Mount Everest Simulation

Recently a valuable NC State tech client wanted to kick off a large global meeting with a new twist. Her goal was to break the ice but more importantly she needed to get the people focused and energized to build their global team. She engaged the NC State Executive Education team to deliver a highly interactive session that would both engage the audience and begin to define critical factors for successful global team management.

NC State Professor Beth Ritter chose Forio’s Mount Everest simulation as a valuable experiential learning tool in her session, reducing the large group to sets of five person project teams. Over the next hour, the teams would work together to successfully summit, virtually, the challenging Mount Everest.

As with many simulations of this nature, the teams must decide how to address numerous external challenges: weather, health conditions, supplies. The truly valuable element of Forio’s simulation, though, is the internal team conflicts that must be addressed, based on distinct member strengths and goals. Success in this simulation is dependent on the team members creating open communication early in their effort, and maintaining this communication as the challenges mount.

This simulation allows teams to experience process losses in a competitive scenario where no one is an expert. After the climbers finish, Professor Ritter discussed common team pitfalls and more importantly how to prevent them. The participants learn valuable lessons in leadership, team building, communication and managing team dynamics and team decision-making.

If you are interested to learn more about this and other experiential sessions NC State Executive Education offers, please contact Ashley Black at amblack5@ncsu.edu.

To learn more about Forio’s Mount Everest simulation, click here.