We always love to embrace the creative world in all that we do and as such, are delighted to launch Outdoor Interactive Theatre. It’s
Part game, part theatre, part pub crawl and is making a huge splash as a non-traditional way to have a fantastic time with your team mates.

Interactive theatre is unlike anything found in your traditional theatre setting (or team building program for that matter). Instead of sitting, the audience is sent on an actual journey through the streets of the city. Based on a concept that has been highly successful in New York, and London, we are now running the program in Sydney and Melbourne. Along with our Shoot! program, its a great way to be outdoors and not get to sweaty!

The premise: You have been offered a share in $50 million dollars – All you have to do is deliver one simple message. Sounds easy enough right? Well think again! Not only will the mob be hot on your tail but so is the local law enforcement, detectives, private investigators and anyone else the mob pays off!

Participants are sent on a mission, aided by clues and mysterious cast members scattered throughout various locations in the city: park benches, iconic landmarks, bars, wharfs, and back alleys. Professional actors take you on a crazy, exciting adventure throughout the streets of Sydney or Melbourne. Your team, the audience navigate the city streets, piecing together clues of an absorbing and entertaining plot “The Messenger”.

Interactive Theatre promises to provide an experience unlike anything you have ever done. This is definitely not an ‘un-Amazing Race’. You wont find a branded polo shirt anywhere!  Set in the best parts of Sydney and Melbourne, you will be ‘contacted’ with a time and place where it is all going down. Visualfunk’s Interactive Theatre’s locations, are of course kept hush-hush – it’s all part of the fun.

So want some team building that is really creative, fun and UNIQUE? We would love to have a chat! Enquire here. 

“The characters are not easily spotted, appearing, then fading back into the crowd. The whole world is your set and you are the protagonist in this tale.”     

Daily Telegraph

Creative Team Building, Team Building | By: simon

I have been lucky enough to share my passion of art and creativity with some fantastic companies over the last 14 years. I love seeing people tapping back into that wonderful creativity that we all have and the wonderful energy that comes from being expressive, imaginative and creative. So I was delighted when we had the opportunity to run a creative session at this years Sydney Fringe Festival for members of the public.

 Whilst not a team building session, many elements were the same as the creative team building programs we run.

• Everyone getting out of their comfort zone.
• Everyone really scared about how to start and what it will look like!
• The first few steps are always very, very tentative.  It’s as if the paper may ignite when the pen first hits it and makes a mark.
• Great things start to happen when everyone feels more comfortable.

It was a sold out program and we had an absolute blast.   The venue was a great space. Always a fan of a great environment to drive creativity, Fringe HQ was buzzing with stimulus. It was great to have a room full of people ready to get out of their comfort zone and to do something creative. There was plenty of fun and energy in the room. Most importantly, everyone left with something that they were proud of! The Fringe Festival gave a nice review as well

 There is a tipping point when you do anything new and out of our comfort zones. There is often a voice inside  you have to deal with, telling you a bunch of crap about how unsuccessful your are going to be. The inner voice/ego/doubt we have holds us back from doing so many things. This is especially true with anything creative. Once you suck it up and go for it, the inner voice starts to quieten down then disappear completely. That’s when great things happen.

I love seeing everyone leave with something they were proud of and the great smile that comes from reconnecting with your creativity. All things start with a small step, even opening up your creative potential.

So, what step are you going to take to reconnect with your creativity and imagination?

corporate creativty, Creative Team Building, creativity, Visual Funk | By: simon

I have had the opportunity over the last 15 years to be part of some great conferences and also have seen some pretty average ones.

Over the last year, I have been involved with some great ones that still stick in my mind. I have sat through some real clangers as well. What made the great ones great?

I thought I would share some recent examples of conferences that stood out.

Conference 1

This was where delegates had won the right to be there from outstanding performance but was also an important avenue to drive key business messages to the delegates from across Australia. There was a large number of presentations and keynotes, (which can often be a conference downfall) but this was not the case. What made these presentations and keynotes great? The biggest thing was that the presentations were designed to give the delegates tools, tips and the right behaviours to grow their business. Everything was about the delegates and what the company could do to help them.  Because of this, everyone was tuned in and scribbling down as much information as possible. This made the Q and A great because there was real interest, not awkward silence. What’s more, the presentations were short and punchy. Everyone was able to stay tuned in and engaged, thus enabling the conference to have a nice finishing time.  PowerPoint slides were powerful points – pictures and videos only. What’s more, every presenter and senior leader was mixing and connecting with all of the delegates and available to chat. How often do you see that?

