Just before I went on my holidays we ran another of our Christmas Corporate Cooking events in the heart of London, Piccadilly. Another very successful evening which everybody enjoyed! This group were very keen on impressing our chef with their presentational skills and they certainly did impress us. The food looked and tasted very nice and the mulled wine was enjoyed by all. After an evening of preparing and cooking, eating and drinking the group then went on the enjoy the rest of their Christmas Party in the city and it was then our job to tidy up and pack away, never as much fun as running the event but we now have this down to a fine art so didn’t take us too long.

After a lovely week off over Christmas it is now back to work and feels like Christmas was already such a long time ago! Hope everyone had a lovely Christmas and a Happy New Year to you all and we look forward to running many events in 2009!

Elena Howe
Team Tactics
01227 738280

Our fabulous team of instructors advised the group and guided them into discovering the usage of Thai fruits and vegetables without forgetting the multicoloured spices! It was all hands to the deck and guests loved the experience of the culinary technique of Thai cuisine.

The smells were remarkable and I am looking forward to receiving the menus and I really fancy having a go myself though I still am not sure what the yellow block of (curd?) was. It tasted fab in the dish anyway.

Please feel free to have a look at flickr for all the photos. Failing that I attach a few here. Any persons reading this, I would like to suggest that if you are considering either some fun client event or indeed some staff (shh team building!), this is totally IT!!
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Finally Martin, I am so glad this met your expectations and I would love you to put your comments for readers, as it nice to hear it from the client’s perspective!

Tina Benson
Team Tactics
01227 738280

As with all events, you do rely on the venue to keep to the arrangements you have made however we were let down badly last week by Divo Restaurant SW1Y who were totally un-flexible on the menu and gave a very poor service on the night.  What with cold vegetables, their table not being ready when guests arrived and then being so slow that my guests had to leave for the theatre before having been served their desserts and coffee, we certainly won’t be using them again!

Having just fought my way into Canterbury, through the throngs of shoppers and long queues in shops, it’s hard to believe that we do have a ‘credit crunch’ on our hands however I know in London many have been affected.  I am sure we will all feel it somewhere along the line and Laura and I will be looking after our current and previous clients to ensure that if budgets have been cut, we will give you our experience and advice on what corporate events you could still choose.  There are plenty of options out there for the lower budget – cab clue trails, cooking, drumming, School of Rock etc – we will be happy to talk things through with you.

My last day is Friday until the January so I do hope all of you have a super Christmas and a very Happy New Year!

Hellen Kelly

Team Tactics

01227 738280

In a recent article in GK Business How Morale is important to a Business, The Chartered Management Institute’s director of marketing and corporate affairs, Jo Causon comments that those companies who STILL undertake staff xmas parties as a means of a thank you for all their hard work, is even more appreciated in a climate of of tightening belts.

Small things do matter. The cost implication of saying thank you and spending £100 a head (?) is worth so much more in terms of personal commitment to a company.

We had some parcels delivered today which were Bonsai trees given to everyone in our company by Production Plus. Thank you to David Austin. I can only say that the impact it had on me was hugley positive and meant so much more in today’s tough market. Production Plus didn’t need to do it but the whole company will simply love them! My only concern is that I don’t kill this beautiful Bonsai Tree that has been cared for all these years before being dispatched to a our household! Secondly I now wonder whether we should have done it ourselves?

Team Events for January?

Still considering doing something in January to banish those January blues and energise your team for the New Year..? Then look no further. We have just launched (officially 5 January) our corporate cooking event called The Corporate Cook-Off. You may have seen some another blog posted earlier when we all tried it out as a company in November. We loved it and have tweaked it here and there to present the finished product to the market. I am thrilled with this event as we can offer this all year to small or large groups and can easily combine with an off-site meeting or conference. It represents superb value for money and a cracking good team building event.

Lots more ideas such as Circus Skills workshop to potentially combine with a thrilling evening at The Royal Albert Hall to watch the renowned ‘Quidam’ by Cirque de Soleil. Or how about some treasure hunts around London, either the Cab Clue Trail or a walking based hunt called The Team Tactics Takeaway Treasure Hunts. Okay…still not convinced and want something perhaps to run in your office? What about some real energisers such as Drumming, Boomwhackers, The Haka. These events can be run in their own right or can be combined to create The Global Music Experience.

Whizzing off to another corporate cookery event so must dash.
Tina Benson
Team Tactics
01227 738280

This was the finding of the EIBTM 2008 Industry Trends & Market Share Report which was written by Rob Davidson, University of Westminster business travel and tourism senior lecturer. As he states that you can’t fire 20 managers and then take another 20 managers on a 5 star trip to Monaco. But there is a big BUT …. he also forsees that companies who are restructuring would hold more meetings and conferences to get the key messages out to employees.

I would share this prediction as we are seeing a large rise in events that are team building, almost energisers that will run as part of a meeting or conference.

