December Collaboration Week

For our final collaboration week of 2023, and in the spirit of the festive season, we wanted to do things a little differently in December. 

We know how tiring & stressful the lead up to Christmas can be, buying presents, making sure you’ve got everything you need for your Christmas dinner, whilst also finalising projects & clearing your workload before you finish for the break! With this in mind, we reduced the schedule down in comparison to previous weeks, which allowed our teams that much needed focus time before they finished for the year.

The schedule included a mix of sessions that were open to all and some team focussed workshops, with an emphasis on upcoming plans and retrospectives. 

One popular session was hosted by our Talent Team and was designed to help us to understand and appreciate our individual differences, viewpoints & quirks.

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At the start of the session, everyone was asked a simple question “If you were catching a train at 3pm, what time would you arrive at the train station”. This question sparked a lot of debate between those who would arrive as early as 2pm, and those who would arrive 5 minutes before the train was due to depart. 

Whilst everyone’s opinions were different, ultimately, it was a lesson that everyone had the same goal, which was to catch the train, but, everyone makes choices based on their own experiences. We talked about how these experiences build our individual perception and how that in turn affects our behaviour and choices. 

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We also held an open demo session with our Customer Success Manager Jamie, who took us through our latest demos, which we use to showcase our products to our clients. 

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Also back by popular demand was part two of our ‘Professional Client Comms’ workshop, where we learned more about DISC personality profiles and how we could adapt our communication based on these. 

Our collaboration week wouldn’t be complete without getting the whole company together for some fun. We held a festive buffet on our Terrace from our friends at Stairwayz Cafe, followed by our annual Christmas Bingo, hosted by our CEO. 

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We finished the week with our festive party, with an amazing lunch at Babucho on Newcastle Quayside, followed by our party at The Exchange, where we crowned our Talent Recognition Award winners for 2023. These awards are based on our values, with each winner receiving a trophy and a cash prize. 

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Quality First Award -  Shaun Dunn, QA Analyst 

Market Focus Award - Ben Gardiner, Marketing Manager

Innovation Award  - Rich Hibbs, Customer Success Manager

Collaboration Award - Mhairi Harris, Project Manager

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We finished the evening with plenty of cocktails, and regrettably, shots of honey tequila! We certainly finished off the year with a bang! 

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