Case Studies

Discover how Helga von Winter used Tower of Power to help supermarket employees work more collaboratively after their store was acquired

When a large retail chain in Germany acquired a supermarket with 55 employees, it quickly sought to integrate its corporate culture into the store. The goal was to reshape the staff's existing mindset with a new focus on cross-departmental collaboration that would drive a shared vision for store-wide success.

The chain started by introducing new management. Both the original store owner and manager had already left, and the chain took advantage of this void to bring in five experienced leaders of its own. Their mission was to encourage the remaining employees to think beyond their own departments and to consider new ways to start cooperating with others.

To support this effort, the chain turned to Helga von Winter, a trainer and coach specializing in team and leadership development and conflict resolution. In her analysis of the situation, von Winter found lingering tensions from the store's 'old ways' and realized that any effort she made to help employees break out of their departmental silos would also have to resolve these historical conflicts.

Von Winter developed a day-long culture seminar designed for everyone at the store (both  employees and managers). The morning session was an in-depth mutual discovery to help people to get to know each other better and to raise awareness about the team's current state of mind. The afternoon session built on this with a dynamic team development activity to foster a spirit of unity and lay the groundwork for increased collaboration. Von Winter's tool of choice for this was Tower of Power.

Tower of Power as a metaphor for a special promotional display

With Tower of Power, a team must work together to lift and stack wooden blocks into a tall, stable tower using a metal crane they control with strings. It seems simple, but as the tower grows, it becomes less stable. Success depends on a shared focus, clear communication and excellent coordination and it's easy to assign workplace metaphors to every element of the activity.

In von Winter's hands, the tower became a special promotional display at the store that everyone was responsible for.

Working in a large narrow room, she set up two Towers of Power - one in front and one in back. The wood blocks were marked with sticky notes in two colors and placed near their respective cranes except for two blocks from each set that were placed farther away in a separate area. These would serve as 'delivery mistakes' that the store employees would have to troubleshoot, just like in real life.   

She divided the group into two teams using a count-off method to break up any department cliques and ensure a random blend of employees and managers. Managers had been asked in advance to step back during the activity to represent their frequent absence from the store.

Von Winter introduced the activity and explained that the group's challenge was to build two tall and stable towers in one color each.

"Every day, you are all busy rearranging, restocking, reorganizing, rebuilding and restyling to ensure that your customers can shop in a pleasant store with an attractive range of products, a store they will be happy to come back to again and again. And you may be wondering what these wooden blocks and these strings have to do with that," she said.

"Today, this seminar is our supermarket. Just like in the supermarket, your commitment is needed today to set up a special promotional display for your customers. This special promotion should be particularly appealing to your customers and will be different from anything you have ever set up before." 

There was just one hitch, she explained, which was a delivery mistake. "As in real life, there has been a mix up in the delivery of the parts for the construction and you will find that two parts you need for your own construction are with the other group."

By removing the two blocks from each set and placing them farther away from each team's primary work area, von Winter elevated the coordination demands of the activity and created a practical exercise in interdepartmental collaboration.

From rivals to collaborative problem solvers

The activity began and right away, there was an obvious difference between the two teams. One started immediately and was clearly faster, while the other discussed each move intensively before taking action. At first, the teams only communicated among themselves, paying no attention to the missing blocks. 

Competition set in quickly, thanks in part to a manager who encouraged his team by saying, "We're better and faster than they are!" Von Winter was prepared to intervene, but quietly allowed the group to resolve the conflict themselves, which they did.

Once the teams realized they needed the missing blocks, one asked the other to bring 'their' blocks to their area out of concern they would knock over the second team's tower. The second team refused, however, saying the first team should do it themselves. Again, von Winter chose not to intervene because this situation mirrored real life in the supermarket so well. She trusted the teams would sort it out.

"And that was exactly what happened," she recalls. "The teams discussed together how they could get 'their' building blocks from the other team's zone. The two teams then agreed to support each other in retrieving the missing components, while keeping an eye on both towers."

In the end, both teams succeeded and everyone was proud of their teamwork.

"The participants were enthusiastic about the experience-oriented approach," von Winter recalls, and the Tower of Power activity "established a much-missed 'we-feeling' in the team."

Discussing success and relating the experience to real life

Following the challenge, von Winter led a reflection about successful interdepartmental cooperation and positive interpersonal relationships. She focused on the following topics:

• Factors for success
• Communication and coordination
• Leadership and being led - mutual acceptance
• Culture of acceptance of mistakes
• Appreciative interpersonal relationships
• Specific incidents such as competition, or planning versus starting immediately

She asked the following questions:

1. What did you experience?
2. What was the coordination of the two teams like?
3. How did you experience communication within and between the teams?
4. How did you experience leadership? Did the leadership role alternate? When was leadership accepted?
5. How did you deal with mistakes and failure?
6. What was key to finding a solution?
7. What are your takeaways from this activity?
8. What specifically do you want or need to agree with each other?

Using Tower of Power, von Winter says, gave everyone at the store an opportunity to break with the past and become more open to a new approach to working together. They even created a list of Rules of Cooperative Conduct during the reflection, which was then hung up as a poster in the supermarket break room.

Feedback from the store management and headquarters was also positive. Both noticed a discernably positive change in the store.

"According to the store management," she explains, "acceptance of the new culture and of the new management team had increased significantly. There was also a noticeable increase in willingness to help across functional boundaries."

About the trainer

Helga von Winter is a Munich-based trainer and coach specializing in team leadership development and conflict resolution.

Connect with von Winter at www.helga-von-winter.de.