Sales & Marketing Professional Magazine - March 2002
The Magazine of the Institute of Sales & Marketing Management
When it was deemed that Channel 5’s senior sales executives needed development prior to
the busy season, the broadcaster’s management opted to send them to darkest Africa – under
the auspices of UPH, a new consultancy set up by rugby international Rory Underwood,
fighter pilot and Gulf War PoW John Peters and
combat survival expert Martyn Helliwell.
Moments after the luxury of BA Business Class, the intrepid group found itself in
buff-coloured amphibious 4 wheel drive safari trucks with canvas roofs, the ubiquitous
spare tyre, shovel and fuel cans strapped snugly to its frame.
Click on images to enlarge
They drove north out of
Malindi, past the numerous beach clubs and hotels knitted to the white, sandy beaches
that melted into the warm Indian Ocean. Sixty minutes later, the party turned off-road,
and drove another four hours into the
savannah. This took them deeper into the unknown, via ramshackle wooden bridges over
rivers that seemed more theme park than reality, past elephant tracks and through spiked
bushes that whipped at the trucks – into an ever-darkening night sky until they were
absorbed into the forest.
The drivers drove maniacally through the bush until they broke
into a clearing under a crystal-bright full moon to a river’s edge.
Down in the jungle
Long boats with large outboards at the rear floated mystically in the water.
The dark river was clear and shimmering and snaked ahead as the warm mist of spray
tickled the group’s sense of the unexpected as they passed crocodiles sliding into
the water and submerging hippopotami.
Breaking the final curve, golden light became
visible, apparently hanging in mid air. The welcome of bleached wooden thatched African
huts awaited, perched upon huge white sand dunes on the delta between the river and the
Indian Ocean.
The adventure had started. The mind was clearer and work began. Interviews and
questionnaires prior to departure provided an intensive audit of the group, which
was developed through psychometrics, strategy workshops and facilitative sessions.
The outdoors provided the theatre for motivation.
The workshops were the reality
and focus for change, with practical leadership tests in a night's survival exercise
out in the bush in order to consolidate the group's management skills.
Does it work?
There has been much discussion on the validity of outdoor management development.
It has become a hybrid recipe of business strategy and physical challenge, focusing
and validating the exercises to the office environment. But what benefit is gained?
How can this relate to the real' business world? This unreality provides the most
powerful business advantage for the senior team time to think, to reflect, to learn
and to play. Away from the pressures of leading the business, it allows the time to
reflect. The 'unusual experience' engenders in a person the need to talk, to share,
to enquire.
The unique combination of experiences beyond the motivational speech' share and create
a real business solution. The power of the setting, the isolation, the of the very real
(and truly wild!) nature provides the inspiration without the forced scenario.
Real organisational change starts from the individual his or her own realisation of the
need to develop. Subtly facilitated, these revelations, values and relationships are
investigated and enhanced. Experiences are shared, solutions are drawn, strategies
developed and motivation reinvigorated.
Such programmes offer an original experiential learning environment, including theory
lectures, psychometric analyses and desktop exercises.
Links with universities have
given their methods a sound academic base, which are reinforced through practical
application during the outdoor exercises and transferred to the workplace through
coaching. This training is not taken in isolation, but as part of an organisation's
Human Resource strategy.
The mix of adventure, unreality and business consultancy produced some serious results
and provided sonic seriously good ripping yarns that began to be massaged and exaggerated
during the return home in the luxury of Business Class with a gin and tonic in hand.
The very real solutions, however, were reinforced back in the workplace through coaching.
The relationship of trust had already, been heartily established. Travel broadens the mind
and produces effective business solutions.
into Africa
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