ENDANGERED ^TM  

Description: High quality teams are becoming an Endangered Species. The need to protect and nurture the team soon becomes very apparent to the aware leader. Teams that are left to their own devices from infancy can quickly become disillusioned and disoriented. Good team performance rarely happens by chance, it needs to be encouraged, developed and monitored. Many teams will have formed and reformed over their life span, and may in the process lose the characteristics that make them special and unique.

The "Endangered" Team Building activity involves participants in a physically challenging activity, which explores forms of communication and interaction and then provides the opportunity to analyze these in the context of the regular work environment.

In this program, tribal teams need to find the last of the endangered orangutans and bring them safely back to base camp in the local villages. Each team will have to prove their wisdom and courage to the tribal elders, locate and rescue the animals, and collect the necessary supplies, all the while protecting their endangered animals and supplies from head-hunters in the other tribes.

Teams will need to communicate to each other during chaotic times and be able to balance resources and time for effective problem solving. The whole team will have to learn to communicate between sub teams whilst simultaneously working on the macro and micro levels. They will need to develop adequate leadership, communicate methods and change strategy according to the changing environment. This environment will be dictated by uncontrolled circumstances along with pressure from other teams and the inherent nature of each activity.

Outcomes and Skills Developed: Multi-tasking and appropriate delegation, focusing on the macro and micro in dangerous circumstances, clear communication across distances, dealing with competitors and coping with change (as competitors change a good team must be able to adapt to the new situation)

Deliverables:

• A tool to learn the core competencies for effective team performance and measure them against the activity and work place environment.
• Understand how team performance can be increased.
• See how competitors' moves impact on an environment and how necessary it is to have a flexible team to cope with this.

Program outline:

Tribe-to-Tribe (2-4 hrs)

• Method: Outdoor activity

• 'Endangered^’ game.

• Teams/tribes of 10-20 have to compete to rescue an endangered animal and protect it from other tribes. (other teams)

Part 1: Solving the clues

• Each team is given a set of cryptic clues to prove their wisdom to the chefs (Tirian facilitators)

• Once the clues have been solved they will show the way to the endangered animals.

• Teams will need to use the clues to search for the animals and bring them safely back to their home tribe.

Part 2: Finding supplies

• Teams are to bring the animals safely to their base.

• Some of the team is to defend and protect the animal from other tribes.

• The rest of the team is to search for food. This happens by certain chosen team members traveling to stations outside of their home base where they complete an initiative activity in order to earn the food supplies. Competing teams will be trying to take the collected food supplies. As each team’s strategy changes throughout the activity, it directly affects all other teams, meaning every team must learn to quickly adapt to change. As this happens each team will then need to communicate this change process efficiently throughout the organization.

Part 3: Tribe-to-tribe

• Method: Outdoor discussion

• Tirian’s 3D approach to looking at what can be learnt from the activity and applied to the workplace

• Debriefing: Processing of the game

• The fusion of the optional morning session into the outcomes of the game

• Relating concepts to regular workplace experiences

• Action planning

Don Kennedy   
Vice President Sales 
Seagate Technology