I had heard a lot about the GO-Plus (Global Orientation Plus) program from my team members. This is an outdoor HR training program mandatory for all Oracle employee. In this program they convey 10 business values of Oracle thorough outdoor activity and games. About the games that we played, it was fun but I am not supposed to tell the details of the game, so I will just mention the values that it conveyed.
It started on Thursday (9th Dec) evening. We started our program with a briefing from HR Jyothi. Then we took a bus to Emerald Isle resort. It is on Old Madras road. It is hardly 25-30km from the office but the driver took different routs and he took two hours (he drove for more than 50 km) to reach the resort. That day we just had a brief introduction round and our trainer Sandy told us the agenda for next two days. Then we had dinner and that was all on day-1.
Day-2
We got fresh by 8:00 am, had breakfast and assembled for the program at 9:00 am. There we had a detailed introduction of everyone. After that we played couple of games to demonstrate oracle business values Fairness, Business conduct, Integrity and innovation. Then we had a two hours of break. We played water polo in the break. Again we assembled for the program after lunch. We had couple of games in after noon session to demonstrate values Communication, Quality and Customer satisfaction. Then we had break in evening. I played Foosball in the break but others were playing it for the first time, so I didn't enjoy the game. Took some rest, watched "Munnu Badnaam hui" and "Sheila ki jawani" on TV. On every music channel they were repeatedly playing these two songs.
After the break again we assembled and played Dumb Charade. This just for fun. I played it for the first time and I played really well. Then we had a treasure hunt. It was a very easy one. It seemed like organizer wanted to finish it off early. We found 10 treasure in less than half an hour. After that we had dinner and bonfire. Prashant, Mahesh and others displayed their dancing talent. Resort didn't had good Hindi songs. Also the fire was not enough and on top of it after some time Monkeys started dropping coconut from the tree. That was all on day 2.
Day-3
We started day 3 with rappelling from a hill at Narsapur. It was another 15 km from the resort. I had done it before so I was very confident. This time I enjoyed it more though it was from less height. I took some snaps there. We returned to resort by 9:00 am. We had a 2:30 hrs of break. I spent some time in the pool. Then again we played couple of games to demonstrate business values Mutual respect, Team Work and Compliance. The game to demonstrate Team Work and Compliance needed some good strategy to complete. I worked it out but even then it was bit complicated to follow. Then we had lunch and after that we had to present a skit to demonstrate values that we learned in two days. There were five teams and each team was assigned two values to demonstrate through skit. After that we had some fun there. Mahesh and Prashant again displayed their dancing talent. Trainer Sid sang a song "RImjhim gire sawan". That was all about the Go-Plus program.
Just a couple of days ago when we boarded the bus, we were strangers to each other but in 2 days we developed a relation that will go longer. Thank you guys you all rocked.
Overall we had fun. But it was no where near our expectation. Resort food was terrible and we had no other option. Also the facility at resort were mediocre. This event is mandatory for every Oracle employee and one attends it only once, so company could have chosen better location to make it a memorable event. Also HR should try to make sure that it does not turn out a bachelor outing. In our group out of 23 people there were only two girls.
Click here for the pics.
