Normally when you hear about team-building, you think small group activities like hokey trust falls and other contrived excersises. Not us, at least not this time. Last week, much of the OE team and 50 executives from some of our top customers went straight to the promised land of team-building, Busch Stadium, for an executive seminar and stadium tour.
Our guests had the opportunity to hear from Cardinal’s General Manager John Mozeliak, and Essendant’s VP of Marketing Diane Hund.
The day’s topics centered around teamwork and the idea that while we work so hard to build a team, are we careful to make sure we are communicating with individuals in the best possible way?
John Mozeliak talked to us about how the Cardinals are so much more than the team we see on the field, that there are hundreds of other people in the organization that support and help build the team we all see on the field. About how his job is to oversee the entire company, and ensure that he is not only putting the best team on the field, but keeping an eye on the future to make sure that their talent pipeline remains full. It was fascinating to hear him talk about the baseball club like it was a regular business.
Diane Hund talked about navigating the multi-generational workplace and how millennials are not only team players but an ever-more influential part of the workforce. She discussed the idea that while generation gaps are nothing new, businesses seem to be more worried than before about managing these different age groups, perhaps because they each have much more differing attitudes about work than ever before.
Baby-boomers, born between 1946 and the mid–1960s, are not slacking off as they age; they are seen as hard-working and productive. The middle ranks of Generation X-ers, who might be expected to be battling their way up the corporate ladder, are viewed as the best team players. While opinions on the youth of Generation Y, also known as “millennials”, are less surprising: good at tech stuff but truculent and a bit work-shy.
These perceptions are not necessarily always true, however, and successful companies have to learn to understand millennials if they want to continue to enjoy their success.
If you were there, and would like a copy of the group picture, please email us. If you were not there, use the subscribe to this blog feature to the right and never miss another update from us.
Below are a few more pictures from the event.
