ພາສາລາວ
Last week, BEQUAL program organised a 1.5 days’ workshop on the basics of management theory for local BEQUAL and LAI managers in Laos
This workshop is the first of a “Managers’ Toolbox Series” which will take up to 12 months to complete. The workshops will be run in a very practical, hands-on manner and mostly delivered by international staff on the program. At the end of each session, the participants will be given a management tool they must try to use within the next month. The group then meets again to discuss the tool.
The participants really enjoyed the newspaper tree exercise which illustrates team management: one team leader appointed to take the small teams through a task – make a tall and beautiful tree out of only newspaper and tape.
The Communication in Teams exercise had also a lot of success. A lone person had to lead the rest of the team, which is blindfolded, through an obstacle course without talking or touching. The exercise demonstrates the importance of good communication, the importance of having agreed means of communication, the difficulties of language barriers, importance of good leadership while under stress … and more. So while the activity is a fun stressor, the debrief was full of lightbulb moments.
At the end of this first workshop, the participants agreed to try a prioritisation tool and a discussion date in March has already been locked in.