The Play is the Thing

Photo Property of Humans of New York
This photo was recently featured on Humans of New York with the anecdote:
“Back in the 30’s, I used to go to summer camp in Maine. Those were the happiest days of my life. There was a great freedom. I rode horseback, walked in the woods, went swimming, made new friends.”
“What was your happiest moment at camp?”
“One time I won a tennis match and got 50 points for my team. The whole camp was divided into two teams: Green and Tan. And we competed all summer long to see which team could get the most points. And 50 points was a really big deal! To give some perspective-- you’d only get ten points for riding on the gunnel of a canoe.”
Taken in 2015--years and years later this woman remembers the points she earned for her team.

When we try to encourage companies to break their audience into teams at an event and have them compete throughout the three days--we aren't making the recommendation for the sake of frivolity.

Adding in team competition:
  • Makes an event more memorable
  • Increases buy-in and participation
  • Encourages organic networking
  • Is an extended team-building activity
There's no mention of which team won, or prizes. It's about the points she earned contributing to her team. That's a powerful testimony to friendly team competition that can--and should--be leveraged at corporate events as well.

For more Humans of New York, visit the facebook page or website.
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Flash Mob: A Team Building Flash-In-The-Pan?

Since we've been talking about Team Building (or teambuilding or team-building or teamBONDING) experiences lately, we thought we'd point out another team building trend: super trendy trends.

Some examples are team challenges/experiences like:
  • Create a "viral" video
  • Create a "mashup" of two songs that describe your company
  • Participate in a "flash mob"
It's interesting to see social media-influenced trends trickle down into the corporate world...about a year after the internet has stopped talking about them. It makes sense, in a way, that this is the time line. It does, after all, take time to build up best-practices and processes around these concepts.

However, the window of opportunity for these super-trendy team building concepts can be very short lived. There are some components of these ideas that have legs or that might work well as part of a larger context. Creating videos, for instance, is something that can be used in team building in a variety of different ways. It's only the colloquialism "viral" that gives it the trend-spin.

The danger, of course, is that these things quickly become passe or "corporatized" to the point where they lose that freshness that made them appealing in the first place. Let's take the flash mob, for instance. The idea behind a flash mob team building is that everyone learns the same steps and has to coordinate to come up with a final product. They then, at some point, perform this--perhaps during an interlude at an award ceremony, for instance. We've seen this now about a half-dozen times at various events and it has never failed to...well...fall a little flat. Flash mobs in and of themselves are/were originally delightful because they had an element of surprise. Some people--the dancers--were in on the mob, but the rest of the audience was amazed by this moment of socially-awkward-moment-turned-coordinated-effort. In addition to taking away novelty, the amazingly complex movements performed by a group need to be simplified, played down and cleansed for a corporate audience with various skill levels. And, truthfully, 80% of all executives we've seen performing in a flash mob looked tremendously uncomfortable.

Viral videos become viral because they have an almost-indefinable nugget of appeal. Something that surprises people and makes them want to watch and share the video. Part of the charm is in absurdity and spontaneity; a truly "viral" video is incredibly hard to manufacture. It is certainly extra-hard for your average meeting attendee, and most of the "viral videos" we've seen end up veering perilously off-message and into the inexplicably bizarre territory. Of course, there's the option to parody other viral videos, but that takes away from some of the creativity this activity is supposed to foster.

There are the same issues with song mashups, etc. The bottom line is that "trend" gets played out and loses its aim quickly when done for trend's sake. We're not arguing against fresh ideas and changing things up--we like that--but sometimes tried and true IS better than flash-in-the-pan. Or flash in the mob.
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Beyond Bike-Building: Making Team Building Better

It seems like, these days, everyone is doing a charity bike building team-building (or team-bonding, depending on how much vernacular you want to employ) component in their events. Heck, the recent scandalous G.S.A. event featured a $75,000 bike-building portion (which worked out to be $3k a bike...those must have been some very nice bikes).

Watching trends in team building is interesting to event professionals. Multi-day meetings have traditionally reserved an afternoon "outing" so the audience could have some non-event "reward" time. This could be a golf tournament, a spa afternoon, some deep-sea fishing...whatever. This was well-intentioned; the audiences were faced with hours of intense workshops or general session content, and in a meeting generally devoid of one-to-one content, interaction and networking (that didn't revolve around the bar) was needed.

However, this type of team building was seen as lacking a true business purpose, and as belts tightened it became more and more frowned upon. Meeting planners were faced with a dilemma: give the audience a chance to relieve stress and network--but with a business purpose. Team Building was born.

And then came ropes courses, build-a-bikes, scavenger hunts... you get the idea. It reflects an unfortunate team building trend--that it's something that is plugged into a meeting as an a-la carte element instead of something consistent with the whole. Not that the charity purpose is bad (it is absolutely not, and could definitely be part of a company's ongoing mission) it's just that people are not utilizing the full potential of team building.

