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Meetings & Conventions: Short Cuts May 2000 Current Issue
May 2000
Short Cuts:
Get a clue

No dummies: A Leapfrog Innovations scavenger hunt
No dummies: A Leapfrog
Innovations scavenger hunt

Riddle me this: What teaches delegating, decision-making and negotiating skills; fosters camaraderie, and allows for some sightseeing? The answer: scavenger hunts not the classic variety, but ones with new twists that push attendees beyond their personal boundaries.

Groups playing It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad Hunt, a program of Leapfrog Innovations (617-738-2111), are asked to “step outside their comfort zones,” says Dick Eaton, president of the Boston-based company. Teams work on negotiating skills while rising to such challenges as bringing back a live pet and its owner, or taking a photo of the group dressed in scrubs at a local hospital.

Challenges have point values in proportion with the chutzpah it takes to pull them off. “People tend to crack open their armor,” Eaton says. “And companies want people who are willing to work in new ways.”

In the San Francisco Bay area, the company Dr. Clue (415-566-3905) has teams of up to 225 solve riddles. (From a hunt at Golden Gate Park: “Nearby flowers and the sound of volleys, a comic strip cat sits high on a perch. His tail bears these words of thanks.” The answer is inscribed on a statue of President Garfield: “Erected by the offerings of grateful people.”) “They have a great time,” says company president Dave Blum. “The work dynamics come out.”

A.D.T.