Key Learns

• Make the content useful for your delegates
• Make the conference about them not you
• Make your PowerPoint slides “Powerful Points!” not bulleted lists and spreadsheets no one can see
• Delegates have a short attention span. Short and punchy works. Do you need 60 minutes to say what you could in 30?

Conference 2: This was for a large team within a very large organisation. The team was made up of 10 – 12 smaller teams that made up a team of 120 people. Some of the teams were small, others around 25 people and they were spread far and wide with various roles, functions and locations. The key aim of the conference was to connect the teams on both a professional and personal level and to ensure that every team knew what the other teams were doing and how they contributed to that success of the larger team and organisation. This would enable all of the teams to work together better and to also enable greater sharing of information post conference.
What made this conference great? In the morning, each team gave a short presentation about what they did. The afternoon was about drilling down and giving greater detail about the teams and the services they provided.  With 12 separate presentations, this was a potential for disaster but it worked amazingly well.
The guidelines for the morning presentation were:

• No more than 10 minutes long. This was timed with a 1 minute and a 30 second counter
• No PowerPoint slides unless pictures or film
• Engage all of the senses of the audience
• Get all of the team involved in the presentation
• Do something different and creative
• Make it enjoyable for the people in the audience

The presentations were fantastic! There were skits, plays, game shows, talk shows, photos, documentaries, singing, comedy, animation, films, Most importantly each presentation told a story. Everyone loves a story. Everyone listened, everyone laughed. Messages were strong and clear.
In the afternoon each team set up a stall (as in a county fair) that told more about the work that they did. Each team had to make their stall as interesting and attractive as possible and get as many people as they could to visit. Budget for each team was $50.  Each team had giveaways, games, competitions, food, colour, music, lollies, banners, streamers and colour. The energy in the room was amazing! At the end of the day there was a vote for the best stall (any stall other than your own) which was a great experience as well.

Key Learns

• Set the bar high with what you expect: We all have a great amount of creativity and drive once we get out of our comfort zones
• Make the audience the centre of your conference. In this instance, the audience was the content.
• Presentations don’t have to be a “I stand, I talk to slides, you sit, you sleep”
• Movement and interaction: When people move, their energy rises

One of the true measures of a successful conference is how long people are talking about it AFTER the event. The buzz for both of these conferences are still through the organisation 9 – 12 months later. Everyone remembers them for the right reason and most importantly the key messages are still alive.

Conferences are such a huge investment of time and energy. It may be the only chance you may have in the year to get your key messages across. You need to make it impactful, interesting and engaging.

What are you going to do to make your next conference outstanding?

Visual Funk | By: simon

What’s your energy like? What is the energy like in your team? What was the energy like at your last conference?

When I say energy, I mean the pulse, the vibe, the buzz? What does it feel like when you walk into your office?

Personal energy and team energy is a funny thing in many ways. It’s not something that is easily measured but we all know when it is not there. We cant always see it but we can always feel it.

We all make a contribution to it every day and a negative energy has a huge impact on all aspects of our home and work life.

When someone asks you what the vibe was like at a party, what do you say? Do you have an answer? We generally would. It may have had a great vibe at the beginning of the night but got worse as the evening went on. It may have had a terrible vibe early on, but once some friends arrived, the vibe was better.

What is the energy like in your workplace or your team? What does it feel like when you walk into a meeting?  How does it feel when you leave the meeting? What’s the level of conversation like in the workplace? Is there a buzz?

What is your own energy like? What type of energy do you take with you? What type of energy do you bring with you? Are you an energy vampire? What type of feeling do you leave behind after you interact with colleagues? Is it a great one?

As you can probably gather from the questions, energy is everywhere. Every personal interaction has it, every group of people has it, every event, conference or meeting has it. Austin Powers had plenty of it, he called it his Mojo and was spent a whole movie looking for it.

