Most of us have at least caught a glimpse of the TV reality show, the Amazing Race. Thousands of miles later, only one team hobbles into victory! Winner takes all! The rest head for the hills, licking their wounds.

On the 20th of August the intrepid Lafarge Cement Sales & Marketing Teams
set off on their Ama-zing-zing Race…

…and what an incredible day it turned out to be!  It was destined to be nothing but that from the start…  Firstly, to Maria Sazeides from Lafarge - From the moment we started planning, Maria was very clear about two things – she wanted the race to make a positive contribution to the communities we visited and to make sure her team experienced a different side of Joburg – different from what most of us experience everyday.  Huge kudos to Maria for her openness to doing something different and for her generosity.   Secondly, to our amazingly talented and passionate about making a difference where others fear to tread, Tracy!  Thanks Trace – you put an amazing day together.  Thirdly, to a great logistics team – you can’t believe the nitty-gritty painful amount of detail that goes into planning one of these things – so a special thank-you to the Nomsa’s (ours and Lafarge’s!), Gill, Raelene, Shirley and Evelyn. And last but not least, to an incredibly enthusiastic gang from Lafarge – they rocked from the word go!

The Avo team created an Amazing race with a whole different spin. Sure, there was competition: teams raced down historic main street searching for clues from egoli’s mining past, teams had to out-create each other with spray paint on the star graffiti wall and there was also a race to get as many African greetings as possible from the New York of Africa…our very own Jo’burg!
 
But the highlight had to be the time spent with the children of the Sunshine Nursery school in Yeoville.

Each team was tasked with creating a learning aid for pre-school kids: a letter of the alphabet to be stitched onto a colourful cushion. With the clock ticking, teams madly designed, stitched, stuffed and decorated with the whirr of the seamstresses’ sewing machines humming energetically: the wind beneath their product’s wings. Then they hopped into their taxis and raced to Yeoville. Here, each adult carefully took the hands of two little ones and embarked on the BIG WALK to the church. This was a great space to play and sing and learn. Learning aids came to life, smiles stole hearts and then the MacDonald’s Happy Meals arrived. It was a day of great fun and huge heart…

And the winners were:
6 Seamstresses in the fashion district
26 team members from Lafarge and most of all…
45 children from a tiny nursery school in Yeoville.  They were not only the big winners of the day, but as a result of our time with them, the Lafarge team has now adopted them!  So a huge, heartfelt thank you to Lafarge for their commitment to continue making a positive impact in the lives of these kids .

I think we all know that we are in for tougher times ahead, and in the training and development world that often means that training budgets are cut because ’soft-skills,’ training is often seen as a nice to have rather than a have to have. And of course, as a sales team, we will need to get very clever as to how and where we apply our efforts…

I was reading an article last night about how to ‘Recession-Proof your Workforce,’ by TalentSmart. In this article they spoke of the importance of organisations focusing on increasing the emotional intelligence of their workforce so that they can more effectively deal with the tough time ahead. So how does ‘Sussing Personalities,’ fit in…?

Well for those of you who have seen the magic that can be created when people (or personalities) are in sync with each other, or the devastation when they are not, I probably don’t need to paint you a picture! But just to get a little more specific, in most work environments, one of the things that can have a huge impact on productivity is people’s ability to communicate and collaborate together in order to get the work done. When this is not happening, some of the things you may see are: one strong personality shutting down another in a meeting, good ideas not being shared or considered as they should, people that absolutely rely on each other to get the work done avoiding each other, compliance vs commitment, communication styles that clash, prolonged decision-making because you need to get the people stuff sorted out first, need I go on…?

One of the greatest benefits of the ‘Sussing’ workshop is that it introduces some very practical ways to help improve one’s emotional intelligence in the areas of self-awareness, self-management, and relationship management. It creates a common platform for people to understand themselves better, as well as those on their team. As times get tougher and the pressure and volitility in our work environments increases, ‘All the knowledge and technical skill in the world, can’t address a productivity issue that is rooted in poor emotional coping mechanisms (2008, TalentSmart).’ I strongly believe that the organisations who really get this and make a deliberate effort to do something about it, will come out better and stronger as a result.

Oh, and by the way, I wouldn’t be a good sales person if I didn’t go in for the close, if you want to be one of those organisations that comes out better and stronger as a result…give us a call…I know we can help!

