With a view to an activity that intends to work on the social aspect of team building, we can identify two macro categories: working on the environment and working on people. A proposal that combines both aspects is our Team Building Farm format.
The format provides several possibilities: from experiencing the life of the fields to everything related to the transition from “product by nature” to “product to be consumed”.
This is a way to go back to basics and rediscover what for our ancestors was everyday life, return to “human” times, listen to the rhythm imposed by nature and the processes related to it.
The timing and procedures of working on the farm follow a completely different logic than the industrial production process. On the farm, natural times must be strictly respected, on pain of failure of any attempt to create anything.
Unlike other team building formats, therefore, the farm offers less flexibility regarding the temporal aspect: you can’t expect to grow wheat and make bread in an hour. Nor can we leave in half a process that has now begun, which instead must be brought to its conclusion following traditional procedures. But all these are not limitations to the format: they are features that are an integral part of it!
The activities to be carried out on the farm can be very different. First, of course, there are all the activities related to animals: milking cows, cleaning the stables, as well as the possibility of feeding the animals and birds on the farm.
It is also possible to engage in the production of natural foods. In this case there are many different opportunities, from the processing of grapes to the preparation of preserves; from the wheat mill to the cooking of bread in a wood oven; from the preparation of butter and cream to that of cheeses and cold cuts.
The focus in any case remains to find a dimension closer to that of nature and to develop awareness about the products we consume every day.
Spending a day on the farm allows you to reattribute the right value to the products, times and processes of nature. A rediscovery to be transferred as a metaphor in your team to return to what are the strong values of the person and the organization.
Finally, the ecological aspect of this team building activity is not negligible, which raises greater awareness of the possibilities of reuse of materials.
On the farm, in fact, nothing is lost: the waste product of one type of production provides material for a different production. Thus, for example, leftovers from agricultural production turn into animal feed, while (vice versa) animals produce fertilizer for the fields!