In team building, N is for... ?

Into the 2nd half of the alphabet now with our A-Z series of all things team building, so we figured we'd celebrate with a competition.

And there will be opportunities to win EVERY month!  More on this further on...

This podcast series continues to reflect on themes cited by our clients in their reviewing sessions, following their experience of herding sheep - Raising the Baa style. 

Today's episode features topics beginning with the letter N. 

Each episode of our A-Z series of team building lasts around 10 minutes - just right for a (sheep)dip into each of the topics.

Expect plenty of sheep/shepherd/dog references from Head Shepherd and Founder of Raising the Baa, Chris Farnsworth, in these short and lively conversations with Paul Warriner, our Lead Facilitator.

Enjoy - and thank ewe for listening :-)

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COMPETITION TIME!

In the October draw we're giving away 3 of our highly sought-after sheepy re-usable mugs.  Help reduce waste and save yourself some money at many coffee shops too - what's not to like?

To enter simply answer the question below and email your response to baa@raisingthebaa.com, with Sheep Dip in the subject box please.

One entry per episode please, starting with M, released on 12th October 2022. 

So to kick off we have 2 questions:

(M) One topic beginning with M is mentioned more than any other in the episode - which is it?

(N)  Which theme beginning with N is discussed in the first half and re-visited later on in the episode too?

The draw closes at 23.59 on the last day of each month (Oct - Dec 2022) and we'll email the winners the following working day.  Open to UK residents only.

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FREE resource:
Sheep, Shepherd or Dog - which one are ewe? Take our personality quiz and find out.

Connect with the Speakers via LinkedIn:
Paul Warriner - The Recognition Coach and Lead Facilitator, Raising the Baa
Chris Farnsworth - Head Shepherd and Co-Founder, Raising the Baa

What are your main team challenges and desires? Maybe we can help?
Book in a 15-minute Exploratory Call now and let's see.

Transcript

Caroline (00:02):

Hello and welcome to Sheep Dip, the podcast from Raising the Baa. We're global leaders in team building with sheep at its core. I'm Caroline and together with my partner Chris, we co-founded this completely unique business. In this series of podcasts, we are bringing you the complete a-z of team building. It picks up on all the themes that have been fed back to us by our clients in their reviewing sessions, following their Raising the Baa programmes. And a few more topics of our own too. Expect plenty of shepherding references from Chris and he is in lively conversation with Paul Warriner, our Lead Facilitator. In this series, at the end of each episode, we are going to ask you a question. It'll be related to something discussed in the show. Keep your answers handy because each and every month we're giving away some Raising the Baa prizes. So wherever you're listening, you can enter. How to enter will be in the show notes. Enjoy the show.

Chris (01:00):

Hi Paul, how you doing?

Paul (01:03):

Very well, thanks Chris. And yourself?

Chris (01:05):

Yeah, good day. It's always a good day, especially in the morning, isn't it?

Paul (01:09):

It is indeed. The sun is shining bright on this particular occasion.

Chris (01:14):

Fantastic. So we're onto N. N for oh, negativity.

Paul (01:21):

That's a very positive start you've come up with there! How did you manage that one?

Chris (01:25):

Well, because I deal with dogs, negativity is something they don't understand. And actually to train a collie as I do, I find that actually any negativity is not helpful at all. In fact, it does the complete opposite of what you want. You can never really tell a dog off. You can only praise it for what it's done well. And I just sometimes feel that when you are working with people, if you took out all negativity and only gave them praise for what they did well, how much better would the world be?

Paul (02:00):

Praise is, uh, is certainly the way to go. But rewarding the behaviour that you want is the key skill. I think we've seen it in the exercises that we do. When there is a, a negative thought that runs around the group or somebody is acting in a negative way, it does tend to set the level and it's not long before an equalisation. Um, and you know, I think that's often misunderstood, when it comes to recognition and reward and things like that. I think positive behaviour is very good. It's not just the way of thinking, it's a way of behaving. So negativity's not a good place to be for success in a group activity. What about negotiate? N for negotiation in team building, what about that one?

Chris (02:56):

Well, we often see that, don't we? We see the negotiation of which idea is best and which idea is going to be deployed.

Paul (03:07):

I think it's, uh, team building in our context, in our events. I think there's a lot of negotiation goes on between the team members, between ideas which one gets adopted, the plan, or even where people stand and sometimes it's when we do other bits of the exercise, who gets involved with what, who lifts what, who does what. So there's a huge amount of negotiation and of course those people are skilled at that and uh, recognise what they want out of an exercise. They often do a lot better. But negotiation is a key element of team building. I think. Not just for the leaders but also for the team members.

Chris (03:46):

The amount of passion which you negotiate with is, is really key. Somebody with such a lot of passion, such enthusiasm when they negotiate, they put all of that energy into it, that gives it a lot more credence, a lot more oomph to the whole thing.

