Manager's Conference

Parabeagle

Okay, boys and girls, I need help. We are hosting our 3rd annual hospitality manager's conference for our general managers and bringing them all to Portland from the four corners of the globe (well, at least the country, anyway). The festivities are October 21-24 and HR has 5 hours to fill. I have my PowerPoints done and my notes ready, now all I need are some icebreakers, humorous anecdotes, practical jokes that won't result in serious injury, etc. Any assistance would be appreciated.

HRQ

I recall an post about having everyone draw pigs. The shape of the tail told volumes about the individual...

OINK OINK

HRQ

Here's one from an HR conference (hotel people, even!), which worked for a large group (around 200?) but could also work with smaller groups.

- Give out ball caps. Participants form teams by finding others with the same color cap as their own.
- Advise group that the seminar facilitators each have a stock of lapel pins. (Faciliators wear same shirt or same color hat so they stand out)
- Goal is for teams to get the most pins by doing whatever it takes to "earn" a pin from a facilitator. The faciliator determines whether or not a pin is earned. Set a time limit - maybe 15 minutes.
- In our case, pins were earned by begging, pleading, dancing, singing, doing push ups, bribery, quoting the company's mission statement, correctly answering questions about the company's history, policies, benefits, etc.
- Some pins are worth one point, and some are worth more. Pins ranged from happy faces to a company logo service pin with diamond chip. Participants were not told the point-value of the pins until the points were tallied.
- Team with the most pin-points wins the prize. In our case, our team won t-shirts made especially for the event.
- This activity could easily be modified using different "tokens" instead of pins, using trick-or-treat bags instead of hats, etc.

This was a lot of fun for a large group of people from all over the country. Keep in mind the participants were ALL from HR, so we were open to just about any goofy game we were presented with.

moneyman

I went to a large Microsoft conference that used the pin icebreaker. Every person was issued 3 pins with their registration packet and the goal was to get one of each. You had to, as you said, do many things to get some of the pins away from some people. One of the pins were very scarce and the hosting personnel had most of them. You usually had to go to a vendor booth or listen to something in order to wheedle that pin out of staff members. It was fun, and it did get you talking to a lot of people.

HRQ

Bring in Don D to do dreams analysis.

(I'm full of ideas today!)

Parabeagle

All great ideas, too, HRQ -- nice to get some from someone who speaks the same language (hotel) I do. I think I may do a variation on the pin thing. Don't know if I would want Don D. to do dream analysis. I don't know if I'd trust him around a roomful of female general managers. x;-)

Maybe I should give out a copy of the Men of HR Forum calendar as a prize?

Don D

(1) Spring for some airline tickets and bring in "The Boys Of The Forum" from the calendar. Set us in chairs on the stage and let nature happen. Make Pork an honorary member.

(2) Hand out copies of the Forum Cookbook and impress your colleagues with what all you've been involved in during the past 6 months.

(3) Fly Ray in and do a flute duet in flight jackets and leather shorts.

(4) You're nearby, so bring in someone from Grey Davis' DOL or Tax group to give a presentation on employer retention.

Any group that could endure a 5 hour HR powerpoint presentation shouldn't be too awfully hard to entertain. Is the numero uno Forum cut-up really asking for entertainment suggestions? Secretely, we all want to see you sweat!

Parabeagle

Actually if I could bring you guys in I would -- why should I have to do all the presentations? I could give some out. Don could do harassment, Ray could do work comp stats, I'll do documentation, etc. ad nauseum.

I'm not doing all five hours, though. I was smart enough to hire talent to do some things for me. So we have some outside consultants doing their Margaret Morford impersonations and a bunch of actors having dinner with us and staging a murder mystery.

Short answer, Don: Yes, I am looking for entertainment help here and I couldn't think of a better place to start lookin'! x:-)

safety

My bags are packed and I'm ready for the E-ticket, oh yea, I would prefer a king size bed and if you can spring for it one day at Cannon Beach for R&R. x:7

ray a

I have 3 different sized "flutes", Don - small, medium and large. Any preference?

HRQ

Ooh Ooh - I have another one.

At another HR conference from my hotel days we were assigned to color teams: red, blue, green, etc. Each team was instructed to create and perform a cheer, and the teams would compete to come up with the best cheer. Judges were the conference facilitators. This really got the energy up.

I was on the blue team:
We've got spirit, yes we do. We've got spirit 'cause we're BLUE!
If you're not blue, you're out of luck. If you're not blue you REALLY SUCK!
BLUE! BLUE! BLUE! BLUE! (Chanted Arsenio Hall Doghouse-style, fists pumping in the air)

(OK, that doesn't sound very "HR like", but we were a rowdy team. We won the contest too.)

Another team made up different words to the song "Do you know the way to San Jose" (Conference was held in San Jose) One gymnastically gifted member did a back flip to punctuate the end of the song.

At the same conference, the ballroom was decorated with San Francisco landmarks. At the beginning of the first night, we "toured" San Francisco by visiting the hotel's version of Ghiradelli Square, Alcatraz, Golden Gate Bridge, etc. This could also be done in any city with their own landmarks.

Parabeagle

All these are great. So, today I have purchased a few gazillion pins of a variety of shapes, sizes and persuasions and will use the pin thing. Would like to use the pig thing, too, but don't know how that works. So everyone draws a pig. So what? What does that accomplish?

Unfortunately, I've already spent too much money on outside speakers, so I can't ask Margaret to jump out of the clouds into the conference, but I think when all is said and done it should be pretty cool. I will make sure to take pictures and if any of them are printable I'll post 'em so you all can see how I managed to waste an entire week.

Thanks for all the ideas and the help.