Last week I wrote a blog and was going to come back on-line to write part two.  Then something happened over the weekend that made my trials and tribulations as an Account Manager seem very insignificant in the world…

Mongie (my domestic worker), sms’d me last Saturday to tell me that she had to go down to the Eastern Cape because her husband had been attacked. She took a bus through the night, but unfortunately she did not make it on time - her husband died during the night.  Mongie is a Zimbabwian.  She had been in this country for about a year and a half and her husband just joined her in January.  Both of them are teachers.  Jabu had finally found a teaching job and had just finished his first week of work.  He was in town asking around for a place to rent and somehow ended up attracting the attention of the wrong people. His attackers forced rat poison and bleach down his throat, poured cold water all over him and left him. 

In a way, I feel a bit guilty writing this blog after reading such an uplifting one from Jules, but on the other hand, this is an issue that is real to South Africans at the moment and we need to be reminded of the work that still needs to be done in this country. 

A huge and heart felt thank you to Jules and Avo for donating money that will help towards getting Jabu’s body back to Zimbabwe and funeral costs.  At a time when the family is dealing with such grief, it is some small way that we can help to relieve some of the burden and ease the difficult times ahead for Mongie and her family.  

At lot can happen between 7:30 and 10:30 am… This morning I earned the Cock-up of the year award (or very close to it).

This week I had 3 different training events on with one company but 3 different business units. I left the Far East this morning on route to one of these events in Sunninghill which was on route to another one in Lichtenburg. I almost arrived in Sunninghill and I discovered that there may be a bit of a problem…

The trainer sms’d me to see if I had the venue mixed up because the location I had sent her to was not expecting her. So I contacted the client to confirm the venue and she said, ‘yes, it is in Sunninghill, but tomorrow.’ On Monday, one got postponed and I mixed up the day and event and cancelled the trainer for the wrong day.

Now I have one of our trainers all set up and ready to go, and no participants!!! (for those of you who know Tracy – she has put countless hours into preparing for this session).

So I sit in the parking lot, take a deep breath and walk into the training venue with my tail between my legs to tell Tracy that she is not actually training today (after all that time on preparing and having the training room all set up and ready to go!). After I explained my screw up, she took it like a champ and told me that she was feeling very privileged to be a part of the biggest cock up of my year and a half with Avo.

This would not be as big of a deal if Tracy could do the training tomorrow, but she is booked to do another client session tomorrow and there is no one else that I can put in to do the training because it is a custom project that she has been immersed in for over 6 months.

At this point I have visions of me prepping into the wee hours of the morning and getting up at 4am tomorrow to drive back to Joburg from Lichtenburg so I can run the session myself. But after a couple of hours of her cell phone attached to her ear, Vanessa, (our Training Manager) has re-organised heaven and earth and made a plan!

So as a result I am able to trade in my prep time to shower love and gratitude on all the Avos (Tracy, Grant, Vanessa, Raelene and Clint) that pitched in to help or had to rearrange their lives to help me (and most importantly my client!), recover from my cock up.
P.S. There is more to this story, it is only 9:45. Part II to come tomorrow – I will get my butt kicked if my blog is too long…

It was a year ago that I joined this precious Avo space. Aside from the usual things one goes through when they are settling in to a new work space, I have had a pretty action packed year on the personal side…

Moved 3 times - One of these moves was finally into the new house we have been building which took forever and is not just known as ‘the house’ to my friends, family and colleagues, but the house with many colourful adjectives in front of it!

Got married to a South African (This also came with the realisation that I am no longer here on a ‘work visa’ but that South Africa is now home. I could do a whole other blog on the emotional impact of this!!!)

Had my parents here from Canada for a month which was a wonderful excuse to go galavanting around South Africa - which they absolutely loved!

Went home to Canada for three weeks for another wedding celebration.

… And in the midst of all of that I managed to actually get some work done!

On the work side, I must admit, slogging it out to build a new territory is not on my list of ‘the most enjoyable things to do on the planet!’ Getting to know different products, how to position them, building new relationships, hanging on to the old, familiarising myself with new systems and processes (and sometimes the lack there of - tee hee), and staying focused on a fairly aggressive sales target, is flipping exhausting! But I think one of the most exciting things about the past year has been the wonderful opportunity to reinvent myself. With all of this ‘newness,’ one would be a fool to not take advantage of it!

So thanks to everyone in my life who has had to take a few knocks along the way (and believe me - these ‘knocks’ were felt as far away as Canada) - Lots of love and gratitude to you all - I owe you big time!!:)

It feels like ages since I have had a couple of ’sane’ hours in the office to catch up on things. I say that with a bit of jest as I sit here with my head stuck in my computer trying to catch up on e-mails, invoicing, customer follow-up, forecasting, doing my pre-work for an upcoming training course, scheduling client meetings, yada yada yada… Sound familiar to anyone?

