"Everyone is a host!" and other tips for creating impactful events.

Over 1200 people participated in 31 of our corporate team building events throughout the month of June.

Good news: attendance was much higher than average at 87%. In the last year the average was hovering around 75%.

The increase is due to a combination of 2 main factors:

1.??????More employers are making their team building events and meetings mandatory. This makes perfect sense because they are an important investment into their corporate culture and alignment.

2.??????More people are willing and able to get out there and connect with fellow employees.

Attendance is important, BUT…engagement ensures that corporate meetings and events have a lasting impact on your organization.

Trend: A new type of wallflower is in full bloom with no computer screen to hide behind!

The traditional wallflowers, made up of people who are more reserved, shy, and introverted, are to be expected because there are a lot of “new faces” among the employees.

Since it is natural to gravitate to familiar faces, we are witnessing an unintentional divide between the old and the new employees.

The more extroverted newbies will navigate their way into a conversation and connect with the “in crowd”.

This leaves the introverts and some of the recently graduated employees, who are far less comfortable integrating themselves into a group, in limbo between active engagement and disengagement.

The recently graduated employees have an unprecedented challenge because their last 2 years of university or first 2 years in the workforce post graduation was done remotely, and many simply do not have the practiced skills of in-person group work and collaboration (regardless of whether they are more introvert or extrovert).

Dare I say a new hybrid type of the wallflowers has emerged, one that can be introverted or extroverted?

Regardless of what brought one to the wall, the wallflowers we have seen recently are fueled by shyness and/or a belief that nobody really cares that they are there. They believe that if they don’t engage in the process, no one will miss them.

Trick: If you are a wallflower, start by flipping the script. Your brain is constantly trying to validate how you feel.

If you think you will be wasting your time at the meeting or event, your brain will help to prove you right.

If you think people will not notice you or care that you have attended, your brain will seek out situations to prove you right.

If you think you are not good at starting conversations, sharing ideas, or that your ideas aren’t worth sharing…you guessed it, your brain will be more than happy to help you fail every time!

Truth: Everyone is responsible for participant engagement.

A single host cannot effectively manage more than a dozen of people.

Here are some tips for helping everyone take responsibility for engagement:

Wallflowers, practice thinking differently.

Your brain will follow your lead.

You will start to act differently.

You will gain confidence.

Engaging in meetings and events will get easier.

Both you and your colleagues will benefit from you sharing your valuable insights.

Extroverts and natural leaders be patient with and stop dismissing people as introverts or wallflowers when they shy away.

By dismissing them you feed into exactly what their brains are seeking to help them justify not engaging in the first place!

You don’t want to risk losing out on the wealth of experience and knowledge they can bring to the table.

Event or meeting organizers, provide some tools to help people break the ice and start engaging with more than a few familiar faces.

Some simple tools include:

·??????Name tags. At the very least people should be able to start to placing faces to names.

·??????Name tags with an additional space under the sentence “ask me about” and provide some pens for participants to fill in the blank with a couple of key words.

My name tag would say Marc Merulla, ask me about Africa; Kayaking (if you want to know why, email me at [email protected] )??

·??????If you want to gamify the icebreaker, and not have to spend hours setting up the materials, here is an icebreaker we recently released called U-Turn:?

?Participants, come up with a few questions that you are comfortable with and use them to introduce yourselves.

After, “Hi, how are you? I’m Marc” a few lines that work for me are:

·??????“What do you like to do in the real world?” Be prepared to share a few things that you like to do such as hobbies, sports, or travel.

·??????“Where were you before joining this company?”

·??????If your group started off with an icebreaker like U-Turn (see video above), “Tell me about your fun fact” can then be a simple follow-up for the rest of the event and the next time you meet for work.

Leadership team, set the expectations by encouraging participants to be aware of the people around them and to make sure no one is left behind.

Reinforce this expectation throughout the meeting or event.

Final insights

Over the last 25 years in this business, I’ve seen too many team leaders be satisfied with the dissolution that they have the commitment and buy-in of all their colleagues because everyone simply nodded their heads in agreement in the hopes of being able to leave early or because they did not feel compelled to speak up.

A truly impactful meeting or event can only be achieved when you maximize participant engagement.

If conclusions are made and decisions are agreed upon with only 50% of the group contributing to the process, then said decisions are almost certainly doomed to fail.

Be a host! Actively look for ways to introduce people, make connections, and bring them into the conversation.

If everyone commits to being a host, chances are less people will be able to hang back.

Once the ice is broken team alignment can begin.

People will feel much more comfortable and willing to share ideas, respectfully challenge assumptions, and contribute to the overall process of achieving a common set of objectives during the event or meeting and beyond.

Here are some client testimonials from the month of June

"It was just too good a day. The employees loved it, and we all left with some great anecdotes and photos! I'd like to thank you for accompanying us so well on our BBQ Challenge. It really was a great day from start to finish! We came away with lots of memorable anecdotes and photos, thanks to the great camaraderie you instilled in our teams. We'd also like to highlight the excellent work of your employees. We look forward to seeing you again soon for another event!" -Tania Tavares, GAA

"A highly original experience that surprised the entire team! A great success all round! We'll definitely want to repeat the experience next year, under a different formula, and you'll certainly be one of the organizations we'll be turning to to explore new ideas!" Elise Dunberry- Transcontinental.

"The team at TBMOQ really cares that all members have a good time and even debrief with us [after Bikes for Tykes] to ensure the best experience." Maria Pan - Lassalle Elementary

"This was a great experience for our team to to go through. Long overdue but very welcomed; our team cannot wait to do another one. the Team from TBMOQ was knowledgeable. very easy to work with and accommodating. We truly cannot say how much that we enjoyed the activities and the takeaways can be applied to all aspects of the business. We can all learn from TBMOQ and Marc was amazing! THANK YOU!" Melanie Price - Ashfield

For more information about or programs please contact me at 514-907-2823 or [email protected].

Our websites are www.tbmoq.ca and www.BeyondTB.ca.

We are currently booking into September!