Background of the Charity Teambuilding and Speaking Event
80% of our work is presentation and public speaking skill coaching and training. The other 20% is usually sales training, keynotes, and – in today’s case teambuilding. Specifically, a Corporate Charity Teambuildung and Speaking Event
Everyone has participated in (or at least knows something about) teambuilding events. Usually, a company books someone to come spend a day getting employees to do strange activities together i.e. building towers of furniture or trying to guess someone’s favorate color. The Impact teambuilding events we offer are similar to this too, but with a unique charitable twist.
In July 2019, I facilitated an event for one of the oldest and most established companies in the insurance industry. 120 people coming from over 18 countries, all having just finished their initial training, were in attendence. Their employer wanted to give them an energetic and memorable start to their new career.
Our hybrid charity teambuilding/speaking event is designed so that employees learn to work together better. But at the same time, they also improve their communication skills, both individually and well as communicating as teams, and between teams. And the best part is they’re supporting a worthwhile charity with their efforts.
In this case, it was Action Enfance, a French non-profit organization running a group of youth-homes for children and young teenagers who have been removed from their families for various reasons (i.e. domestic violence, neglect, or substance abuse).
Our collective goal was to donate, by the end of the day, 55 completed teddy bears. Each of them complete with a super-hero uniform and personal backpack, to the organization to be distributed among the children.
Kickoff
So, at 1pm, I kicked off with a short opening, and then showed them this short video from Benoit Revillion, Head of Partnerships for Action Enfance, explaining the organization, who they are, and what they do.
People were now fired up! The usual teambuilding activities were now worthwhile challenges. There is nothing like a common higher purpose to unite a team and inspire them to peak performance.
So now we got to the good stuff –the challenges. The first challenge was developing individual networking and self-presentation skills. We gave people 10 minutes to meet and greet their new co-workers (with an introduction time of 20 seconds each before switching to the next person, so in total, meeting 30 people). We gave them advice on how to network, introduce themselves in a memorable way, and memorize names quickly, then set them loose. Afterwards, one participant was able to remember 23 of her new co-workers’ names! And not only that, but also remembered a small fact about them. Not bad! In 2nd place, someone could remember 19, and another 17. Impressive.
The Challenges
Upon getting to know each other, everyone went into teams to take on a series of challenges. We created the teams so they were international and professionally diverse with a mix of nationalities and fields of expertise.
Our first team challenge was getting on stage and introducing their team in the most memorable way possible. Here are some photos of the teams getting on stage and giving their best group presentation for the “judges” (who were non-participating members of the company).
As you can see, some of them got quite creative, and had a lot of fun with it! As we did not specify against using multimedia, one team decided to put the audio and visual equipment in the hall to good use, winning themselves 1st place.
We went on to do 3 more challenges, and at the end of each challenge, teams received a component to create the teddy-bears. The winning teams would get a head start on the building time, so teams had to pull together to get ahead.
And on to the fun stuff:
Then finally came the highlight of the event, creating the teddy-bear. Each team stuffed their bear, put his superhero costume on, and wrote a short note to the child who would receive the bear with words of encouragement and support.
Here we are at the end, all 129 of us, thumbs up and celebrating the end of a successful event.
Right after, me and 2 of the managers at SCOR then hopped in a taxi, along with the 55 large stuffed teddy bears (drawing interesting looks from the driver and pedestrians peering into the taxi along the slow drive through rush-hour downtown Paris traffic). We headed to the Paris headquarters of Action Enfance where our gift was gratefully received on behalf of the children in their care.
Do you want a fun, exciting event which both boosts your team morale and performance? While supporting a worthwhile children’s charity? New employee inductions, sales meetings, manager conferences, annual events – whatever the situation, we have a set of challenges and program which will be the stuff of conversations for years to come. To find out more about the program, get in touch with us today.