A well-designed meeting has team building, sure, but it uses it in a different way:
  • Team building is integrated with the theme and content of the event. Is a major component of your event a new product? Sales training? The goals for the next year? You can--and should--use these as jumping-off points in designing team building activities. Use team building to build upon skills. That's not saying it can't be a bit lighter on the learning and heavier on the fun, but integrating team building with content produces a powerful punch.
  • Team building is not a 3-hour single event. Team building integrated throughout the event (i.e. putting the audience on teams and having multiple team challenges throughout the meeting days) can be much stronger both in team building and in overall audience engagement. You can still have the three-hour team building block, but it can be supplemented by other team building activities. Your whole event has the potential to build up your team--grab and use that potential.
  • Team building has meaning. You don't want your audience to walk away going, "That was fun, but so what?" or worse, "That was pointless, I wonder how much that cost?" Team building is an amazing opportunity to give your audience members a gift; of creative opportunity, of peer learning, etc. It should be relevant to them. The new wave of team building tends to be slightly more inclusive than the divisive "golf outing" wave, but hardly any of the messaging lasts beyond the event. I've never spoken to anyone who reminisces fondly with colleagues: do you remember that bike-building we did?
To be clear, we think that team building can have an impact and be a necessary, positive thing. It's a chance to bring people together, to forge bonds, to strengthen the organization through interpersonal relationships. But it shouldn't be a throw-away.
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Case Study: Amazing Team Building for Onyx

Company: Onyx Pharmaceuticals
Event: 2011 "Living Onyx" National Sales Team Meeting
Produced:
• An innovative game for introducing new executives
• An audience-response knowledge-check game
• An amazing teambuilding event that truly had an impact
Team: Live Spark Internal; Dan Yaman, Kristina Gooding, Missy Covington



Situation Overview: Onyx had three needs:

1. They knew they wanted to use an audience-response game during their event to engage the audience and review material. We had produced a similar game for them the year before with great results.

2. They wanted an engaging, entertaining way to introduce their new executives that both allowed them to give a bit of their vision for the company and also show off some of their personalities.

3. They wanted a team building event that kept people engaged, utilized the location of Marina Del Rey, CA, and that wasn't just another bike building or scavenger hunt.

Their audience was a young-but-experienced sales team who tended to have a rather cynical view of activities designed to elicit their participation--whether in-session or in a team building setting. Our challenge was to come up with creative solutions that were not only unique (never seen before) but that also had a deeper, relevant message.

Solution 1: Audience Response Game
In the pharmaceutical industry, it is critically important that everyone learn and retain certain compliance, pharmaceutical and policy information. You can test everyone to see what they know and don't know--or you can play an interactive, competitive audience response game that both illuminates the gaps and rewards participants for active listening. 

We custom-designed a game utilizing Onyx's theme graphics, brand and color scheme to create an engaging audience-response activity within the event. 

Each audience member had a keypad--so everyone got to play along. People were put onto teams by region, and the competition was fierce. As the percentage of the team that answered correctly was revealed and the scores rose (or failed to rise), the room erupted into cheering (or groans of disappointment). 

Solution 1 Result: Because the audience knew they were going to be engaging in a competitive game activity around the presentation content, we saw an increase in focus during the presentation and VERY high rates of information retention.

Solution 2: Getting to Know You Game Show
There were three brand-new executives being introduced at this event. Onyx wanted a way to break the ice--to stimulate conversation in the networking portions of the event--and to reveal some of the executives' vision for the company. 

We designed a customized game show that was part "To Tell the Truth", part "Dating Game" and all competitive, interactive fun. We sent out a questionnaire to the executives beforehand to elicit information on their hobbies, personal heroes, backgrounds, families, etc. The game had multiple rounds:

The first executive was brought onstage and the audience was asked a question about that executive. (I.e. On his day off, you're most likely to find [John Doe]: A. On a golf course, B. Surfing in the ocean, C. Drag racing, or D. Playing competitive backgammon). The audience (in their team designations) voted on which answer they felt was correct (using audience-response keypads). The answer was revealed, and the executive in question used that as a jumping-off point to elaborate and go into a 3-minute pitch on his vision. After he was done, the team tallies were revealed and the next executive was brought up to repeat game play. 

After the vision statement round, a series of questions were asked in which the audience had to assign certain characteristics, hobbies, goals, etc. to particular executives on stage. (I.e. Which of the following says that his personal hero is Sir Richard Branson? A. Steve, B. Joe, C. John.) The audience voted and the team tallies were compiled for a fast-paced round of about 10 questions. 

For the final round, the audience made a bet on a physical challenge: Which executive was most likely to putt a golf ball closest to the hole? The audience considered and entered in their bets. The bets were revealed--who did the audience think would be most successful? The executives then tried for a putt. Once the closest to the goal was determined, points were awarded to the audience with the correct bet. 

Solution 2 Result: The audience got a much better handle on the personalities of their new leadership, were able to have a little fun and establish some early rapport with the new executives, and were able to participate in a way that is usually not available when vision statements are being given.

The audience had very favorable feedback on the activity:
"Creative and engaging introduction to the team..."
"Great way to know more about where we're heading!"
"Nice way to 'get to know' some of our new team members..."

