take care of each other. Because

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it's the most important thing. If you're taking care of each other, I think it breeds that

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trust that you're talking about. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I mean, you can certainly feel the

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impact of that for someone who just came in for a brief period and performed with you

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guys on stage. So do you see in terms of the psychological safety? I mean, you've talked

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about it works with improv. I would say it can work with improv. OK. I'm not sure it

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always does. There's there's lots of times when we're we don't feel safe. We're not safe.

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But even sorry to interrupt your question, but even I have definitely seen people who

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do not like each other still create that trust in a scene. And they can play together because

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they both trust what they're doing. I have also seen people who like each other fine.

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But if you're going for quick laughs or they they don't have that psychological safety.

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So I've seen it go the other way as well. And it it usually they go together. The good

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troops have amazing trust and the bad troops might not have as amazing trust. But not always.

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I've bizarrely seen it seen people just are good enough to go the other way. Interesting.

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For me, though, that's not fun. I don't care if I'm putting up great scene work if I don't

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to a little degree love everybody I'm playing with and completely trust them. It's just

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not fun for me. Yeah, that's really interesting, because I think that what you are talking

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about is a choice you make. You would rather trust and play with people that you enjoy

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rather than making a ha ha ha a fabulous, you know, something that gets a lot of laughs

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from the audience. So that's a deliberate choice. And it's an interesting one for me

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because I want to understand, you know, where where does that come from in you?

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So my instinct is to say I think it comes from just getting old and not caring anymore.

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No, no. There's no scout from SNL that's coming to Singapore, watching us and going to cast

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us. So and we don't make enough money to to care. So for me, I better just love every

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minute of what I'm doing. Yeah. So that's what I do. I go in and I play with people

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I like. I do scene work I like. I have a good time beforehand. I have a good time after.

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And maybe I drink some beer. And that's the end. So you mentioned you do run workshops

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and you teach improv to aspiring aspiring performers as well. What is what is the hardest

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thing to teach? I mean, do you do you start with that element of how to work as a team

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being vulnerable together on a stage? Is that the step one? Like, how do you teach that?

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Well, I don't much teach beginners anymore. OK. I teach only when I feel like it. So I

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don't. I don't teach like improv one on one anymore. Yeah. I just when I feel like teaching,

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I get the bug. I I call the theater. I don't I text the theater because nobody calls anymore.

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And I say I'm going to do another master class four hours on this day. Yeah. And so I'm usually

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teaching people who have done it for six months to two years. Right. So with them, the hardest

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thing is to get them to let go. They all there's this nervousness that I'm very familiar with,

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because I would have had it at that time. Right. Of, hey, I know all the techniques.

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I know all these things I'm supposed to be doing. So if you wander outside of it, there's

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this weird feeling of guilt or hardship. Or if you feel like you didn't support your partner,

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you feel like you've ruined the world. Right. If I can get people to let go and just be

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present with their scene partners and just be in that state of enjoying the moment that

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they're in it, I have won that workshop. Yeah. So in general, that's what I try to teach.

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And that's a hard thing to teach because it needs to go into muscle memory. You can't

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tell somebody to let go and have them let go. I guess you can. It just doesn't work. Yeah.

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So I experience, if I were teaching beginners, the first thing you teach is, I mean, there's

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very basic set in stone improv technique that is so many people do it because it's so good.

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Right. The yes and theory of accepting what's there and adding information to it is such

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a simple, easy, powerful thing that everybody teaches it. Everybody does it. So that's where

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I start just like everyone else. Very interesting. Very cool. So I want to

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just to ask a little bit more. I've shared the impact you had on me and what I observed

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you had on the other players that night at the cage match. And psychological safety is

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such a buzzword almost in leadership today. You hear about it in the corporate world.

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You hear about it just about everywhere now. And so if you have leaders who are wanting

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to learn how to create psychological safety, but they're not managing an improv team, of

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course, they're managing a team of corporate employees. Do you think those lessons on psychological

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safety from improv apply? Yeah. I think, I mean, it's the reason a lot

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of corporates like to hire improv coaches to come do what they call applied improvisation

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is because a lot of these lessons apply very well to teamwork and creativity and all of

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these things. Psychological safety, it's funny, I've never really seen that applied in this

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way. But I think you hit it spot on. I think that is part of it. Trust is what we normally

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would call it. Yeah, people kind of call it psychological safety now, but they say it

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in terms of people need to be able to speak up. They need to be able to give their ideas

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and all of that. Yeah, absolutely. If you want people to be able to have teamwork, to

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work on each other's ideas, to be honest and trust each other, yeah, to innovate, they

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have to be able to feel like it's okay for them to fail.

