It was a recent work conference weekend that I started to appreciate the value of team exercises, which bosses are so keen for their employees to participate in. It had been an average two day conference with too much coffee and too warm in the room with the overriding desire to fall asleep all to prevalent. It was typical work conference for so many places of work.
It was the least speaker that made the candidates sit up and take real notice. His expertise was communication and how best to utilise it. It was during his talk that he made us participate in an activity using blindfolds. Simple yet effective, the exercise involved sitting around in a circle blindfolded. Everyone was given a shape of plastic Perspex some of which had different shape holes in the middle. The idea of the exercise was that the group had to work out which piece did not have an exact copy someone where within the group. It really was a test of our communication skills. These skills are ones that we use everyday without even thinking about it. Sometimes this is successful sometimes its not. By removing some senses we were all in the same situation, and had to have a chance to explain ourselves thoroughly, for a chance of group success. This is something that our work team are now doing on a daily basis. We have removed many assumptions within our lines of communication and the office is thriving.