cooking & coaching

Recipes for success for your team

TARGET: Activities for team development in combination with an unforgettable event; learning a lot about oneself and the team in a very relaxed and entertaining atmosphere, which has nothing in common with daily work - at first glance.

TARGET GROUPS: All kinds of teams: new or established, permanent or temporary, internal or cross division, internal working structures or external cooperation. 9 - 17 people are ideal for such an event.

METHODS: Professional cooking for a greater number of guests not only requires the knowledge of preparation and cooking rules and a lot of creativity for a surprising meal, but also the ability to structure and manage a highly complex process.

The participants are backed by a professional team, which takes care of the culinary quality, as well as the delivery of the necessary ingredients and all other small details. We normally start the preparation of the 5-course-meal in the early afternoon; the end is up to you.

The participants are completely responsible for the sequence of the work process. A lack of professional knowledge to manage the cooking gives rise to uncertainty, which we amplify with the deliberate distribution of apparently arbitrary tasks, responsibilities and limiting factors. [The real team leaders can also participate, however on special duty.]

Time pressure, different levels of knowledge and quality expectations, as well as potentially colliding functions, easily lead to stress. The participants quickly forget the proven rules of cooperation from work. Consequently they tend to ignore the given tasks and a responsibility of managing the cooking process and everybody activates their natural conflict solving patterns.

The following morning we analyze the cooking event with the help of the observations of the trainers. Our very special analysis allows us to draw important conclusions for improving daily cooperation and communication methods, exactly because of the thematic distance between daily work and team simulation in a kitchen.

The training experiences can be supported and boosted by tests like “Belbins team role-plays” or more specific personality tests, as well as with our special 'team mirror'

EXAMPLES: The apparently arbitrary, but actually deliberate distribution of tasks, responsibilities and limiting factors is determined by the themes of your team:

• As a kick-off event for a new team: The coordination of tasks and responsibilities can be left to the team.
• If there are personal rivalries between team members, we for instance can split the responsibility for colliding targets, such as time and quality, between these people.
• Internal group building can be consciously reproduced by separating the team into two, one group for service and the other for the kitchen.
• If the target is to improve the cooperation with an external service provider we can let the aforementioned teams work independently from one another.

Disruptions from the normal work process will be deliberately installed as problems to be solved in the team simulation.

BENEFITS: An unforgettable nice evening, delicious meal, interesting recipes, sharing beautiful experiences, a new perspective on some colleagues and an important experience to improve the quality of the collective work.