Business game: Building the Valley
In the business game Building the valley participants literally build a valley. The game is all about customer centricity, collaboration, strategic thinking and anticipating with the objective to take care of all stakeholders interests. Participants battle against each other in four regions and aim to make their valley as profitable as possible. But profit is not key. The most important aim of the game is to provide participants with insights and reflection on their own mindset and behaviour, whereas a connection is made with their day-to-day practice.
Results/ objectives
- Gain insights in the most important roles, tasks and interdependencies within their own organization
- Understand the corporate strategy and how they can contribute
- Practice with balancing between the in- and external focus and prioritizing between customer interests, quality and meeting deadlines
- Improve collaboration, reflect on their own behavior and learn from each other
- Are open to new ideas and dare to try something new
Our approach
01. Let’s get to work
Participants of Building the Valley enter the room and find big plans which represents the layout of the valley to be developed according to the needs and assignments of the client. At the start the message is: divide the roles and prepare to start. The objective is to optimize the KPI’s and profit. The question is how to achieve this? Participants start working on constructions and have face-to-face discussions with the ‘client’. Instantly the energy is felt and competition starts to show in the behavior of the participants.
02. Gaining business insights
The game is a metaphor, participants recognize their own company in the processes and roles.
They face the same dilemma’s and interest as in real business life. Next to this they experience what the effect is of their behavior, choices and collaboration on the whole organization. It becomes very clear where the challenges are to create different and more optimal outcomes. After every round participants reflect and evaluate to gather insights and start optimizing the results.
03. Optimizing results
As the games evolves participants feel more comfortable starting to experiment with different approaches. They might start adjusting processes, roles and ways to connect with the clients. The team(s) create their own ‘flow’ and start to optimize their (business) results.
"I want to thank you very much. Sometimes the introduction to a company can be a bit stiff. That's what I was afraid of at the beginning of the onboarding. You guys brought it really well, with the right amount of dynamism, humour and challenge."
Results
After playing the simulation game a final evaluation takes place with the main purpose of translating the insights and learnings to concrete behavior and actions that enhance their contribution to the results and success of the organization. The experience helps employees to be more efficient and effective when meeting challenges in daily practice. This in line with your corporate strategy.
