Team Building with Sogeti

Last Updated (Monday, 29 June 2009 13:37)

Quest were delighted to be asked to work with Sogeti again in mid June to deliver a team development programme for the third tier of their overall Consultant Team

Building on the programmes delivered for their graduate consultants, the primary objectives for the programme were that it had to test the team's leadership skills and present them with some very stretching challenges.

SPEED - Race Against Time

Working out of the Oxford Spires 4 Pillars Hotel, Quest delivered a bespoke version of a one day 'Speed - Race Against Time' event:

Following an initial fun ice breaker to assist the delegates in another of their aims, (which was simply to get to know one another), the delegates were then started as one complete team, and given a detailed and complicated briefing document. The event HQ countdown clock was simultaneously started, and the delegates quickly realised that they had 345 minutes to complete the challenge and stop the clock and avoid a very loud exploding noise!

Concurrent Taxing Team Building Activities

From the briefing the delegates were informed that they had a number of diverse and taxing team building activities to solve and achieve, and the completion of each one would then provide them with credits which would be needed to complete a final activity. They quickly realised that they needed to appoint a Management sub-team that had to rotate every hour to manage the event HQ, and they also needed to form a number of other sub-teams to enable them to tackle multiple challenges at the same time. In addition they were told that the activities were spread all across Oxford and the immediate surrounding area, and that they only had one seven seat vehicle in which to move the sub teams around. The final stretch for them was that the activities all had limited "opening" times. For example the casualty evacuation challenge opened at 10.15 but closed at 12.00, and it was situated across the other side of Oxford!

The first appointed management team quickly took firm control of the Team Building event HQ and produced some very impressive wall mounted control boards whilst at the same time sending sub teams off to tackle a number of the challenges. All was working extremely well until mid morning when the management team realised that the vehicle was urgently needed for moving a sub-team to the reservoir and it was being used to bring another sub-team back from the punting challenge.

Strategy & Effective Management Was Key

As the HQ management team rotated they quickly addressed that problem, and although penalties were incurred for completely missing an activity, performance at the LandRover recovery and other activities resulted in crucial credits being clawed back.

Working on into the afternoon, challenges were steadily completed and with an hour to go on the clock, all of the team was back functioning as one team to complete the giant 3D cube puzzle. Impressively, enough credits had been earned to release all bar 3 of the puzzle pieces, and those missing parts were provided after the penalty time had been passed.

The event was a resounding success. Once the clock had stopped the delegates were divided into two sub-teams and worked through a thorough and searching self lead review session. The crucial importance of effective leadership was acknowledged and discussed at great length as was the importance of clear and effective communication and methodical and systematic planning.