For example, The Haka is very popular “It is disciplined, yet emotional. More than any other aspect of Maori culture, this complex dance is an expression of the passion, vigour and identity of the team. It is at it’s best, truly, a message of the soul expressed by words and posture..”

Then there is the hugely popular corporate cookery events that can be added onto smaller conferences and meetings. We find that, at £125 pp, which includes the entire team building event plus the food and the drink…represents fantastic value for money.

Ice Carving is another quick energiser as part of a conference, meeting or incentive. This events lasts approximately 1.15 minutes and is highly rewarding for the participants to see a lump of ice be sculpted into a horses head within 30 minutes. Okay, admittedly some do look like donkeys but the idea is there!

I could go on for ages about different ‘add-on events’ but this article was an interesting read. A rise in short lead-in times for events, corporates, he predicts will need to ‘do more with less money’. Also they may look to hold overseas events in the UK which is no bad thing. The British economy needs the money for sure!

Well, look no further than Team Tactics as we always try to find the right event for the chosen brief and we have a huge amount of cost justifiable events to offer clients!

Tina Benson
Team Tactics
01227 738280
www.teamtactics.co.uk

Our clients arrived to a reception of homemade mulled wine which our chef had prepared. The smell filled the room and with Christmas Carols playing in the background it all felt very festive. Our Head Chef then went on to demonstrate how the Christmas food would be prepared and cooked, the group were then split into teams and like Santa’s little helpers with their Christmas hats on started cooking and the wine began to flow. In their teams they prepared a whole host of festive food including a large Italian Christmas Tree cake with sparklers which tasted divine.

Once the food had all been prepared and cooked the clients enjoyed their feast of festive food accompanied by more wine, I even managed to taste some of the food and it tasted really good! For the grand finale we dimmed the lights and lit the sparklers on the cake, which went down very well and it looked amazing.

Everybody really enjoyed the Christmas Corporate Cooking experience a fun alternative to the normal Christmas party.

For more information on our Corporate Cooking Events please contact us and look out for more Christmas events for 2009, coming to our website soon!

Client Testimonial - “Overall the evening and event was fantastic. Our entire team had a great time and were able to get to know all the new members in a fun and relaxed environment and everyone enjoyed doing something different as part of our Chritmas party. The cost and value of the experience, considering we were in the heart of London was extreamly reasonable and would recommend it to others.”

Elena Howe
Team Tactics
01227 738280

There has been a lot written about how to improve the morale of people in the workplace. It involves making people feel valued for their contributions, being there to listen to them, and making sure that they get the support they need to do their work.
However, sometimes what is overlooked is that low staff morale is often a build up of lots of little problems that, as they accumulate, cause morale to drop because they have been overlooked. It can be a case of not seeing the wood for the trees!
Improving morale is the duty of everybody who has a supervisory role – from the Team Leaders to the CEO. Part of their role is to watch and listen. Team Leaders should be encouraged to share their experiences with senior management. More importantly, they should be listened to, as they are usually the ones who know what the real problems are.
Improvements in staff morale have big financial payoffs: happy staff are productive staff. If the changes needed cost $500, but your income improves by $1000, then you have more than covered the cost. You also have to remember that sometimes it’s a once off cost as well.

China Trade Information
Every day renews China’s trade information

Globally, it will continue to be negative next year in the human resource sector, especially for the auto, finance and construction industries, said China Miner Gorman, chief operating officer of Society for Human Resource Management, the world’s largest human resource management firm.
“It is time to take action to boost staff morale and the employers should be cautious before embarking on large-scale layoffs,” she said.
Currently, the “big four” have no plans to curtail campus recruitment. An email to PwC staff in October stated, “there will be no reduction in graduate hires. We are not going to make short-term, knee-jerk decisions to cut hiring, which we will regret in future years.”
PwC also confirmed earlier in November that it plans to hire about 2,000 graduates in China next year.

Branford Magazine – wordpress magazine

A great deal of energy is expended by many of the largest business corporations persuading us that they are truly committed to providing excellent customer service.
If my experience is shared by other consumers looking for reasonable service from businesses, shops etc, then these claims are hokum…I asked for directions to find a product in a very well known shop, and was told ‘to the left’ with the wave of an arm, and no eye contact. A little later, I had to wait for the privilege of paying for the item. Staff morale was obviously at rock bottom, and it was no fun to shop there, so people did not bother. Any senior executive could surely have seen and sensed what I did. Too obvious, I guess.
We humans are a gregarious species. We enjoy communicating with our fellows - we need to be needed. We are hard wired to cooperate, so helping one another should come naturally. But no, decision makers, out of touch with day to day life, seem to come up with formulas to better the business but forget what happens at the sharp end.