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And so we talk about an improv that you have to lean into the failure. Like it's actually

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kind of fun to fail. And so we have a lot of exercises and show how fun it is to fail

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because that makes a good scene. And you can actually come up with really good innovations

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by failing at a number of other things. And everybody kind of knows that logically. But

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do we have that in muscle memory or do we get afraid? So it's the same thing. If I were

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doing a corporate masterclass, I would try to teach the exact same lesson as in my other

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masterclass. Get you to let go and just be present with your team members and work on

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whatever you're working on in that full and complete trust. If I can do that, that would

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also be a win. I think it would be beneficial for that team as well.

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Yeah. And if we could find a way to get past failures by acknowledging them and not creating

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a sense of guilt or anything in a corporate team as well, that would be something that

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could really unleash, I think, more innovation. Because people have to feel comfortable with

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their team as well to innovate. Yeah. Except if I went to coach a team of people

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doing terrible work, I would let them remain afraid. People should do that. We should go

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into corporations that we hate and who are doing terrible things to the world. And we

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should just teach them to be afraid of each other and to not innovate anymore so that

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maybe the company will start failing bigger. Stop innovating. I'm going to start a new

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company, but then we have to trick them into hiring us.

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Yes. All right. If you would get to work on that

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business plan, I will get to work on the trainings. We're going to make this happen. Stealth failures.

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Stealth failures. Yeah.

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Yes. So that's actually a good segue when you're talking about companies overall. Now,

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you have worked, if I called improv your career, I don't know why I call it sustainability.

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It's probably your calling. It's my habit, maybe. My hobby.

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But you have been working in sustainability for most of your career.

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All of it. All of it. So it's obviously something that

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you care about. And with sustainability and things like climate change, there's a lot

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of companies making promises about what they're doing. There's a lot of innovation going

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on, which is great. And environmental change and climate change is a huge global challenge.

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I've heard, yeah. And I personally believe, I know you've heard.

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I personally believe like, we have in the world, if we were going to make a good stab

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at resolving some of the human induced climate change, right? We have the money, we have

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the resources, we have technology. What we are lacking is the willingness to actually

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make the sacrifices or the courage to actually change our behaviors, I believe. So that if

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we want to actually make a big impact, people have to start changing their behaviors, right?

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I think this is a very key thing to this. And I want to know your thoughts on that and

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how psychological safety might work in it as well.

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So I think there's not a lot of behaviors that have to change. I also think it is not

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that valuable to try and get a mass number of people to change their behaviors. And this

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is, I'm sort of in the minority in sustainability work here. So this is the part that is, I

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don't want to say I'm unique in this. There are plenty of people who believe this, but

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we're not in the majority of people who even work in sustainability or climate change.

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But I think we should stop trying to get people, we should refocus and move away from trying

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to get you to stop flying and to eat vegetarian and to whatever, take public transit whenever

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possible. Like all of those things are good and all of those things do make a difference.

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But trying to get everybody to do that, even if it worked, even if we succeeded at doing

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that, let's say we got 300 million people to all do that, we would still be in trouble.

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It's not impactful enough. It's not valuable enough. Whereas I'm going to try to do some

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statistics off the top of my head with nothing in front of me, but it's something like 5%

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of the top power plants make 72% of all emissions from all of electricity. So we don't need

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to focus on getting you to stop flying, although maybe you should. We need to get those 25

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coal plants offline or to switch to something renewable or to change those. So the infrastructure,

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we need infrastructure change and we need kind of corporate change and we need behavior

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change, but we focus way too much on the behavior change. We have to focus on the infrastructure.

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And that's where the big impact is. The behavior change can follow.

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Very interesting. So I understand the statistics.

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Maybe you can explain them to me. I'm working at it.

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I understand your argument using the statistics is what I meant to say. And that behavioral

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change will impact some, right? Like you said, it'll move the needle a bit. And if we're

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going to make big changes, but in any type of big global challenge like this, say it's

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I used climate change, but there's inequality, there's inequitable access to healthcare

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resources. There's all kinds of global challenges out there. And some of it's going to take

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courageous leaders who are willing to sacrifice some short-term profits or sacrifice their

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own remuneration in order to get better results for more people. So that's courageous behavior

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in my opinion.

