Office Olympics 09

We had our first Office Olympic games today and it was loads of fun despite the slow start and the Wild Boars losing :(

To explain a bit more, at WSO2 we have 4 different houses that all employees belong to - Wild Boars, Cloud Bots, Titans and Legion. Every so often we have various activities and games where each house tries to be the champion for the year. The biggest event we have is the Basketball championship. The Competition can get fierce but the main thing is for everyone to participate even if its just cheering on team mates.

While having a bit of fun and breaking away from every day work is certainly a good reason to have such activities, the main aim is to break down barriers, bring about better team work and understand the real strengths of people we work with everyday.
I've seen new comers getting more comfortable at work as well as the more quieter people coming out of their shells. Leadership and creativity are also skills that really get put to the test.

As an organizer of events for the company the challenge is to come up with interesting events that really get people going. Its important for everyone to join in and have a good time. and of course cool prizes can really motivate people too!

Coming up next at WSO2 is probably a carrom or Table Tennis championship in September and of course the Basketball matches start in October. Lets hope the Wild Boars do better here than at the Olympics and regain our title :)

Webinars - why do we have them?

At WSO2 we started doing Webinars about two years back. We've been conducting them at least once a month since then and sometimes even more frequently. We get valuable information about who really is interested in our stuff by the people who register and attend.
Attendance is usually anywhere between 30-50% of all those who register. A lot really depends on the Webinar hosting system used to present the content. Hosting systems are a dime a dozen and each have their own pros and cons. The main thing I look for is getting good reports, ease of setting up and running and of course it works on any OS. I'm yet to find a system that gives me all three completely. There has always been some give and take.
So anyways the main point of this post however is, what do we really gain by conducting webinars and why should we continue to do them? Yes its a great tool to present our products in a low cost, geography neutral and hassle-free way. As in you can sit at home in your PJs and present all the great things about your products to a whole bunch of people located all over the world! But when it comes to marketing lead generation I'm still undecided on how effective it is.
Other than building awareness can we really expect a person to buy something right away once they've attended a webinar? perhaps the content needs to be geared towards selling rather than just informing? I guess time will only tell as we embark on a new series of product specific webinars this quarter.

2009

A new year and already almost half the month is gone!

So what does 2009 have a in store? more blogging perhaps...learn to swim...finish CAM...go for oh so many wedding and functions...who knows what else?! :)

On a side note watched a really good movie called "Slumdog millionaire". Very nicely done and interesting portrayal of modern Indian culture.