Blog re. Woolworths
Kickstart Business Performance. Supporting London’s Businesses

According to Abeo Consulting’s MD Derek Bishop, one of the main cause’s of Woolworths’ loss in profits is likely to be attributable to their customer service and had they drawn up a competitive analysis plan, it would have given them the ammunition to live up to the top dog title.
“Managers need to be walking with the staff on the shop floor, staying close to them, as this is a very traumatic time for them. With managers becoming more sensitive to staff, morale will boost leading to improved sales and more money to put back into the kitty. At the same time, staff will have a huge number of ideas on how things should be improved in order to make a difference to the customer – engaging them will have a positive impact for the business. The employees also need to be kept informed on the movements of the company, if it is to completely collapse, so they would get a chance to create a back up plan if necessary. This will also contribute to higher morale and respect”, explains Bishop.

“Customer experience is so crucial right now as retail sales are already under strain, let alone within Woolworths. They need to start focusing on the customer experience again and put unbeatable prices to the side”, adds Bishop.

Women in Business
Boosting Employee Morale in a Weak Economy

During this time of year, it is important to take all the energy from the holidays and turn weakened morale from the struggling economy into positive business. One way of upping the business morale can be found in encouraging staff development. As a business owner, you can find value in your staff when you involve them in the inner workings of the company. With the economy in the shape that it is, and the holidays quickly approaching, poor employee morale may be evident, but by making an effort to turn this into bonding energy, employees will be dedicated and driven to the CEO and to each other. Employees are a vital part of your business, and in stressful times, you don’t want them to feel as if they are competing to keep their jobs. Collaborative, supportive and strategic staff involvement can further your business and make your employees feel like a cohesive team.

Hope these have been interesting reads for our bloggers. Full articles can be found clicking on their titles.
Best regards
Tina Benson
Team Tactics
01227 738280

After a busy morning in the office, we all set off as a team to meet up with some of our long standing clients for a fun packed evening in Central London. We invited key clients to come and join us and test one of our many new events, the ‘Corporate Cook Off’! This was a trial for us so it was extremely important to get feedback from our clients as we strongly value their opinions and want to make sure we are offering the best possible package.

Our new cookery venue is in Portland Place, Oxford Circus and offers lots of space and a feel good factor. The kitchen was immaculate (six ovens, wow!) with all the fresh ingredients and fresh meats and fish, fruit and vegtables on display ready for us to cook. There were 16 of us altogether, so once we were split into our 2 teams, each team was given their own personal Chef and taken into a room where everyone discussed and chose the ingredients we were going to use to make up our dishes which we would then cook and then prepare for the opposite team! Once each team had chosen the 2 dishes (starter and main), it was back to the kitchen where everyone donned their cookery hats and aprons and the Cook Off began!

Team Tactics Team had chosen to cook their opponents a fish food platter to start and chicken stuffed with goat’s cheese and olives for main whilst HSBC’s team opted for scallops with a sweet chilli sauce for their starter and for their main, duck in an amazing 5 spice sauce.

Six members of each team were given 40 minutes to cook their starter and prepare their main whist the other 2 members stayed front house to set up the tables. We were able to use the most beautiful flowers and got to design our own fancy napkins and also got to make our own menus.

After sitting down and sampling the starters - which were amazing – the teams went back into the kitchen to finish their main dishes, which also tasted fantastic. I have to add here that there was a group in our team who headed off in the direction of the cocktail making. Big decisions required on what type of cocktail to concoct! Our opposing team suggested ours did look a little on the colourful side and strong (!!).

Once the teams had finished their three course meal, everyone was anxious to hear the results! The judges also tasted all the dishes that were prepared and the overall mark was given on the presentation of the table layout and the food and also the feedback from all team members.
And the winners were Team Tactics! But only by 2 points!

We all had a super evening and it was lovely to see familiar faces and enjoy an amazing three course meal that we actually made ourselves. I just want to say a huge thank you to all the staff and Chefs for working so hard making the event so enjoyable.

Laura Underdown
Team Tactics
01227 738280

The Rugby season is also in full swing with clients attending the England v South Africa game on Saturday a Twickenham. Do note that 2009 Rugby is on sale and boxes are going fast at the Millennium stadium for the Wales matches. Do chat to Elena or Tina if you have any queries.

A busy week ahead with a Boomwhakers and Haka event tomorrow plus Robot Wars and a plenty, so will give you all the details next week!Corporate cooking’s

Hellen Kelly
Team Tactics
01227 738280

After a busy day in the office last Thursday 13th November I made my way to Heathrow to the Park Inn Hotel where a conference was being held for a large company. We were holding our drumming event that evening which was a surprise for most of the 256 guests. Once they had finished their meal, in stormed the drummers. Guests were given drums which they used to participate in collective drumming routines which made the room come alive with the different beats and rhythms they created! It was a brilliant event which everybody enjoyed, the evening ran very smoothly and everyone seemed to have a lot of fun while making a lot of noise! Once the event was finished and the guests went on to enjoy the rest of their evening we had the delightful job of packing away all 250 drums which we managed to do fairly quickly!

Please contact us for more information on our drumming events, just one of our many team building events!

Elena Howe
Team Tactics
01227 738280