In improv, before your team gets on stage, you’re in the green room feeling all the nervous and anxious energy of, as comedian and author Andrea Flack-Wetherald put it, “performing comedy on demand for a room full of drunk people that have high expectations.”

Flack-Wetherald, who authored “The Funny Thing About Forgiveness: What Every Leader Needs to Know About Improv, Culture and the World’s Least Favorite F Word,” said in that moment in the green room, minutes before going on stage, the way the team combats those anxious feelings is by reminding each other, “I’ve got your back.”

For Flack-Wetherald, that means “we are all going to take on the responsibility of creating an environment that’s safe enough to be brave in.”

Flack-Wetherald spoke at the Women in Retail | On the Road Columbus event this fall about how the concept of “I’ve got your back” can apply to not only improv, but to learning how to be a forgiving leader in the workplace. She said in improv, as in life, if we want to collaborate well with the people around us, we have to have each other’s backs. In order to do that, we have to forgive.

Flack-Wetherald defined forgiveness as “the process of identifying limiting beliefs from a painful event and replacing those beliefs with ones aligned to your deep truth.” She walked the audience through her “proactive forgiveness process”:

  1. Alignment affirmation: Say to yourself, “I trust me. I trust you. I trust the process.” Flack-Wetherald said she likes to start her day saying that phrase out loud.
  2. Notice resistance: Acknowledge and allow all the feelings.
  3. Be curious: Ask yourself, “Where did this come from? What is it about? What are the limiting beliefs?”
  4. Release and realign: Take a deep breath and repeat the affirmation.

This article was originally published by Women in Retail Leadership Circle, sister brand of Women Leading Travel & Hospitality.