Humanitarian Project for Teamwork
Why not change your teambuilding "usual" workshop and ask your participants to work together on a humanitarian project to help children in needs ? It works so well !
A "Humanitarian Project" as Case Study for Teambuilding seminars
Context :
Teambuilding sessions require specific workshops to help Participants practice what they just learnt, or to help the group discover in which direction he still needs to progress.
Most workshops are in door or outdoor exercises, or specific case study. However they have one thing in common : they are more or less fictions, and short time. It's easy to forget once the seminar is over. Even in the case of extreme outdoor event, it is still « OK » to forget what has happened in the workshop. The linkage between Participants might be too low to resist to time and bad habits, once back on the work place. We wanted to make an unforgettable exercise, where learning is extremely high and fast, with visible results, and strong emotional content. We want to make sure that, once back on the work place, Participants do change their behaviors once for ever.
New seminar workshop :
The new workshop is a humanitarian project. Participants will use their new skills, intelligence, synergy to help Children in desperate needs in a tangible manner. The success will have an immediate and strong impact. The willingness to work as an "effective and innovative team" becomes immense : Participants want to help the children, and by working better together, they will help more. An orphanage, in an odd country, was selected. It was important to select a place where logistics is not easily available, where it is not easy to find money, and where any success is a real achievement. Bulgaria was selected after different tests, studies and travels.
Real example with SiliconGraphics Europe :
The group had the objectives to help an orphanage in Bulgaria. The process was developed taking into consideration the image of the Company, the risk for the children, the emotional level threshold, the security of team members abroad, the budget, and of course, the exact Teambuilding objectives. (we will keep them confidential).
New Teambuilding seminar Process :
Basic teamwork seminar with personality issues, work processes, communication issues, project mgt basics, etc...
One month after :
- Documents, information, names of contacts in Sofia are distributed.
- Travel to Bulgaria, visit of the selected orphanage, links built with children and social workers
- Resources allocated (car, tel, budget, etc...)
- Training session on : how to develop a fund raising campaign, how to motivate donators, legal issues
- Participants work out a strategy, a plan, and discuss the possible consequences
- Fund raising activity starts. The group manages the project progress.
- Clothes and food collected also.
- Group is coached permanently and evening feedback sessions organized with immediate feedback.
- Distribution process: how to make sure that food, money, etc... are not stolen by Mafia or by others ?
- The group then works on the long term effect : how to guaranty that the process will continue at least for a year to avoid children disappointment after such a nice treat.
- Most Participants went back home with a « God son or God daughter » and start a long term relation with small gifts, cards, pictures, pocket money, etc...
- Process on how to make sure that the group apply their new skills and attitudes once back on the work place. The Participants found it extremely easy . And still today, the effect are visible, nearly two years after.
Comments from Participants 3 months after the session :
- Bulgaria has revealed a lot about ourselves
- We are more organized, more efficient, we work better
- We have a nice feeling of accomplishment, as a team, we can be proud of what we did, and we know that we can do it again and again
- The experience impacted everybody and the group dynamic changed for the better
- Team spirit : now we know exactly what it really means, it was there, in Bulgaria
- We even see progress in our professionalism after Bulgaria
- Now we do help each others, and that is new. I discovered a fabulous supportive humane group
Safety :
The Participants were coached in a permanent basis. The rules were strict : nobody could go outside without being accompanied by one of us. It was forbidden to drive : Participants had access to local selected drivers with cars.
Local multinational companies gave us support. I.e. : Ernst and Young, Reynolds, SGS, and others helped us with specialists, logistics, experiences, names of contacts, funds, etc...
After :
The team spirit was much better after the session, and the effects are still visible. The group changed drastically, the links were much stronger, each one was dedicated to helping the other, etc... The subject of Children in needs is mentioned very often and that is a strong sign of anchoring : if you think about the program, you think about the team.
The effectiveness of the team is much higher than before, members solve their conflicts more openly, without delays, communication flows are much more effective, listening is real. A team spirit has been built, and it will last for long.
The emotional content is so high, and children are so marvelous, that Participants naturally decided to build a long term project. This is important to monitor because it helps in keeping the ethical consideration and in managing our responsibilities in front of extremely desperate human conditions. Participants know, when they travel back to their work place, that they did something very useful for Children, and we know that it is going to be long term. CSI Consultants makes sure that Children are not abandoned immediately after the project.
There are so many Children homes, in Europe, that need urgent help. CSI Consultants believes that using Participants intelligence and skill development in order to bring some happiness and hopes in the life of abandoned innocent children is a very good and useful way to learn. If you have doubts, please write to our Bulgarian children, they will tell you !
Budget :
Such a program is expensive. We have to prepare the logistics, to establish connections with key persons in Bulgaria (local social representatives, legal aspects, security, resources, etc...), Participants have to be briefed, specific teamwork basics have to be given prior to the workshop, they have to travel and to stay in a hotel, etc...
The duration of the whole process, for Participants, is 2 days for a specific teamwork session before, and 3 day workshop in Bulgaria.
Please contact us for a detailed proposal and budget, adapted to your group objectives.
Options :
If your budget is very limited, we are now developing a process with a Children home in France. The process will be identical, the needs are of course different, i.e. French homes have food and heat in winter, but they have nothing else. We are planning a teamwork project to offer vacation to the sea to the Children, as well as long term English teaching courses, to help those Children in their future : they may not have long years of school education, but they will know two languages, and in tomorrow Europe, that will help.