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Yeah. It will take, let's see, given your example, there are lots of examples that I

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can point to of various courageous individuals. There are the people in the world who decided,

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whatever some First Nations person who decided to take care of their forest, somebody who

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decided to clean up their river bed and change the way that works. Someone who decided to

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test the PCBs in the river outside of their village. And there are so many people who

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decided to live with no carbon. There are all these people who've done all these things

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and very courageous. And I think they're wonderful and they're my heroes. But you're right. It

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will take somebody courageous or some handful of courageous people who are in charge of

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something large to say, sorry, in my city, we are going to make sure there's biodiversity

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and no plastics and whatever they decide in their city that's important. So that seven

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generations from now, people who don't even remember me will be able to enjoy this. It

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will take people in governments to say, look, we're going to have to allow these things

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and not allow those things. And I don't know how to make them be courageous because they

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have a lot of pressures on them from various places as well. But yeah, that's where the

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impact can happen. And we need to sit them in a room, give them some psychological safety,

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teach them how to tell stories, and let them make butt jokes and give them all some courage

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and teach them all how to do something really hard that some of those individuals with a

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river outside their house have already done. And I wish I could make the CEOs and the presidents

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as courageous as the little girl who tests for PCBs because she learned it at school

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or something. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it's going to take, obviously, like you mentioned, it's

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going to take the decisions made by people in charge. However, a lot of people are going

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to make this happen, right? It's not going to be the implementation done by just a few.

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And I think it's around allowing people this space to, like we said, innovate and come

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up with solutions to these problems. So that's where I think the psychological safety comes

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in is there is so much of a call on workers now to participate in transformation programs

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and change and big visions that are put forth. And how do you actually motivate people to

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want to do that and creating a space where they can fail and they can come up with something

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better in its place? Maybe they all just need to listen to your podcast. I don't know. They're

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going to learn how to be courageous and to make non-traditional choices with their lives.

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And then they're going to save us all. I think it's valuable to do what you think is right.

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I for sure have put myself in a place in the corporate world where I don't have a ways

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to climb in corporate management and leadership because I don't care. I care a little bit

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about making various companies better. But like I was joking about earlier, I kind of

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want to make good companies better and I want to make, let's say, amoral or bad companies.

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I don't care what they do except I want them to clean up their dirty assets and maybe I

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want to help them clean up their dirty assets. I want to help them do certain things. But

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I don't want to make, I don't know, I don't want to lead them well. So maybe there's that.

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It's not just evil companies either. I'm really only interested in companies who are on purpose

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trying to do good things because we're in a place where we're past the time where we

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can be neutral on sustainability stuff.

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I think that's really interesting what you just said. It's beyond the point where we

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can just remain neutral. You have to be kind of for something. I sound like, what was the

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president who said you're either with us or against us?

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That was George W. Bush. Actually, what he said is, I think, you're either with us or

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you're with the terrorists. So I'm going to start to use that. You're either with me,

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you're either for biodiversity and inclusion, or you're with the terrorists.

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Or you're with the terrorists.

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So I'm going to put that on my LinkedIn profile.

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But I think that's so key because I think in companies today, at least the ones I've

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worked in, people are less likely to be allowed to have a kind of nine to five job where it

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is just their paycheck. I think a lot of teams are being called upon now to align themselves

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with the company purpose, to devote a lot of their brainpower and their time to serving

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a company purpose. And so if you're not aligned with it, and if it's something that's not

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serving you as well, it's more difficult to find yourself satisfied by that type of work

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and fulfilled.

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Yeah. You know, I'm really lucky right now. I will say in so many ways. In so many ways,

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I'm very lucky and very privileged, I guess some would say. But I happen to work for a

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company where I'm fairly aligned with its stated mission, you know, this kind of better

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world theory. And that is great. I definitely have worked for places and I it's so funny,

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I don't think I would mind a place with its stated mission was kind of terrible. You know,

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if I work for a place and there was like, we were trying to make money for ourselves

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at the expense of everyone, I'd be like, this is this is so blatantly honest, I don't know

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what to do with myself. That's fine. But what I find most difficult, and I think this is

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where more of the difficult companies are, is they have stated missions and visions that

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feel positive, but the culture inside is not that way. So you know, this whatever this

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place is meant to like build character and do good things like, well, what we do this

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and this and this is like, well, we got to you know, we have to our competitors are it's,

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you know, we can defend that in some way that feels moral to us, and it's clearly not to

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any observer. So that's the part that I think is difficult. I have worked for those places.

