“Seasons change. Our season has changed. The season of negativity is over. The season of looking at ourselves as victims is over. He the Almighty did not create all of us to be victims.”
~ Pastor Peter, Unilever Indaba delegate.
On the 16th and 17th of February 2016, I had the honour of being part of the Schuitema crew working with the Unilever Boksburg delegates at Bela Bela in Limpopo. I had initially started this piece with the intent of doing a write up on what happened in Bela Bela, relating chronologically what happened at the Klein Kariba Holiday Resort. However, relating what happened–account upon account, would be too ordinary. What I experienced, with the Schuitema Crew on those two days was anything but remotely ordinary.
If I could have summed up the two day event in one sentence, I would like to quote one of the delegates who came to our table during lunch on the second day. “You people have changed the way I look at things…” He said, quite a few times. Indeed, kudos to David and Jenny, our lead facilitators who presented the thematic in such heartfelt manners– that it made my journey from halfway across the world to be here to learn from them, one of the best decisions in my life.
Having been in government service back in my native Singapore as a teacher for many years prior to this, staff retreats, team building sessions and management ‘time-out’ sessions are nothing new to me. All of them geared at what we, the staff of the organization and in my case, the Ministry of Education, can do for our organization we work for. It was all about the organization and what can we achieve for them. The two days I was with the Schuitema Crew working with the Unilever staff, I was given a breath of fresh air. It was all about the staff as a person.
The theme for the retreat, “My Life: Creating a Brighter Future” was very succinct. This theme, in my opinion firstly sets the mind-set of the delegates, that Unilever and Schuitema, who are conducting this retreat value each and every member of the staff as an individual and care enough to grow them as a person first, worker second. Next, this theme was the factor which actually gave the retreat its essence. That they were out there in Bela Bela to take time out from the company for a while and think about themselves, not the company. With that, the energy became very positively charged and the delegates were enthusiastic in participating in the team activities led by David and Jenny, facilitated by the Schuitema Crew. I 
was still drinking my coffee towards the end of the tea break when one delegate walked to our table, tapped her watched and said to me, “Session supposed to start in 5 mins ma’am! You are still drinking!” she teased, before hurrying back to the hall. How is that for enthusiasm?!
One brilliant approach which up to now I still can not get over, and have since told people back in Asia to replicate, was having a graphic artist, Sonja, to draw out the thematic as the sessions were going on. The delegates could walk over to the board and see the concepts taught by David and Jenny in picture forms. Sonja’s talents are impressive. She captured what the thematic would look like in pictures. As a visual learner myself, I could only wish if only we have had this approach all the time when I was studying, I would probably be quite clever by now.
The other highlight of the retreat was the presence of Drum Café. The Drum Café’s tagline was ‘Team Building, One Beat at A Time’. I was floored by the idea, as drumming is very central to African culture, something which they could relate to. The host from Drum Café summed up their session with the delegates with these words, “Each of you drum a beat. You drum your own beat for your music. But together, all of you can drum the music of your company and how all of you want the company’s symphony to sound like. Each beat you make matters.” That, I felt, cut deep down inside all of the delegates, because it had that deep impact on myself.
I had gone around befriending some delegates just to find out what they thought of whatever they learnt during the retreats. Some of them said they had an awesome time and they actually learnt something about themselves. A few said they realized that all these while they have been penalising themselves with their self-imposed victim mentality. One said he felt that he came in hating his company
and his bosses but now he felt he could change the situation by changing himself first.
Schuitema Crew scores. I am thankful I was part of it.