For many people returning to work in January, the first week is spent mired in emails and admin. But not at SoulProviders! Early January is workshop week, where ordinary citizens are turned into #Social Media Ninjas! New skills are imparted and lateral thinking is employed to get everyone to see outside the box. And at the end of the week everyone walks away knowing that there is no such thing as a non-creative person… Check out what we learned last week:
Nonto Khumalo
To pin point one thing would be difficult because for me it was playing on new turf. I enjoyed learning about strategy and making sure we present the best possible option for the client. This was new to me because as a graphic designer my main focus was always to present the most striking visuals. Now with this new knowledge I know it’s not just about things looking good, it’s also about my work communicating to the target market and clearly getting the message across.
I thoroughly enjoyed Clement’s creative session because as a creative myself, it was interesting to learn new ways of being creative and not thinking too hard about it but mainly just making sure I’m in the right frame of mind and remain inspired. Brandstorm!!!!! Presentation was the main highlight because I’ve never had to present since doing literature in high school. I didn’t realise I had the potential to get up there and sell an idea, but with such a great team I exceeded my expectations and that is purely because SoulProviders allows one the platform to grow and tap into one’s hidden talents.
Nosipho Ginindza
1) The presentation by Clement that taught us that you can be more creative when you start applying lateral thinking.
2) Another highlight was Melissa’s presentation which showed where our weaknesses and strengths are with our brands.
The brandstorms were awesome because they pushed us to come up with great campaigns and ideas for brands we do not work on and also seeing how we each have different ways of looking at each other’s brands.
Angelique Redmond
What stood out for me in workshop week was learning lateral thinking and that creativity is there – you just have to coax it out! I also loved the brandstorms – the rush of adrenalin you get from presenting and coming up with killer ideas, I felt like a social media sherpa!
Lindelwa Nxumalo
It was my first workshop week here at SP. My favourite session had to be the one on Creativity. The most important lesson I took from that is that curiosity/creativity are drained by fear. Definitely changed the way I think about thinking from now on.
Priya Pitamber
As the newbie on the team, the workshop week was a first for me. It was a great way to see the team interact, apply their wealth of knowledge and get direction for the year ahead while applying their/our creative sides. Guest speakers, Clement and Melissa, were thorough, well-prepared, engaging and entertaining. One thing Clement said: “Don’t be scared to be creative,” has resonated with me the most.
The group work also enabled me to get to know my team better – since we were group 2, we dubbed ourselves “Two Legit to Quit”. My most nervous moment was presenting the campaign idea for Sibebe to the rest of the SoulProviders team. Presenting is not my strong pint, clearly. The highlight was my group winning the best idea for said campaign around Swaziland’s former, late King Sobhuza. The central concept was to honour his memory and legacy in the month of July since that is the month he passed away. It served to evoke sentiment in Swazis of a royal they respected and admired, much like the way South Africans celebrate Mandela’s legacy more so during his birthday month.
Ingrid Sinclair
I loved the structured feedback we got from Melissa – it really put things into perspective in a very organised way, and the template she provided will help us measure the success of our work going forward — great feedback to keep referring back to and trying to improve on all the time.
I also adored Clement’s random-word exercise. It was amazing how being under time pressure brought out some of the best ideas! Like he said, sometimes boundaries are a good thing.
Thobeka Tyesi
What stood out for me most during workshop week was Clements presentation, the take-away for me there was to never be afraid to voice out an idea (creative ideas stem from ideas which we think aren’t creative). Best moment had to be the brandstorms and winning the task. It was a refreshing exercise and personally it made me realise just how much I’ve grown and developed throughout the time spent here at SP. An insightful week!
Wright Mbongo
What I’ve learnt the most is that working under pressure can make you produce best results. It was also good for me to learn something apart from sports, and I think marketing is a bit challenging.
Andy Wassung
I loved the random word exercise, which forced everyone to think out the box and funnily enough resulted in some brilliant ideas. I loved the energy, pace and teamwork environment of the Brandstorm and seeing fresh ideas go from concept, through strategy, to presentation.
David Tshabalala
I’ve learnt the importance of presenting and selling an idea to an audience or client. I also learned how to structure a presentation in a story-telling manner that engages the listener.
-Thinking from a different angle to solve a problem.
-Attention to detail regarding the aesthetics of Facebook posts.
-Analysing data and translating that into accurate visual representations. i.e (infographics etc)
Charly Makwanya
Workshop week was great, i finally had a chance to learn how to use the four functions of management (planning, organizing, leading, and controlling) within my field of work. I also learned how important it is to have a team vision and a good strategy towards every project (The Big idea, USP, KPI etc) .
What stood out for me was the presentation by Clement, although i couldn’t fully engage i still managed to learn how an indirect and creative approach instead of a tradition one can create amazing results in cool and exciting way.
Penny Bouwer
What stood out for me most was Clement’s workshop. I loved how he showed that we shouldn’t be afraid to think outside the box, and that you can be creative from absolutely any angle. Those random words he threw at us made me imagine an educated, larger than life baby, in a world of it’s own. And that example he showed of the Coca Cola campaign was awesome.
We all have a creative side, we just need to believe in ourselves and ideas. We really can become trend-setters. What I also enjoyed was Deirdre giving brilliant ideas at our exercise, don’t get me wrong, everybody had great ideas, but for the ‘non-believer’, Deirdre really came out and kicked butt! That was a great highlight.
Mahlohonolo Tshangela
Must say workshop week was very inspirational, motivating and very educational.
From going through the different brand strategies, to how they work and the planning and foundation that was placed down to build the structure of a campaign or project. I really enjoyed the Creative workshop and just getting back to basics. Remembering to be creative without fear. That really helped because most times, fear becomes a ceiling to our creativity. So that workshop really helped. And lastly the workshop on starting on a campaign. Snap! I learnt so much on it. Words cant even explain.
Lebogang Mgiba
What I’ve learned from all the workshops was that one needs to be in a good state of mind to be creative, pay attention to the little things around you. They can serve as an inspiration and a cool award-winning idea. The brandstorm was one of the highlights for me, there’s nothing as scary as being put on the spot and be expected to produce good quality work. We often undermine ourselves but we have the potential to become whoever we want.
Thina Zulu
Nothing like a good workshop to shake things up and clear the brain of holiday beach sand. I thoroughly enjoyed the exercises on lateral thinking which encouraged us to always look at our tasks in a different way every day because it’s easy to fall into comfortable rut – a very dangerous space for a creative 🙂
