JJFS Does Focus Week

For the 3rd year running, we held our Annual Focus Week just before the Christmas break and we want to share our insights.

The aim of our Focus Week (well, it was 2 days this year but we packed a lot in so feel we can justifiably call it a week!) is to re-group as a team and dedicate the time towards making further developments to our internal processes, discuss ideas and thoughts for the business and to re-evaluate the year; looking at what went well and what areas we can focus on for the following year.

It is also an opportunity for us to get creative – we workshop our ideas and encourage ourselves to think outside the box through imaginative activities and tasks. It is hard to believe that re-assessing our client engagement procedures and project management tools led to a fun and interactive session which had us in fits of laughter and still concluded in action points for us to implement in the new year that we believe will create efficiencies in how we work as a team.

One ideation method we used is “worst possible idea”, a term coined by Author, president and co-founder of The Growth Engine Company LLC, Bryan Mattimore*. Rather than getting bogged down in trying to think of good ideas, the concept starts with the group being encouraged to adopt a radically different approach: to think of ideas that wouldn’t work – the more ridiculous and awful the better! During our session, because we were all trying to think of the worst ideas possible, we soon felt we could relax and loosen up. In turn, this helped us to overcome the pressure of trying too hard to think of good ideas and, by turning the notion of “the worst possible idea” on its head, we were soon able to inject the creativity we used to come up with awful ideas into thinking of some really great ones!

Our Focus Week also gives us the chance to learn more about each other and cement our bond as a team. This year, we were extremely privileged to learn about Shamanism from Lyn who took us through an insightful account of what it entails, as well as a relaxing and enlightening meditation session.

Additionally, high on our agenda, even more so in light of the events of 2020, is having fun together. Amongst our workshopping and business planning, we included some light relief – we got competitive during a fun quiz led by Chloe, and worked very well together in an online ‘escape room’, aptly themed “trying to recover an email drunkenly sent to the boss at the office Christmas party”!

Our focus week concluded with our virtual office party, where we chatted over food and drink and played some silly games.

We hadn’t anticipated Focus Week being as effective as previous years, given we couldn’t meet in person, but in actual fact it turned out to be our best one yet. We all put our ‘Out of Office’ on ready to see the back of 2020, and we are feeling more motivated than ever to step into 2021, equipped with tools for enhancing our internal ways of working and exciting developments for the business. Bring on 2021!

Sources:

*https://www.interaction-design.org/literature/topics/worst-possible-idea

Faith LiversedgeJanuary 6, 2021