Gary Hirsch

Gary is the co-founder of On Your Feet, a consultancy that collides business and the arts. He uses improv to help organizations generate new ideas, collaborate, engage audiences and walk their talk...all while having a ridiculously good time.

18 years ago Gary and his colleagues at On Your Feet noticed some striking parallels between improv and organizational life. Improvisers are simply teams of people that work together to create something (a story) to satisfy a customer (the audience) under extreme time pressure (instantly, on the spot). They must step out into uncertainty, work in a state of constant change, and co-create something coherent and entertaining. Based on this observation, Gary and the OYF team have designed customized, improv training, keynotes and workshops for clients such Nike, Intel, Disney, Apple, Daimler, The British Ministry of Defense, and others.

Gary is also a visual artist and the creator of Botjoy, a five-year visual experiment that uses over 30,000 large and small hand-painted robots to explore collaboration, inspiration and how art can help. Gary’s public works can be seen in Boulder, Dallas, Melbourne and in his home town of Portland.