I visit a lot of work places around Australia and the one thing that always jumps out is the energy in the office. Sometimes it feels like a sad camp and other times it’s buzzing. We have a Media Client and every time we are in their offices it’s alive. The offices are full of colour, vibrancy and energy. You can feel it the energy. It’s a nice place to visit.

What I do know, is that a great vibe is a positive thing. It makes everyone feel good. It’s infectious, it’s catching. It’s motivating, empowering and makes people smile. People enjoy coming to work where there is a great energy. You enjoy going to work when there is a great vibe.

So what can you do personally and with your team when you find the energy is going south?

• Move: The moment you move, your energy changes. If you find yourself with a bad vibe, move! Get a coffee, get some air, exercise but make sure you move!
• Add some colour. There is a whole industry around colour science and mood but some colour in the office goes a long way. Decorate, have some fun.
• Breathe deeply – connected to exercise but some slow deep breaths will help to centre you and help with a feeling of calmness. As I say with a very young family of three “Breathe in for peace and out for strength!”
• Freshness: Do something new and interesting as often as possible both personally and with your team, in and out of the work place. Run competitions, get involved with charities, have a lunch together once/week.
• Change your perspective. I am note sure of the origin of the quote but I like “If you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change”. Be a glass half full person.
• Have some fun and lighten up.

Remember both good and bad energy is infectious. Check in with your energy, your teams energy, your state, your teams vibe often. Ensure your energy wake you leave behind is a good one!

Art, Energy, Team Building, Visual Funk, Visualfunk | By: simon

You see so many list of what to do to be creative. In corporate land, its always about using a specific tool (invented by a consultant) to help you to think up better ideas. In creative land (where people make a living every day from doing creative stuff), the lists are different. You don’t rely on just a specific tool to keep being creative – why would you?  For me, these creative tools miss most of what it means to be creative – the act of creating itself.

To be creative, you have to create and live creatively. And the good news is that you don’t have to buy it.

Designers become great designers from designing

Artists become great artist through creating art

Florists become great florists from constantly putting together floral creations

Photographers become great photographers from constantly taking photos

The more you CREATE, the more creative you become. You can then throw out the book of thinking tools you paid $60 for and is on the bookshelf in your office.

This is why I really liked the Rules of a Creator’s Life from Creative Something.

My favourite rules were:

• Try new things
• Always be creating
• Turn work into play

Sounds so simple but creativity is simple. Creative people are creative because they try new things and area always creating. Who cares what is looks like at the end – just concentrate on having a good time in the process. Mistakes are OK!

So what’s stopping you? Go and be creative today. It feels good!

Art, corporate creativty, creativity | By: simon

A recent study by Adobe of over 5000 people in the worlds 5 leading economies: United States, England, France, Germany and Japan has revealed that only 1 in 4 people are living up to their creative potential. There are some interesting points:

• 80% of people feel that Creativity is key to driving economic growth
• Whilst 50% agree that they are increasingly being expected to think creatively at work 75% say that there is increasing pressure to be productive rather than creative at work
• 59% feel that creativity is being stifled by the education system – echoing the words of Sir Ken Robinson

There were some interesting barriers that people spoke about as a barrier. The biggest surprise to me was that 43% indicated that a lack of money was the biggest challenge to being creative. Isn’t creativity free? Artists are considered highly creative but have one of the lowest per capita incomes around. I fully understand the issue of time (which I have spoken of before) as you have to make time to put the idea into action and make it real.

Some other barriers to creativity were:

• Fear of being judged
• Finding others to support you
• I don’t take chances

What people wanted most to help them be creative were:

• Time to think creatively 36%
• Training to learn and use creative tools 31%
• An environment to think creatively 30%
• Tools to create 27%

71% of people also preferred to be by themselves when they create – something to think about next time you head into a brainstorm session.

One thing I like about this study is that it is easy. Thankfully, a study on creativity has been represented, creatively! Easy to read, not much text and plenty of colour. To download the study, click here

There is always lots of negative and positive feedback about any study such as this and this has been no different. Whatever your thoughts, its a great way to think about how you are trying to encourage innovation and creativity in your company and the one I really like, ‘Are you living up to your creative potential? If not, why not?’

corporate creativty, creativity, Innovation, Visual Funk, Visualfunk | By: simon

I really enjoyed an interview I read where Peter Cook was interviewing Professor Adrian Furnham. For me, it was great to read an an article that was low on jargon and trademarked and what I see as the bulls#*t factor. Unlike a lot of academics work on creativity and innovation he speaks simply and realistically.He also acknowledges the hard work (as with any success) involved in developing a culture of innovation.

