XL Events Blog

1) Do you have public liability insurance?

You would be surprised as to the number of providers who don’t carry PLI.

If something happens to your staff and your provider is not insured it could become very expensive for your organisation

2) Have you carried out a risk assessment on the activity.

Again many providers don’t give a second thought as to the potential risks involved and courses of action in case something does go wrong

3) How experienced is the Event team

Many providers utilise staff with absolutely no experience in team building. These providers will give you an experience, not a teambuilding event.

4) How professional is your organisation?

Do you have support staff? Do you have an office? Or do you work from home with a mobile number as a contact?

5) If you are organising a large event does your provider have the necessary experience on this scale?

Running an event for 20 people is vastly different to running an event for 120 people.

6) Does your provider have a wet wether plan in case your outdoor event can’t be run due to bad weather?

7) Does your event provider have staff who are first aid qualified?

8) What is included in the price quoted. Are there any essential add ons?

9) Can your event supplier provide 3 recent references?

10) Is your Event provider running the event themselves or will they sub-contract out the management?

Team Building in its most basic form, is all about interactive experiences. Bringing people together to share, discuss, contribute ideas, comment, identify, react and achieve is the basis for most team building initiatives on the market today.

From more traditional team building programs in past years, like ropes and raft building, to the more dynamic offerings today, like Amazing Races, Cooking team building events like MasterChef and Hi Tech programs, the only thing that has really changed is the innovative thinking and delivery methods of today's suppliers.

Traditionally team building suppliers were usually former HR trainers, psychologists or had a military background, providing a good base to develop and deliver quality team training programs. Today the market is filled with everyone from slick business people with an interactive experience to sell, to former employees of team building companies with an entrepreneurial streak, to high flying extroverts with a skill for talking and presenting, and we even came a cross a bunch of Personal Trainers who are selling Boot Camp as a team building program.

Yes it is all there on the internet for the buyers to view, scrutinise, and choose what type of team building initiative they are going to engage for the upcoming company offsite or away day!
Everything from bowling to basketball to canoeing to fitness activities are being promoted as team building programs these days. Without commenting on what experiences are value for money and will deliver a good ROI, to what is rubbish and will bore your team to death with their mediocrity, our challenge today is to give you the basics in where to start when looking for a great team building program that will provide you with bang for your buck!

Firstly, when you Google for team building ideas, it is important to realise that because a team building supplier is listed high on the sponsored links part of the page, doesn't always mean that they are the best option. Anyone can pay to appear on the sponsored links page!

When you have a short list of suitable programs or experiences, it is very important to do a quick reference check or background check on the suppliers in mind. Not all companies offer the quality programs purported on the endless flashy websites!

When you contact the supplier, the first thing that should be asked is what their experience in delivering team building programs and activities as, what professional indemnity insurance they have, and exactly who will be delivering the program and debrief.

Contingency plans should be available in most cases to cover weather issues, and you should receive a detailed program brief outlining exactly what is included for your spend, such as event insurance, risk assessment, and emergency plans to the basics like water and sunscreen, and location expenses like permits, garbage collection and and bump in/out times etc.

Your team building supplier should leave you confident in that your program will be delivered as it should be, is dynamic and fun, suits all participants, and will leave you stress free and receiving the kudos for organising in the first place!