IDEAS

With the support of Vice Provost (Academic Affairs) Professor Lai Choy Heng, CIT staff engaged in the Team Challenge NUS on Wednesday, 13 December 2006. The Team Challenge is a department-based by-request programme offered by the Office of Human Resources.

As the programme is described in OHR's training directory: This is a highly experiential workshop aimed at inspiring staff to embrace NUS mission, vision and core values, and build a culture of teamwork and service excellence that would permeate throughout the organization.

Indeed, Team Challenge NUS was as hands-on as it was described. CIT staff made their way to Sentosa for a day filled with learning activities which challenged them mentally and physically.

"We went through a lot of activities and learnt that working as a team is important," Technical Support Officer Leow Sin Lak explained, "during the team challenge, some things happened along the way but as part of the team we tried various ways to help one another overcome the difficulties and brainstormed to solve problems."

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Rini, Sin Lak and Hui Yi enjoying the Team Challenge activities

TSO Goh Sze Yin added, "It felt great to see everyone putting in their effort and ideas on how to best tackle the activities and how creative juices overflowed from different people. This is a side of one another which we don't get to see at work."

There were many lessons learnt. Some were on an interpersonal level, as Nor Idayu, CIT's Secretary, reveals, "I enjoyed mingling with my colleagues, the ones whom I hardly interact with on a day to day basis. It's surprising what you learn about them!"

Gopi 'Hrithik' Kakani, a Systems Engineer, learnt about teamwork. He shares, "When I first saw the Diamond Maze, I thought that it was simple, and I could easily go through at least 4 or 5 combinations easily by myself. But when I tried, I found out how difficult it was and realized the necessity of the team, which helped me go through it. Sometimes one has to try certain things to have better understanding of the problem at hand."

The Team Challenge was a great success, based on the positive reactions from CIT staff. The last word comes from Gopi, who suggests, "This is an excellent program that every department must consider!"