There was a nice sum list at the end the summed up the his view on encouraging personal creativity. Read the article, it’s great.

Furnham’s top creativity tips

PK: Given that creativity may be necessary but insufficient for an innovative enterprise, I asked Professor Furnham for his top tips to encourage personal creativity at work, learning and play:

AF : Here are ten simple but important ideas:

1. Sleep on it:  Come back to problems and issues.  Let them fall fallow for a bit; stew; incubate.  Revisit them when it suits.
2. Read widely: Talk to all sorts of experts.  Get outside your box. Talk to people who think about things differently from you.
3. Don’t give up:  Persistence is the key.  Most attempts fail.  Breakthroughs are rare.
4. Take a Risk: Fear of failure, humiliation, teasing and abuse are natural enemies of creativity.  Go on – play with hunches and tentative ideas.  Break the rules.  Take courage.
5. Piggy back:  Take others’ work and take it further.  Put things together which do not fit.
6. Identify peak times and conditions:  Work out when and where you are at your best for idea generation and refinement.  Set aside these times for those activities.
7. Record your flashes:  Have a place and method to record all ideas – some worth revisiting and incubation.
8. Build your particular expertise/skill/knowledge: creativity is always skill based.  Get to the cutting edge of your chosen area…..there is no substitute for this.
9. Question and Probe the obvious:  Take little for granted; turn things upside down; celebrate similarities and differences.
10. Lighten up:  Be playful; use humour; have a sense of the absurd and the ridiculous.

corporate creativty, creativity, Innovation, Visual Funk | By: simon

I think that we all have a creative knot. Something that in all of us, is tied up, tight and potentially stopping us fulfilling our creative potential. Stopping us expressing ourselves and coming up with some great ideas and then acting upon them. It’s a knot that can be really tight. Untying this not is the key to tapping into your creative mojo and all the good things that can happen.

So what helps you to unlock this creative knot? I am writing this in the middle of a 5 hr plane ride and I find that this is where I unlock my knot. It’s usually after a wine and about an hour into the trip. The realization hits that there are no phone calls, no email, no messages. I am feeling relaxed. I am usually watching a movie and then I start to feel really inspired. Not just inspired, but over the top of inspired. I feel like my mind becomes a flowing river if ideas, thoughts and images. Things are happening. I get my creative flow on and I stay in it. I always keep my notebook handy and jot down, draw and play with the river of ideas. The more you unwind the creative knot, the easier it is to keep it that way and to keep harnessing that wonderful creativity that we all have.

Think of it like fitness. To get fit you have to unlock the knot of motivation. You have to get off that couch. You need the will power to keep the exercise going after 2 minutes when you get puffed. You need to push yourself hard. The more you untwist the knot, the easier it is to keep it untwisted. You get your fitness charging and then you don’t want to let it go. It’s the same with you creativity and your self-expression. Once you untie the knot and start expressing and acting on your creative talents, the easier it is to keep it going and not have that knot reappear.

Whilst untying the creative knot sounds like a very slippery use of a metaphor, finding the right environment, mood, situation, stimulus, energy to untwist your creative knot is essential. It’s different for everyone but once you find it, it gets easier to stay creative and fulfill the great potential that we all have. I don’t want to do a 5 hr plane ride every day so it’s important to put into your day those little things that untie your creative knot.

How do you untie your creative knot?

corporate creativty, Creative Team Building, creativity, Innovation, Visualfunk | By: simon

I read plenty of articles about team building. Many bag out team building as an effective way to build teams or provide a positive influence in the workplace and many others are completely the opposite. The ones that bag out team building generally say something along the lines of “just by doing xxxx you won’t achieve xxxx.” And there is a great point there. In an age where you type team building into a search engine, you  find everything from going ten pin bowling (activity) to a high end leadership course (lets say a development program). I have written before about the lottery with what you might expect from an activity that labels itself as team building.

