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Team Building

digitalumbrella — Mon, 19 May 2008 16:36:12 +0200

Team building is very definitely not my special subject. It requires years of training and practice to be a good business psychologist and build successful teams. It’s also an expensive luxury for small voluntary groups.

But in putting teams together to work on particular projects you can get good results by exercising a little bit of common sense. You need a variety of different types to get the best results – someone dynamic, someone innovative, an analytical/financial brain and a people person who will bring soft skills to the mix. It’s not rocket science........but it is if you do it really well.

Of course, sometimes you just don’t have the luxury of choosing your team. I’m off to Scotland at the end of the week with three friends in an effort to raise £25,000 for the Five Stars Scanner Appeal. This is part of a £1million effort to put a state-of-the-art MRI scanner into the new Manchester Children’s Hospital. This will detect rare cancers and other life-threatening conditions in very sick children.

Anyway, when you’re crossing Scotland coast-to-coast in 24 hours for a charity challenge, the team becomes self-selecting. I know my dog, Aster, best in the team – hard-working, resourceful, intelligent. Then there’s IT manager Chris Robinson, alias Christopher Robin – bags of energy, sociable, enthusiastic and loads of drive. He’ll be well outside his road runner comfort zone but he’ll do it. Then there’s former British and Commonwealth heavyweight boxing champion Scott Welch. I’ve only met Scott once so I can’t say I know him well. But you don’t achieve such sporting excellence unless you’ve got real guts, drive and determination. He ran across the Sahara for fun last year too. Finally, there’s financial advisor Austin Hutchinson – laid-back, sociable but with a sharp financial brain.

In team terms, we’re a pretty odd – even unbalanced – crew! But I think it’ll work as we all have the same goal......to raise loads of dosh to help sick children. If you want to know more or even sponsor us, go to www.k9c2c.co.uk

Finally, a very big THANK YOU to all those who sponsored me at Saturday’s CVS event. The total was £72!

Alistair

Great Day!

digitalumbrella — Sat, 17 May 2008 15:52:45 +0200

I think everyone will agree, todays event has been a great success and enjoyed by all. Highlight for me was the singing as well as being on the DU stand of course!!

Looking forward to next years special event!

SGP 2008 Photos

digitalumbrella — Sat, 17 May 2008 14:29:20 +0200

We've posted a few photos of the event so far and we'll be expecting quite a lot more as our resident photographer Peter runs around taking snaps. Watch out for him!

In the meantime, have a browse through the photos on the blog that we have so far. They'll be shown every now and then on the big screen as well!!

Group Dynamics Presentation

digitalumbrella — Sat, 17 May 2008 14:19:53 +0200

The day kickstarted with a presentation on Group Dynamics, given by the legendary Alistair Macdonald. He talked about the different types of people who you might find working with you in teams in the workplace.

It was quite a dynamic presentation (no pun intended), as Alistair gave examples of what the different types of people might be like, such as the Chairman, and the Idealistic workers.

Alistair will be blogging with us in a bit to talk more about the presentation and about his fundraising efforts for children who suffer from cancer.

Welcome to SGP 08!!

digitalumbrella — Sat, 17 May 2008 11:19:15 +0200

Digital Umbrella would like to welcome you to the Special Groups Project 2008 Event! We hope you have a really good time during your visit!

We have our own stand at the event, with this blog updated LIVE throughout the day! The blog is shown on a big screen in the main dome (as you can see) and we welcome anyone to post comments. Just ask Liz or Andy at the main Digital Umbrella stand.