Satyakam: Leveraging Experiential Learning for High-Performance Team Building

What’s common between Sir Don Bradman, Sir Garry Sobers, Viv Richards, Sachin Tendulkar, and Virat Kohli? Apart from being genius Cricketers, they are a personification of dedication, determination, and a desire to excel.

Though these legends are decades apart from each other, they all exhibit the same immutable qualities described above. While they are individual geniuses, cricket however is not a game of individual effort. It takes the efforts of all the 11 players plus the support staff to achieve success.

The Indian team was blessed with a great player like Sachin, but it took the Master Blaster 22 years to realize his dream of winning a World Cup. Was his performance not enough all those years? Was the Indian team not performing all those years? ( After 1985) While there were high-individual performances in those years, the team-work clicked in toto only in 2011 and was the key to Indian Team’s success. The unmatched combination of Sachin, Gambhir, Dhoni, Yuvraj, Kohli and the rest of the team members who gave their all, resulted in a High-Performance and Team-Work success formula.

And that, dear readers, is not just a key to win the Cricket World Cup, but the World Cups of our respective lives too. Former First Class Ranji Player Jude Cardozo, understood these principles first-hand while representing Goa.

In the second innings of his professional life, as a part of the corporate world, he could see the gap between company goals and those of the team. To align the two, training sessions of various kind were conducted. But Jude  Cardozo could sense that these theoretical training sessions, apart from being boring, are not in tune with the demands of todays world. He started dabbling in experiential learning programs. One day and two day sessions were conducted to make people understand about brainstorming, team objectives, problem solving, creative thinking, and the importance of contribution of every team member. The focus was always High-performance and Team-work.

Gradually, Jude saw the results, at the top management too. In a few years, he realised that he needs to take his passion for experiential learning to the next level. The result, in 2004, came in the form of Satyakam, his agency based in Goa providing turnkey services in conducting Team Building Events & Outbound Training Programs for the Corporate Sector. In the last 16 years, Satyakam has conducted over 450 programs for companies across the globe.

Unique Techniques that Work

Satyakam took roots in Goa, in response to the need of corporate team-building and outbound training for Corporates who came to Goa for conferences or team-building exercises. The client was forced to tag-along the trainers due to the lack of one in Goa. With Satyakam, Jude Cardozo provided them with world-class outbound training services.

Satyakam’s training sessions have the entire focus on High Performance & Team work which encompasses everything else. Qualities like  desire, determination, dedication, communication comprehension are reinforced and the training programs are designed using well known tools.

Johari Window—is used effectively to understand colleagues better and build bonds. Most people know the theory but find it difficult to implement the technique in real-life. Satyakam programs lets clients understand and re-discover themselves.

Brain Mapping Technique, PRISM – A tool for improving self-awareness within an individual that helps in understanding one’s relationship with oneself and others.It approaches human behaviour from a neuroscience perspective and is used to understand behaviour of an individual. It shows their natural behaviour preference and also how they modify or adapt their behaviour to respond to specific situations. This helps in understanding own behaviour which ultimately helps in understanding other’s behaviour.

All the attendees in a training session at Satyakam have to go through PRISM brain mapping so that the training can be delivered accordingly. High Performance and Team Work can be achieved with these techniques not just on the professional front but personal too. It helps individuals to handle people and situations in a better manner.

Skill Development – The Root Cause Analysis

On any given day, Jude, along with Hemang Laheru, the Program Director at Satyakam and Master Practitioner of PRISM, and other trainers come across people from different industries. However, their underlying goal is the same – Team Work and High-Performance. They make the attendees realize that every individual must contribute to reach the goal. The team adapts the training programs and modules as per client understanding.

While Jude interacts with people of different age groups, he mentions that working with students is a challenging. His years of experience tell him that this is because of the education system that has made them a tad rigid. He also comprehends that cognitive skills development is not emphasised on in the current education system. In light of this shortcoming, he adds, “At the lower level of the corporate world, these youngsters face issues which are left unattended by the education system. They are not really taught the soft skills that will be required after the education ends and the corporate world starts. The transition isn’t well developed..”

Satyakam’s training modules help these youngsters overcome these challenges as they rely on experiences rather than rote-learning. The times are changing and so should the education model which should teach application and problem-solving techniques instead of just learning and memorizing.

Satyakam Sports & Educational Trust is trying to introduce experiential learning in a professional manner to youngsters. The team is interacting with teachers, parents and students to focus on experiential learning rather than a degree-focused learning. They add, “If you can’t apply what you learnt in real-life, the learning is incomplete.”

Expanding Horizons

The Satyakam Centre for Experiential Learning, is being set up in Goa, will be focusing on students from all over India through its 3-day and 6-day training programs. The Satyakam Team believe, what students learn at this stage, will help them in their later life when they start their careers.

The company aims to cover students coming to Goa, from all over India. It will also provide training in college campuses for better reach and gradually seeks to move and expand all over India.

Satyakam Sports & Educational Trust is also involved in arranging activities for the underprivileged students as the team feels, they are the ones who need upliftment for the overall progress of the country. Looking at the long-term prospects, Jude wishes to expand Satyakam’s vision through the franchisee method and will be looking for people who share the same passion as his.