Chief Change Officer Podcast Summary

Episode Title: From Talk Show Dreams to Improv CEO: Erin Diehl’s Business of Joy — Part One
Release Date: February 4, 2025
Host: Vince Chan
Guest: Erin Diehl, Founder and CEO of Improve It

Introduction

In this compelling episode of Chief Change Officer, host Vince Chan delves deep into the transformative journey of Erin Diehl, the dynamic founder and CEO of Improve It. Ranked among the Global Top 3% podcasts on Listen Notes, Chief Change Officer serves as a beacon for growth progressives and unconventional thinkers seeking career and life transformations. This two-part series uncovers Erin’s unique fusion of improv and business to cultivate joy, foster growth, and navigate failure.

Erin Diehl's Early Aspirations and Journey (02:21 – 08:36)

Erin begins by sharing an anecdote from her childhood, illustrating her innate affinity for performance and communication. “I came out of the womb dancing and saying, hello world, I'm here,” Erin humorously recounts her mother’s description of her birth, setting the stage for her lifelong passion for the stage.

Driven by a desire to become a talk show host inspired by Oprah Winfrey, Erin pursued a degree in communications from Clemson University. However, the early 2000s lacked the digital platforms that today’s aspiring hosts rely on. Undeterred, she relocated to Chicago—the heartland of improvisational theatre—and immersed herself in improv classes at renowned institutions like Second City and Improv Olympic. Erin reflects, “I kept coming back to improv,” highlighting how her experiences on stage seamlessly translated into her professional life, enhancing her listening skills, empathy, and quick thinking.

The Birth of Improve It (08:36 – 16:13)

Transitioning from a full-time role in business development and sales at a recruiting firm, Erin identified a unique intersection between improv and organizational development. Her pivotal moment came when she proposed conducting improv workshops for United Airlines, initially offering her services pro bono. The positive reception and eventual compensation from United validated her innovative approach.

In 2014, Erin founded Improve It, an improv-infused talent development company aimed at empowering the new generation of workforces through play. “Improve It is an improv-infused talent development company for the new generation of work,” Erin explains. Over a decade, the company has evolved, offering diverse workshops designed to enhance leadership, team dynamics, and personal growth.

Key Aspects of Improve It’s Approach:

• Customized Workshops: Tailored to client objectives and challenges, with a blend of improv activities and structured debriefs.
• Engaging Pre-Work: Participants engage with humor-infused videos that set the stage for workshop themes, such as effective communication.
• Holistic Learning: Combining in-person or virtual training with subsequent e-learning modules to reinforce skills over time.
• Celebratory Culture: Unique elements like the "chicken dance" and crowning an "improv chicken champion" foster a positive and engaging atmosphere.

Erin highlights the company's growth and commitment to client-centric innovation: “We created it with the client's challenges in mind and just kept listening and building to get us to this point.”

Measuring Success and Key Performance Indicators (16:13 – 19:30)

When discussing how Improve It measures success, Erin emphasizes a client-focused metric: Return on Objective (ROO) rather than the traditional Return on Investment (ROI). This approach ensures that the workshops align closely with the specific goals and challenges of each client.

Improve It’s Three-Tiered Engagement Model:

1. Culture Jumpstart: A single workshop designed as a conversation starter for immediate impact.
2. Culture Shift: A series of three workshops over a year, facilitating incremental behavioral changes and ongoing engagement.
3. Culture Change: An extensive program spanning two years with six engagements, integrating improv principles deeply into the client’s organizational culture. For instance, the American Marketing Association adopted the core value “Yes and,” prominently displayed throughout their offices.

Erin elaborates, “Ultimately, what you are getting is higher collaboration, less frequent problem solving because people are coming up with solutions versus problem problems. You get more people interacting and cross collaborating with each other and it overall creates this sense of positivity which is psychological safety at its core.”

This client-centric methodology not only fosters immediate improvements but also ensures sustainable cultural transformations within organizations.

Embracing Failure: The "Fail Fluent" Philosophy (19:30 – 20:51)

A standout feature of Erin’s approach is her candid relationship with failure, which she terms “Fail Fluent”—a blend of failure and influence. This philosophy underpins one of Improve It’s key workshops, focusing on reframing failure as a fundamental element of success.

During the conversation, Erin hints at her personal struggles with failure, introducing her keynote titled "F Words at Work." She shares, “The F words are all about failure. Plus the frequency of failure equals the fundamentals of success.” This candid admission sets the stage for the next episode, where Erin promises to delve deeper into her personal experiences and strategies for overcoming failure.

Conclusion

Erin Diehl’s journey from aspiring talk show host to the CEO of a thriving improv-based talent development company epitomizes the essence of harnessing change as a superpower. By intertwining the spontaneity and creativity of improv with structured business development, Erin has created a unique platform that not only cultivates joy but also drives meaningful organizational transformation.

As this is part one of a two-part series, listeners are left eagerly anticipating the continuation of Erin’s story and her innovative methods for navigating and thriving through failure in the next episode.

Notable Quotes:

• “I'm in the business of joy.” — Erin Diehl [08:36]
• “We measure your ROO, your return on objective.” — Erin Diehl [16:30]
• “The F words are all about failure. Plus the frequency of failure equals the fundamentals of success.” — Erin Diehl [20:24]

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