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I've certainly observed those places. And that is where I think the problem is. Yeah,

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is in the organizations that feel like they are doing good things, or at least say they

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are, but are backed in a corner, they feel like they're backed in a corner. So they have

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to do bad things to stay alive. Yeah. Yeah. So if you work for any one of those companies,

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you should hire our company stealth failure, and we will do all of your team building for

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you. So go to at stealth failures on, let's say Instagram, because Twitter is going to

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go away. Yep. And hire us. We'll come train your people. We'll get you sorted. Yeah. Nice.

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Very interesting turn this has taken. What in the fake company we've set up to try to

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ruin companies. You didn't know we were going to go there from the beginning. That's not

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on your little sheet. It's not what I had planned. But I kind of like it. So if you

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had if you have a leader out there who's who's thinking, you know what, and the answer you

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cannot give me is just, okay, hire me in for a workshop. But if you're actually do not

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do not hire me for a workshop. You can do that later. But if you're going to give kind

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of one or two pointers to a leader that says, listen, I, we have a big job to do with this

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team, right? And I need to I need to create an environment that is more conducive to them

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taking risks. What is any practical advice you could give them?

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Sure. Actually, I do think I have an answer to this. The I've seen wonderful things come

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out of projects where we made one role, which is to start with one question at the beginning

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of any process. And that is, how can this decision or this project make the world better?

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So I think if you start there, it refocuses all of the things you think you have to do

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or you thought you had to do. So if it's building an innovative team, which I think is what

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you're you're noting, or a safe team or a trustful team, start with how can I make this

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team so that the world is a little bit better? And I, I think whatever this team does, it

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might help you refocus on what's important. Because honestly, it might not be important

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to get everybody well, it's important, it might not be the most important thing for

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you to get Jake from marketing to trust other Jake from accounting, right? The Jake's always

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had this thing. And so we to make sure that they trust each other, it probably would make

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your team better, but it might not be the most important thing. It might be important

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for you to make sure your product is not toxic. Right? And if you say, Hey, Jake and Jake,

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I need you to we have an important thing to do. How can we make our product make the world

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better? And one of the Jake's might say, you know, I've always thought maybe we can maybe

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we don't have to paint the product. Maybe we can just leave all of the toxic stuff off.

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I've always thought we can do this thing because my, my daughter would like it if it if it

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did this and maybe the world's a little bit better. Jake and Jake might trust each other

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better if they're working on something beautiful rather than they're just working to get a

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paycheck. So that's the first thing I would do, which is I think the psychological safe

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space can follow better world thinking. I would really love it if everyone would put

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me out of a job so that you all are doing the work yourselves in your, in your things.

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You don't need me to talk to you about circular economy and, and better world thinking. So

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I can just go do improv and start stealth companies and hang out with the Jake's at

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night. Cause honestly they're fun.

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We're getting this company started. I mean, it's already decided. I'm, I'm on Instagram

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right now creating an account for us. I'm going to approach Jake if that's okay. We'll

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just, which Jake? Well, we'll, we'll see if I don't know what head count we can start

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off with. Depends on our venture capital. What, what impact would you like to leave

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on the world personally?

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I'm going to get depressed thinking about that because I, I'm trying to solve these

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big issues and I really would like to, and I'm pretty sure I won't, you know, I'm going

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to leave the corporate world and I will not have solved climate change or climate change

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in finance or climate change in the building sector. I will not have convinced everybody

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to, to have made that change. Um, so maybe the mark I would like to leave on the world

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is more people being able to start anything they're doing with what I was calling better

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world thinking. Maybe if I can do something, it's, it's that.

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I really like that.

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Plus this company, stealth failure, two things. And if the Jake's could hug it out, I would

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be, if I can go three things, three things.

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So Fresco before we finish, how can any listeners find out more about you and your improv group

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as well?

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You can find us on Instagram at at new kitten party, new kitten party, and come see our

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shows. We're fun.

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Perfect. And you're based in Singapore.

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I am based in Singapore. Right. You can't come see our shows unless you're in Singapore.

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Do you guys put any of your shows online? I've seen snippets.

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I think we only do snippets. I don't really take care of anything. Yeah. So I don't know,

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but I don't, you know, putting out, it takes a lot to make a good recorded improv show

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that looks good. So usually you just gotta go see it live. Awesome. Well, I hope every

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listener gets a chance to see you guys cause you guys are awesome. Oh, thank you. Thank

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you so much for joining me today. All right. Well, I'll see you at the kickoff meeting

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of our startup. Yes. Well, we're going to get started next week. Okay. Okay. Bye bye.