On top of all of that, I am absolutely starving because I rushed out of the house this morning without breakfast (and food is very important to me)! Then an angel appears - her name is Dinah. She has a plate full of the yummiest pasta you have ever tasted! So I wolf my pasta down doing work in between fork fulls. About an hour later doesn’t she appear again! This time with a cup of tea exactly the way I like it. As I sat and enjoyed my tea I realised how lucky I am to have such caring people around me in my work space. She doesn’t have to do it - she just always seems to know when I need a little pick me up.

So Dinah - this is me just taking a moment to say a special thank to you, and to Maria and Nomsa for taking such good care of us you precious things!

Becks xx

Well here I sit finally getting to blogging after many nice kicks in the butt from Jules! What is coming to mind is, It has been 8 months since my last blog and these are my sins! But then I thought, first let me google the word Canuck. This is a word that is commonly used in Canada when we are affectionately referring to ourselves, or our neighbours to the south are nicely poking fun at us. I have used it for years and it occurred to me that I really had never thought about where the word came from or what it actually means. Anyways, once I found this google definition of the word ‘Canuck’ I thought I just had to share it with you. I was amazed at how much fun this guy is having looking up the meaning of words and what a great sense of humour he has. So here is what I found:

Dear Word Detective: A little while ago a friend and I were talking about hockey and started to speculate about the origins of the word “Canuck.” Well, maybe “speculate” is the wrong word, since the “speculative” conversation went something like, “I dunno” (shrugs shoulders). Anyway, since then I have been trying to figure it out and the closest explanation I can find is that it may have originated from the word “Canadian.” Is this so? — M.K. Shaeffer, Ohio.

You and your friend shouldn’t sell yourselves short. If you were to wander into my study on an average day and ask me about the origin of “canuck,” I, too, would almost certainly shrug my shoulders and grunt, “I dunno.” Then I would ask you how you got past the 19 locks on my door. Then, being a New Yorker, I would mug you.

Just kidding. I haven’t mugged anyone in years. Besides, the whole scenario wouldn’t work because, while you have been fantasizing about breaking into my apartment, I have been looking up “Canuck” and now know the answer. I actually know several answers, so even if I did mug you, you’d be getting your money’s worth. The simplest and most popular theory seems to be the one you came up with, that “Canuck” is simply a shortened form of “Canadian”.

However, according to “Unkind Words,” a fascinating book on ethnic labeling by Irving Lewis Allen, “Canuck” isn’t really that simple. First of all, it seems that French-speaking Canadians living in or near the northeastern U.S. consider “Canuck” to be an offensive ethnic slur. But in the rest of Canada, “Canuck” is a label of national pride, as evidenced by the name of the Vancouver Canucks hockey team. Go figure.

As to the origin of “Canuck,” Allen reports that it may have arisen as a blending of “Canadian” and the Inuit (Eskimo) word “inuk,” meaning “man.” There’s also the possibility that it came from Hawaiian, brought over by laborers imported to colonial Canada, but that seems a bit of a stretch to me. So there you have it, and good luck getting out past the cats. The big orange one mugged me last week.

So there you have it, an interesting piece of something from the other side of the world from this very homesick Canuck.

P.S. In another 8 months I will come back on and blog what I was going to originally blog about!

Hmmmmm, Where to start?! Well you know what they say about the stars aligning and things just working out the way they are supposed to and that is how I met Jules. We just happened to be at the same supplier meeting of a mutual client and immediately hit it off. We also had a little help from a friend, Christine Ayiotis. Thanks a bunch Christine, I owe you big time! Hanli was also at that meeting. I walked away with an amazing impression, and thought; “These are definitely chics that I would like to spend more time with!”. As I began to meet more and more Avos I became more and more convinced that this is the place where I am meant to be.

I arrived in South Africa from Toronto, Canada about three years ago. I was full of k@#*k’ (can I say that on-line?) and was extremely excited about the adventure that lay before me. Well adventure was an understatement!. It has been an amazing mix of highs and lows and personal tests. I must admit, there were many times when I wondered, “What the heck am I still doing here??!*?!”. All that being said, it has been an incredible journey and, as with many things, its takes a little time and being in the right space to fully appreciate the experience. I am happy to say that I have found that right space, and I will be sticking around a little while longer.

Now on to this “Sales thing”, which is what I do at Avo. I get an absolute kick out of meeting people and getting to know what makes them and their organizations tick (or not tick?). Over the past 12 years I have been involved in pretty much every aspect of training and development, developing, delivering, selling the stuff and managing the people who sell the stuff. I think the coolest thing about doing what we do is how much we all learn off of each other each and everyday. Sometimes I feel like saying; “Ok, enough already, there is no more space at the inn!”

Well, I think that’s enough from me. As you can probably tell I am sooooooo happy to be here and looking forward to being a part of the magic that Avo weaves.