Paul (04:02):

It's a good point to be made within every team building exercise, one of the skills that you definitely need to deploy is negotiation skills. So you can learn, there's a subsection there. It's a whole new course on its own, I think negotiation.

Chris (04:14):

Yeah. But it's because it's a new experience, new being a another end, the new team, the new dynamics, everything is new and get that freshness. Wouldn't you say that's the real key?

Paul (04:30):

Undoubtedly. I don't know the percentage, Chris, you probably do. But 90% plus of the people that we have on our team event have never done sheep herding. So it's a completely new experience and a completely new environment. And that in of itself brings challenges that you can't replicate in a classroom.

Chris (04:51):

Very true. I think good old practical sense that you have to just get in and do it to really appreciate it, I think.

Paul (04:58):

And when you say get in and do it, you know, so, so much teaching and learning is done remotely these days in a virtual environment. In the good old days, it was in the classroom. This is a totally new experience with Raising the Baa that I think pushes people's capabilities to new levels, but also their connectivity to new levels. Because if they don't connect, it's hugely evident to the success of the exercise. So the newness of this, I think is something that catches people completely off guard and I think it's a great replication of what's happening in the business world. That's just the business perspective, let alone the enjoyment. Who's going to do sheep herding again for ticking a box? It's probably not on many people's bucket lists, but it should be.

Chris (05:51):

Yeah, very much so.

Caroline (05:54):

If you're enjoying listening to this podcast, we'd really appreciate your following us and rating Sheep Dip wherever it is that you tune in. And if you've got a burning question arising from today's show or you have a topic that you'd like to discuss in a bit more detail, then please email me Caroline@raisingthebaa.com

Chris (06:14):

But back to you Paul, what's another N for you?

Paul (06:18):

Actually nurturing. I'm gonna pick up on that one. Nurturing. Often we see people come in very nervous, another N and not really sure what's going to happen. And there are other people that take the lead and it's important for those people to nurture and bring on people who are less confident. And you see that in many cases where people are not sure and they just build and build and build and there's the group have nurtured them into that new position of confidence where they feel comfortable and competent of doing the tasks that are involved or that they've been asked to do. So as with any team, I think nurturing people along that particular journey to be a brilliant team member is really important. This is a perfect environment for that. And it happens all the time.

Chris (07:10):

Of course, the sheep nurture their lambs and look after them incredibly well as well as we nurture the dog. I love that one. Nurture. That's such a good word, isn't it?

Paul (07:21):

It is. And because it's wholesome and you talk about the sheep and the dog, you are coming at it from that perspective, but if you don't, you don't get the best from people and not everybody's at the same level, same standard, same attitude, same level of confidence, and you need to bring people along on that particular journey on the particular day. And it's a really great thing to see when a team has nurtured everybody to success.

Chris (07:52):

I always say that when you get a young puppy and so the whole life is in front of it and it's how you train that dog. And often people say to me, oh, you, you give it the old dog to look at and then train it off the old dog. And I go, no that's not the best thing because the old dog will have a few bad habits. And then if you show the puppy the old dog and it follows the old dog, then it picks up the old dog's bad habits and makes a few more of their own. And so actually you get this progressive downward spiral or of a culture that you don't want. So actually when you've got a clean slate, it's really important with a young puppy to actually go out and actually train it on fresh sheep and actually not starting those bad habits that the old dog had.

Paul (08:48):

On that particular note, I don't know where this comes in in the alphabet, but if a team is doing things and they're not working, it takes a great effort to change that approach and have it adopted and move forward in a completely different direction. Otherwise you just get this accumulation that you've just described, that a continuous behaviour that breeds the wrong kind of outcome that you are looking for. And we've seen it where people just go down a burrow and they just keep going down one particular track. It's so difficult to break that behaviour. And I'm sure that's not in this particular letter for the team building, but it comes on that building on bad behaviours or poor behaviours or poor results. And it takes a lot of courage to sort of stop, draw a line, go in a completely different direction.

Chris (09:43):

That's, that's really hard to do with the dog, is to stop it doing what it wants. It can be done, but it takes an immense amount of consistent negotiation with a dog to actually sort of stop it doing it. I mean, I remember one dog in particular always used to work on my right hand side and it was quicker to go right, right, right to go left. It's quicker to send it round one way than to actually, but over a period of time you can correct that. But it, once that habit is in place, it is really hard to change it. And I imagine that the dynamics with a team is exactly the same.

Paul (10:23):

I think we'll put that one under the N for negotiate.

Chris (10:26):

Yeah, very good. Paul, brilliant to talk to you as always. Loved our conversations and I'm looking forward to the next time.

Paul (10:35):

Likewise, Chris

Chris (10:36):

Speak soon.

Paul (10:37):

Bye

Caroline (10:38):

Well, I hope you've enjoyed the show. Thank you so much for listening. Did you get the answer to the question? Keep it handy because at the end of each calendar month, we will be doing a draw of all the correct entries. Full details of how to enter are in the show notes. Till next time, have baa-rilliant week. Bye.