When I started my career in training and development with a company in the UK, if there was a team development program that didn’t link back into the work place, it wasn’t worth doing. It had to provide more ROI than just the activity alone. It doesn’t mean everyone wasn’t having fun (as fun is essential to learning) but the program had to provide serious insight into the business. That was standard and our clients expected it.

Now, over 10 years, our business in Australia gets so many calls where teams just want to get out of the workplace and have some fun. The clients are really adamant about this. Nothing to do with work, just fun. Don’t mention ANYTHING to do with the workplace.

So how do you then work out the value of such a program? At the end of the day, only the team wanting to do the program can comment on the value of that program to their company.

If you are to understand if a team building program is valuable, you have to understand the context for wanting your team to participate in that program. Once you know what success looks like, you can then work out post session if the team building activity helped you achieve that. You can then judge if the program was successful for you and your team.

As an example, one person may bag out shaving Mohawks in each other’s heads as a team building program but if you really wanted to shave each others heads and this helped you achieve your exact aims of giving everyone funny hair do’s then the program was successful. Sounds pretty simple?  If you were only looking the cheapest possible activity and say you take the team lawn bowling and everyone has a great time, then in your context the team building program has been successful.  If you take your team bowling and you were looking for something that gives you outcomes that a round of bowls cant achieve, then the program wasn’t successful.

The very same program/activity/night out/whatever can be exactly the same but in a different context, it is wildly successful or a real pile of crap.

At the end of the day, only a team leader or team with a true understanding of their context can say if a team building program has been worthwhile. If the company who is delivering that program understands your context, you should have great results. The problem comes when a team building program promises things that it can’t deliver. This is where the majority of negative articles come from and rightly so. The ability for a team building program to change behaviour and make lasting change will be in another future blog.

Creative Team Building, Team Building, Visual Funk | By: simon

A great book has been written recently by Susan Cain called the “QUIET: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking”. It has triggered of a rash of debate/feedback/emotions (nothing quiet there!) about brainstorming/group work/collaboration and creativity in general.

There are three articles that I read that are worth a look that explore this topic:

1. The brainstorming process is B.S. But can we rework it? 
2. The fortunes of Solitude: Susan Cain on Introverts, The “New Groupthink”, And The Problems With Brainstorming
3. Does Solitude Enhance Creativity? A Critique of Susan Cain’s Attack on Collaboration

My thoughts after reading the articles and Susan’s work are that I am somewhat of a fence sitter. I take this position both as a practicing artist/creative practitioner (I think is the current term of phrase) and a business owner where creativity and people are our business. Those thoughts are:

1. The great thing about being people is that we are all unique and different. What applies to one wont necessarily apply to the other. That’s what makes us cool.
2. Great things happen when people collaborate and spend time by themselves. Coming to this argument with my artists hat on, great moments of creativity happen when you are alone in the studio. Playing undisturbed with your art is fantastic. Given that, you also need stimulus from the outside world to keep feeding this creativity going and developing and get some new energy going.
   Collaborating on art projects is fantastic as you get to mix and mash plenty of ideas together and you also get great feedback on what you are creating.
   As a business owner in the field of creativity, I cant wait it share ideas with the team and get their ideas and mix into a huge hotpot of creativity. I could not achieve what we do without this collaboration/sharing/feedback.
   Spending time by myself however gives great time for contemplation and review and when the mind rests, plenty of ideas are unlocked from the subconscious. Plane trips are great for this. If you have an ultra busy life, always being disturbed by phone calls or a household of young kids, these quiet times are ideal on both a personal and a professional level.
3. Brainstorming is potentially crap and potentially great. It depends on how these are run, the environment, the expectations, the leaders of the ‘storm’, the energy and dynamics in both the team and the organisation, how the information is captured.
4. You have to find what works best for you and your team. Try different things, be open to feedback, listen and see and the best way to work will be easily apparent
5. On both an artistic sense and a business sense, collaboration and solitude both have a place in the creative/being productive process. There is no hard or fast rule for what works for who, that what’s makes us so interesting as humans, we are all different and amazing, regardless how we may all be grouped.

Happy Creating and exploring what works best. Whatever you do, enjoy it.

corporate creativty, Creative Team Building, creativity, Innovation, Visual Funk | By: simon