Human Resources & OD Teams

The Bohemian Rhapsody Team Meeting
 
Team

Team Leader: HR-Learning Director for EMEA Region and his extended team.

18 executives from 16 countries.

Objectives

Designed for a team of EMEA Learning Professionals, the aim was to bring together an extended regional team across various businesses in order to work on some specific objectives:

  1. Develop action plans in response to Internal Customer Surveys,
  2. Explore and practise some Organizational Development tools, and
  3. Set down some clear team priorities and objectives for the next 12 months.
Solution

2 day - 2 night team meeting in the Bohemian forest 1 hour north of Prague.

Diagnosis and planning included a survey of the team as well as their internal customers across the region (prepared, analysed and presented by D&B).

The environment we chose was unique, and carefully selected in order to help bring together an extended team, whose job it is to provide learning tools and create learning environments for their internal customers. A beautifully restored 17th Century Barn in the Bohemian forest one hour north east of Prague provided us with a cosy and intimate environment for both work and fun.

Our working sessions were interspersed group workshops and with some simple D&B activities designed to help build team communication and commitment. These included a wine tasting session of local wines, a good hike through the forest to Korkorin Castle for a picnic, and an evening barbecue at the Barn with swimming pool, sauna and hot tub.
Inspired Guests

Our Inspired Guests included Mike Perna, an Organizational Development (OD) guru who is an internal consultant to the Company’s Aerospace Division and who has many years of experience with a variety of international firms, including Motorola.

Bérénice Hillion-Bourbon: expert in OD from within the company. Bérénice brings not only competence in OD, but years of experience within the group, the function and the region.

A Bohemian wine expert: presentation and tasting of regional wines.

Results
The meeting was a resounding success: all the objectives were met.
Comments

The Team Leader:

  • “This was a new approach for us, we were exploring a new way to get our team aligned and we were very impressed with the results. Significantly changing the scenario and breaking some rules guided by D&B helped us be more creative and increased our overall alignment”.

One of the team members:

  • "It has been a great experience in building stronger relationships between team members. I will recommend this experience to other people and hope to do it again in the future."
Inspired Guest, Mike Perna:
  • "I found Rod and Robert`s manner, style etc... very welcoming and comfortable. Great at creating a non-traditional learning experience and building community. This is great to see / experience so that those unfamiliar with this can see its value. This type of authenticity I find an asset to creating a learning organization."