CBST Adventures and CEO Jay Irwin were recently featured in an article in the Daily Camera newspaper.
The article focuses on an interview with Jay and discusses how CBST Adventures is changing the landscape of leadership development and team building for companies in the Rocky Mountain region and beyond.
Be sure to check out the Daily Camera article here!
CBST Adventure’s CEO Jay Irwin was featured on best-selling author and well-known entrepreneur Darren Hardy’s daily videocast. In the video, Jay talks about his decision to not live with regret and start transforming lives through adventure by becoming the CEO of CBST Adventures a little over 2 years ago.
Watch the video to learn more about Jay’s life-changing decision.
According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the definition of a lifeline is ‘a thing on which someone or something depends on or which provides a means of escape from a difficult situation.’ When we developed our ‘GPS Lifeline’ activity, the dictionary’s definition is precisely the idea we had in mind to help teams better problem solve, think creatively, and communicate. The GPS Lifeline experience is a cross between ‘Capture the Flag’ and the board game ‘Battleship,’ as the experience has a ‘seek and return’ component while also requiring teams to be strategic in their approach. At the start of this activity, a group is broken into two teams and each team must use GPS units to set custom waypoints or markers for the GPS to track. Then, the competing teams will swap their GPS units and try to find the other team’s waypoint. The twist with this activity is each team is linked together by a single rope, or a ‘lifeline,’ as we like to call it. The activity is timed and the team that finds their waypoint and returns to home base in the shortest amount of time wins. You could think of the experience like a high-tech version of hide and seek that requires a fair amount of team strategy, communication, and creativity.
When MD Live, an innovative, virtual doctor and healthcare service, came to us looking for unique and outdoor-geared team building activity, we knew the GPS Lifeline experience would fit the bill. While some team building activities can incorporate problem solving and communication skills, very few do so effectively in the outdoors. Our approach is not to just plop people in some empty field with a ropes course or climbing wall. Instead, we take teams to locations where nature is so impressive, it can have a powerful effect on people. In this particular case, enter the beautiful Burro Trail in Breckenridge, Colorado.
Each team had the fortune (and the challenge) of hiking the scenic and secluded trail to complete their ‘Lifeline’ challenge. If there was one word to describe this day’s activity for MD Live, it was ‘cross collaboration.’ A big reason for this was that only one person on each team had a GPS unit. This person is thereby essentially telling the people nearest him or her where to go and then those people have the responsibility of communicating with the rest of the team. Sound familiar for your company? The point of this activity is to highlight what is required for teams to successfully complete challenging tasks – trust, communication, alignment, creativity, and support – and to emphasize what can result if these ideas aren’t practiced- dissent, frustration, disappointment, and confusion.
Both teams completed the activity and ‘escaped their difficult situation’ thanks to the ‘lifeline.’ While there’s a winner and a loser in this activity, MD Live had a bigger takeaway: growth and friendship. You could see teams stretching their critical thinking and effective communication muscles during the activity and realizing new capabilities through the experience. At the same time, we witnessed new bonds and relationships being formed over the course of the day, as believe it or not, tying a group of people to a long rope requires them to engage and interact with one another, oftentimes in ways they haven’t before. Seeing this brings a smile to our face because we know such new relationships and insights probably wouldn’t have happened without this event. That’s why we commend companies and teams for taking time out of their busy and important businesses to get outside and have a unique, team-driven experience. In our opinion, it’s too important not to.
If you’re interested in creating a similar experience for your team or just want to learn more about how we can help your company, give us a shout! We’d love to hear from you!
At CBST Adventures, we’re always trying new and inventive ways to tell our stories and the stories of our clients. Today’s post features a short film recapping an experience for a client. We hope you enjoy it and please share your feedback with us on any of our social channels!
To give you a little background on the video, we recently created an experience for Cargil, a global food provided cooperation based out of Minnesota. Cargil’s requested theme for this event was reaching new heights so we put them through our Community Camper Competition as this is a great day of camping-related activities that challenges people to step out of their comfort zone and maybe do some things they wouldn’t otherwise.
Rather than share the details of the event and spoil the video, we highly encourage you to check out some amazing footage we captured from the event. The last thing we’ll mention is that there was a social impact component to the event. Pay close attention to learn how Cargil chose to make a difference through this team building experience.
So often companies think that team builds have to be highly structured and serious events in order for them to be relevant and applicable to their business. In our experience working with companies from thriving small businesses to Fortune 10 corporations, laughter and fun can be incredibly powerful tools in bringing teams together. Make no mistake, structure and focus certainly have a place when it comes to team building but when these ideas become the primary focus, we find a team build is not as effective as it could be. So when prominent consulting firm Deloitte came to us to help them wrap up their 2017 planning meeting, we were sure to bring the fun.
In learning that the Deloitte was coming off a couple days of intensive meetings, we felt like the group would really benefit from some active experiences that emphasized enjoyment and silliness. The day began with a Disc Golf competition that the group had fun with, especially as some folks struggled to throw the disc and received some playful ribbings from their colleagues. All in good fun, of course.
We then moved on to our main event – the super popular GPS Challenge, where the group was broken into teams and were provided a GPS unit and a camera. The object of the game was to complete challenges throughout the town of Vail using clues we provided. Teams are awarded points for how well they complete their challenges and the team with most points at the end of the day wins. Challenges for the day included the hilarious Tour De Trikester, where adult participants ride child-sized tricycles around a mini-bike course, and the entertainingly ridiculous Rode Ramblers, which involves participants hoping around on inflatable mini-horses and trying to rope and wrangle targets all while wearing outrageous cowboy hats. The images alone bring out non-stop smiles and laughter but the good times really happen as folks dive in on these events.
What was especially neat to witness with this group from Deloitte was that while they certainly competed against one another for the GPS Challenge, they also were just really excited to partake in the different challenges and their enthusiasm was evident from one challenge to another. We love seeing teams having a great time like this and not taking themselves or the event too seriously. If you haven’t seen them already, we highly recommend you check out the pictures on Facebook as they’re pretty enjoyable, complete with people doing planks, posing with statues, and even some dancing.
It’s safe to say that at the end of the day folks were relishing the day after a rollicking good time. The team was also more connected at days end – the events, while ridiculous at times, gave them an experience to share and bond over for sure. It was great to watch and be a part of.
If your company or team is interested in working with us, give us a shout! We’d love to chat with you.