Duration: 60-90 minutes
Can your team's leader manage their way out of a tight spot? This highly enjoyable leadership game challenges the leader to process complex information and help his team choose logically between a number of alternatives.
Terra Nova is a fictitious area of Newfoundland and the team has been dropped by sea plane on Pine Lake. Their task is to reach any one of the five lakes on an adjacent island so as to be picked up again by the plane. There is at least one alternative way of getting to each of the lakes (bus, ferries, hiking, 4-wheel drive hire, plane, rafting, etc), some faster and more expensive than others.
The leader has to get his team to cost at least three alternative methods/routes and make a decision as to where the pilot has to pick them up before he takes off. The decision will obviously depend on the quality of the decisions the leader makes, the strategy adopted, how well talent is used in the team and whether they decide on speed, cost, adventure, physical activity, etc. There is no right answer (apart from making correct calculations of the cost of each alternative) and this makes it an ideal simulation for leadership seminars.
As John Kotter of Harvard Business School has reported, one of the key characteristics of successful leaders is their ability to 'set direction' and let the managers and the team get on with the planning. In this exercise, the group's decision depends on the leaders skill at setting strategy and asigning taks to the team to get the optimum outcome.
This leadership game is supplied with full instructions and can be played with either a single team or in competetive groups against the clock.
