Icebreaker - A new way to present them

You might have guessed that we're a little addicted to creating videos at the moment. We think it's a really interesting way to deliver information and we thought we'd test the concept on an icebreaker. See what you think...

Body Language Training

We've been getting a bit carried away with the promotional videos lately. Here's our latest effort for our Body Language Training materials available at www.trainerbubble.com

Trainer Bubble Promo Video - Just for fun

I've just been having a bit of fun with creating a new promotional video for Trainer Bubble. It's not as slick as I'd like it, but was good fun and helped me procrastinate a bit today!

Team Building - Developing a Team Vision

When trying to implement a team building programme, a useful starting point is to help the team appreciate what makes a team work to the same goals and principles. Core to this team building principle is the ability to develop a team vision.

Every team must have a clear understanding of what they are trying to achieve and how this fits into the wider organisational picture in order to work effectively. It helps if this is presented in a challenging and meaningful way, where individuals feel that they are contributing to a wider goal.

Without this sense of purpose individuals begin to work independently and become focused only on their own set tasks with little concern for the impact it might have on others in the team or organisation. I’m sure you can think of situations where somebody says they are, ‘just doing their job’ and yet the impact of their actions has a hugely detrimental effect on others.

Quite often in business the purpose and direction of an organisation is summed up with a vision statement. You may already be aware of some of the larger organisations vision statements from the past…

Land a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth by the end of the decade. - NASA

PepsiCo's responsibility is to continually improve all aspects of the world in which we operate - environment, social, economic - creating a better tomorrow than today. - PepsiCo

To be the world's best quick service restaurant experience. Being the best means providing outstanding quality, service, cleanliness, and value, so that we make every customer in every restaurant smile. –McDonald’s

To empower people through great software – any time, any place and on any device. - Microsoft

Now, you might not agree with these vision statements or even think they are clear, exciting or achievable. However, they do provide clarity and a common purpose to the organisation it was designed for. When trying to improve team building and develop teams, this is crucial.

The idea of using a vision statement can also be useful for teams within an organisation as it gives everyone a guiding principle that clearly emphasises the aims and focus of the team, while giving everyone a common purpose and goal.

A key benefit of a vision statement for a team is that it provides clarity when their might be confusion. For example; if a team member is presented with a difficult decision to make that could affect the rest of the team or the organisation as a whole, they can think to themselves, ‘Does this action align with our team vision?’ The answer will tell them how to progress.

A good example of how well someone buys into a vision statement and is clear on their role within an organisation relates to the NASA vision statement provided in the slide. The story goes that President Kennedy was on a tour of NASA headquarters and was being introduced to the staff. Upon leaving he walked passed a gentleman that was quite clearly a janitor holding a broom. In his usual polite way JFK said to the man, “...and what do you do here?” to which the janitor replied, ‘Sir, I’m putting a man on the moon.”

I think it’s clear that this guy had bought into the vision of his organisation!

This is a short excerpt from the Trainer Bubble training course materials for, Team Building, which can be purchased from our website at www.trainerbubble.com

Work Better

We found this image on the internet and thought it was pretty much true. We hope you do too...

Free Training Resources, Energisers and Icebreakers Update

We have had to have a bit of a reorganisation of our main website at Trainer Bubble. This is due to the fact that our free training resources section has grown to epic proportions and we now offer over 400 free training resources, icebreakers, training games and energisers on our website.

The sheer size of these free training resources was really slowing down certain sections of the website and so we have re-grouped the sections from one main 'Free Training Resources' section to four separate sections of Free Materials & Resources, Energisers, Icebreakers and Training Games.

Of course we are sure you will still be able to find all the training resources you need, but you might have to dip into different sections rather than accessing them all from the same page. Having said that, we have now found that it is a lot easier to sift through the areas to find what you want. It just might take a bit of time to get used to it.

I hope you all still enjoy accessing our free training resources! We look forward to providing much more in the future.

Kid learns how to ride bike and gets inspirational

Sometimes we all need a little inspiration in life and this kid gets the thumbs up from me. This video could be useful in a motivational training session or anywhere you'd like to add a bit of lighthearted fun and a wink to being inspired...

Word 2007 Training Materials added to www.trainerbubble.com

We've recently added Word 2007 Foundation Training Course Materials to our website. These Microsoft Word 2007 Foundation Training Course Materials can be used either with the full training materials in a classroom environment or by individuals working from the supplied workbook.

The Word 2007 Foundation materials set out to give the participants the core knowledge required for using Microsoft Word 2007. Therefore the materials are useful for anyone with limited or basic knowledge of Word 2007.

Visit our website to view these Microsoft Word 2007 Foundation training materials.

Post Office Entry Examination 1897

I saw this Post Office Entry Examination from 1897 on a wall recently and had to share it. How well would you have done? I'm pretty sure I would have struggled to get the job!

Why not use this test as an icebreaker to your training courses and find out what your participants think? (click on the image to make it full size).

Physiological find a word

This popped into my inbox lately and I thought it would make an interesting icebreaker or energiser during training. I'm not sure of the 'scientific truth' of it, but it should add a bit of fun to proceedings. I've not known anyone yet to look at it and not want to let everyone know their words! (click on the image to make it a reasonable viewing size).