Solution 3: Persuade Me Team Building Challenge
We wanted a team building activity that went so far beyond bar-side networking, build-a-boat or scavenger hunt activities. This experienced group had been-there-done-that and didn't seem to think that team building could be an impactful experience in any way, shape or form. They also wanted to figure out some way to utilize their sales skills: to mimic the rapport-building that they, as reps, had to exhibit on a day-to-day basis with doctors in their field.

Then came the Persuade Me challenge; a team building event unlike any other. It was an activity that challenged their sales skills; their ability to quickly establish rapport, uncover information and maintain a positive relationship—all with a stranger.
Logistics: Teams were given three flip-cameras each and bussed over to Venice Beach, CA, where they had 45 minutes to complete their activity. They were then bussed back and prepared for their presentation.
Objective: They must persuade a stranger to share their human interest story with them. Their challenge is to interview a stranger and capture the interview on video; creating a moment of trust to come up with a deep interaction that is engaging, heartfelt and emotional.
This human interest moment can be a wide variety of things—at the discretion of the team--but should be something that one wouldn’t normally share with a stranger.
 
The Teams Delivered:
  ·     ONE clip—up to and no more than 90 seconds.
  ·     Given that each team had three cameras/crews to shoot, they had an abundance of clips to select from. Part of the challenge was figuring out a strategy to locate the most compelling clip.
  • The final clip was the best representation of the team’s interaction. It could be:
Humorous Heartfelt Moving Deeply Personal, Etc.
 ·     Each team delivered a final presentation (4 minutes) including the clip. They also described their experience, for instance:
   -        Setting up the video clip (What are we about to see/hear? What’s the story? Why is the clip compelling? Etc.)
   -        Describing the experience of your interaction
   -        Describing their strategy
   -        Illuminating challenges and insights (What did or didn’t they expect? What made them successful?)
   -        Describing what the team got out of this interaction
   -        Etc.
The teams were then scored on both their clips and their presentation by a panel of judges. 
Solution 3 Result: Teams produced some amazing, truly moving clips. They were able to quickly get into rapport with strangers on Venice Beach and capture wonderful human moments of humor, sadness, forgiveness, regret, optimism, etc. 
The audience said, of the activity:
"Taught me a lesson about judging people...also about collaboration amongst co-workers."
"Liked it...it was different and surprising!"
"Loved the teambuilding!! It was surprising. Really helped us use our skill sets to get people to open up! Key in sales!"
"Team building was fun and collaborative. Infused meaning into my work and added humility to my belief system."
"...an eye-opening experience"
"Loved it!"
"Outside the box!"
"Leveraged our strengths as sales people. Didn't know what to think at first, but it was fun!"
"Loved it! Helped us to focus on rapport--which I think we forget sometimes..."
And many more similar comments. It was definitely a hit.
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Teambuilding: You're Doing it Wrong

We recently were chatting with a client about their company's plans for the ubiquitous teambuilding portion of the event.

"We just want to let them go to the bar and network. They're so stressed out from sitting in the meeting all day that they need to relax."


It was like a needle-scratching-record in our conference room. Jaws dropped. Heads started to shake back and forth slowly in disbelief.

There are three things that are astounding about that statement:
1. The meeting was so stressful and packed with information that the attendees needed to medicate with alcohol. (To forget the event?!?)
2. Drinking is not networking, nor is it teambuilding.
3. This sentiment is more common than people might realize.

First off; your event should never be so jam-packed with information that your presenters must drink to forget their experience. Your content is presumably important--it should be metered out in digestible chunks so that it can be absorbed and remembered--NOT so it causes stress (and if it's not important enough to be remembered--why are you covering it?).

That aside, there are key elements that one should remember about teambuilding that will help produce the event's outcome:

Teambuilding should occur throughout the event. Three hours of teambuilding isn't as effective as teambuilding that is woven throughout the event. Give attendees a chance to bond (and a brain-break) with interactive activities sprinkled in between presentations. Dividing the audience into teams and having competition (with competitive elements like game shows, presentations, etc.) within the event is a great way of doing this.

Teambuilding should be carefully structured. An afternoon of golf doesn't bring your audience closer together. It brings a foursome who like golf closer together. It brings pre-existing cliques within the organization closer together. That's important, sure, but the strength of teambuilding is networking with peers that one might not normally come in contact with (but who can enrich one's working life through the contact).

Structure teambuilding to mix up regions, cliques, job roles, etc. Make sure that everyone has a role in a teambuilding activity so that no one is left out.

Teambuilding should be neutral. Not everyone loves a spa trip. Not everyone loves a ropes course. Some people (gasp!) hate golf. Pick a teambuilding event that is on "neutral" ground--that focuses on the team instead of the specific activity.

Teambuilding should support the content. There's no reason that you have to discard your content to do a teambuilding event. You can get just as much mileage out of getting your audience to present content in a fun way--to play with the content--in a team setting. It both suits the event objectives and is a bonding experience.

For instance, we'll occasionally have an American-Idol-Style evening event where teams have to come up with the best product presentation (using craft materials, creativity, and fun).



It's time to rethink teambuilding. Three hours of golf and spa is recreation, not bonding. If you want to bring your group closer together, get closer to what teambuilding SHOULD be. Raise the bar--don't congregate around it.
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