Warm Up You Imagination for Professional Agility

Victoria Hogg
Sep 18, 2025
4 min read

Updated: Oct 8, 2025

Hello Moment Takers!

Have you ever sat in a meeting, with a great idea on the tip of your tongue… only to watch the moment slip away, or even worse… someone else not only speak up instead, but they steal your thunder!! And all you can do is sit there fumingly bemused thinking “I was going to say that!” (Which is, of course, the least satisfying phrase in the English language, just behind “your call is important to us”).

Now think about this carefully. Is that sting of a missed opportunity just about one moment you missed; or is it a career pattern?

These situations are too often framed by how we perceive our role, our job titles... to the point it can shrink our contributions. The result? Well, lost chances to influence, grow, and, super importantly… the chance to be seen.

You’ll never guess what…, improvisation helps break that cycle. It helps to expand your thinking and contribution and ultimately your role so the next moment is yours. Don’t miss that moment… again.

Unless of course you enjoy kicking yourself afterwards, in which case carry on.

Come find out what we’ve learned and add your say! Our Tuesday Breakfast chat is free. You’ll learn an activity you can try out immediately.

Warm up your imagination with professional agility

TRY IT OUT

Opportunities rarely arrive labelled and sometimes you have to see more than what’s simply in front of you. In pairs or trios, grab a random item from your drawer. First, name its obvious use (It’s a teaspoon used to stir tea) Then, in quickfire fashion, invent alternative uses, practical or playful (fit for a mouse, it’s a tin baseball cap with a long peak). Push past the obvious; silly ideas welcome. This is imagination strength training.

Debrief: Notice how your first ideas are safe and predictable, but better possibilities emerge once you push further. The same applies in meetings where the real opportunity often lies just beyond the obvious.

“If opportunity doesn't knock, build a door” Milton Berne, comedian and actor

Something emotional…

A few weeks back, at short notice, I (Paul) was called into a workshop – not as a facilitator this time, but as a participant. The objective was to create a vision statement. Fluffy stuff. And it would have stayed fluffy if I didn’t decide to take the moment and give the room a different direction. It’s not that they didn’t have the knowledge or experience, it’s more they couldn’t find the emotion of the vision.

We see this a lot with businesses… that they focus on the external problems – the things you can see. When the real problems lie with the internal ones, where the real pain is felt, where the emotion lies.

Let’s be clear, it was not my intention to take centre stage. It simply came down to seeing a moment that needed clear intervention. I didn’t create the moment, but when I saw it I seized it.

10 minutes later we had the vision statement nailed. Yeah, that was emotional. Not Bake Off final emotional, but close.

Something doubted…

“Hey, can you present this short film of a case study to the client in an hour? The film should be ready in 50 minutes from now.”

Hmmm, so that will give me 10 minutes to see the film for the first time and prep my commentary which will be delivered as the film plays… live with the client.

My natural instincts were screaming at me to run a mile. (Although, let’s be honest, I’d have made it about 200 metres before needing a cup of tea). And yet, I said “sure, I can do this”.

So I did. It was actually fun. The format couldn’t allow for waffle or over-explanation, meaning the commentary became clearer and more concise. And because it was unscripted, it was more conversational rather than ‘teachy’.

Never in doubt, and rounded off with a nice cup of tea!

“There are no mistakes, only opportunities” Tina Fey, actor, comedian, writer, producer

Something aged…

This week I (Paul) took to the stage at the Guildford Fringe Festival with my improv group, New Choice, to perform an unscripted play. Not only unscripted… none of the characters were defined and there certainly wasn’t a plot line. The audience threw us the word “jelly” for inspiration, and that was all we needed to start.

At some point I had to enter the stage. So I did. With a character of a party-decorator half formed in my mind, I strode out confidently only to be welcomed as another character’s grandfather. In that instant I had to become a different person. My first thought was… I’ve aged. A lot.

Let’s be honest, that moment could age any of us. Like it does when something happens that throws you. In this case the thing being thrown was a bone… so like any old grandad would, I hobbled over to it and croaked out my first line of “I’ve brought some jelly”.

The kind of line that makes you wonder whether retirement might not be so bad after all.