First published as a cover story for Glo Life, Globacom’s staff/customer magazine in November 2019
By John Awe
Teamwork makes the dream work
-Bang Gae
But then a mail went out in the tail end of April to 100 staff members informing them they would be participants in the first of a series of team-building events that would form a basic component of an elaborate staff engagement strategy. The strategy was being spear-headed by the Executive Vice Chairman, Mrs. Bella Disu.
Now, the jigsaw puzzle was falling into place. Indeed, there had been a foundation; an enchanting New Year missive sent directly to every staff from the desk of Mrs. Disu. That, too, was a bolt from the blue; first of its kind.
In that mail, Mrs. Disu had expressed the commitment of Globacom’s management to develop “our most important asset: You all”. That message signposted the beginning of a new more interesting chapter in the history of Nigeria’s fastest growing telecom company.
The team-bonding idea interlocks firmly with that inspiring January email, promising renewed drive towards staff development and empowerment.
“I got the invite and said ‘Wow! Is this real, or is it some mistake?’”, Ayotunde Olaoye of Admin told Glo Life. “I honestly wasn’t exactly sure it was going to happen until I got there and saw the unmistakable Glo buttons everywhere.”
The D-day was April 27th, at the upscale Upbeat Recreation Centre, Lekki Phase 1, Lagos. Kick-off time was 10 am. Early birds started clocking in from 8am. By 10 am, the main hall of the recreation centre was bursting with enthusiastic Glo staff members drawn from all Globacom departments across the country.
The facilitators were a combination of internationally-certified life coaches from the Olusola Lanre Coaching Academy (OLCA), arguably the number one firm of life coaches in Nigeria, and the coaching crew of Upbeat Recreation Centre. While the OLCA team handled mainly the cerebral aspects of the exercises, the Upbeat coaching crew took care of the physical exercises.
By 10:30am, registration of participants, anchored by Mrs Jumoke Aduwo, had been concluded and the much anticipated team-bonding experience began with the introduction of the OLCA General Manager, Tolulope Afonja by the Head of Human Resources, Mr. Wole Ayanleke, supported by Mr. Femi Kolawole .
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| Brief side conference to agree final event details. |
Mrs. Afonja gave a brief introductory talk and launched the class into its first activity tagged ‘Know Thyself’. It was an exercise designed to find out things about your colleagues that you would not know in the course of a strictly formal official interactions.
Participants were required to learn as much as possible about the most number of participants in the shortest possible time.
To achieve this, a worksheet with various adjectives or descriptions was handed over to every participant. The adjectives or descriptions included Multilingual, Foreign, Owner of Dogs, etc. Participants were requested to find colleagues who matched the adjectives or met those descriptions and get such participants to write their names on the sheets and sign. The participant that could get all the descriptions signed the quickest was assured a gift.
The hall exploded in an orgy of excitement. Everyone wanted to complete the task in the shortest possible time. What followed was some 20 minutes of delightful bedlam. If you easily knew a colleague who was a foreigner, it was not so easy to know one who had a dog. You needed to work hard to get that one. Participants hopped from one to another, asking questions.
Soon, a winner emerged in Mrs. Jumoke Aduwo.
However, at the screening stage, one of the people who signed Mrs. Aduwo’s paper didn’t quite meet one of the descriptions. So, the lot fell on the staff with the second best time, Amaka Oruche of Legal. She was adjudged the winner.
Thereafter, Life Coach Chukwuemeka Ezeogu of OLCA, gave a brief presentation, entitled “Effective Team Dynamics”, which dealt with the basic components of functional teams.
Done with some theory, the team poured out into the field for some live action. As the American philosopher, Ralph Waldo Emerson, once opined, an ounce of action is worth a ton of theory.
On the pitch, the early morning sun was not enough to deter participants from having fun with music-aided aerobics. It was a delight to see staff working out together regardless of cadres or designations. It was one big happy family.
For the purpose of group-based activities, the staff had been divided into four colour-coded groups, namely, Blue, Orange, Purple and Green. Each participant was branded with a matching ribbon representing his or her group for easy identification. The first group-based competition was tug of war.
Team Orange was pitted against Team Blue. Heavyweight in Team Orange’s line-up included the heavily-built Ayotunde Olaoye of Admin, chiselled-torso Pastor Ike of Technical, athletic Akin Akinsanya of Enterprise Business, towering Mustapha Omotayo of Gloworld, barrel-chested Dipo Olusanwo of Sales, and the sprightly Temitolu Temidara of Events, among others, while Team Blue boasted formidable figures such as the bubbly and sturdy Dolapo Samuel of Advertising, among others. Team Orange won effortlessly.
Next, Team Purple squared up against Team Green. Purple boasted heavyset Omotayo Seriki of Marcoms, dainty Seun Adesunmi of Business Unit, athletic Emmanuel Bello of Mrs Disu’s office, and energetic Kunle Bamgboye of Technical, while Team Green had burly Femi Opadere of Media and sporty Ugoje Oghenemaro of Gloworld, among other fit athletes. Team Purple won.
Blue and Green squared up, Blue won to take the third place.
In the final showdown, the two winners squared up against each other to decide the first and second place winners. Basking in the euphoria of an emphatic trumping of Team Blue earlier, Team Orange filed out in their winning formation. Hefty men such as Pastor Ike and Dipo Olusanwo stood like concrete pillars at the front. Ayotunde Olaoye provided solid reinforcement somewhere in the middle while the rope was anchored on Omotayo Mustapha in the rear. This team looked intimidating.
Team Purple came out in their own winning formation as well, anchoring the rope on Omotayo Seriki. Consequently, by some serendipitous arrangement, it became a battle of the Omotayos, each of them determined to win the day for their respective teams.
Seriki, with an army camouflage face cap perched on top of his head cut the picture of one determined to take no prisoners. He wrapped the rope around his waist and adopted the pose of a professional sumo wrestler. One swift tug later, it was all over. Many of the Orange men were prostrate on the pitch. Pastor Ike’s six packs and Dipo Olusanwo’s huge biceps were unfortunately of no avail in this instance. That Purple team had the towing force of a Ford Expedition!
The Glo team had a number of other interesting physical activities, including the one called ‘The Web’, anchored by internationally-acclaimed Coach Kolade Stephen from OLCA. The activity emphasised the importance of collaboration in execution of tasks by teams.
Back upstairs, the team indulged in many other fun activities, including jumping on trampolines, competing in a foam pit race and so on.
One of the high points of the experience was the award of N50,000 gift vouchers each to about 30 staff members who had distinguished themselves in the discharge of their duties. On hand to present the gifts was Mrs. Disu. She was assisted by Miss Shade Mike-Adenuga and Mrs. Maria Svensson.
The team subsequently listened to an OLCA presentation on the importance of listening in effective communication before calling it a day.
Many of the participants described the totality of their experience as ‘awesome’.
“I have learnt a lot about team-building. I’ve learnt a lot about collaborating. It has been an amazing experience,” said Amaka Oruche of Legal.
Dipo Olusanwo of Sales described the experience as ‘wonderful and one of a kind’. He said he met and interacted with people who had been in the company with him for 16 years without them meeting.
Indeed a cross-section of the participants expressed their gratitude to Globacom for organising the event and prayed that more of the exercise be carried out in the future.
