Did you ever have to facilitate a group of people and it was not your best performance so far? Maybe you were thinking: “What have I done wrong?” or “How can I improve?”. Well, I was exactly like that. But then I’ve got an offer. I was offered to spend my New Year’s Eve in the Slovakian mountains, in some village called Drienica, with more than 25 people from 8 countries, who I mostly didn’t know. During that time we were supposed to develop our knowledge and skills about facilitation, group dynamics, and team roles. Well, I couldn’t say “no” to such an interesting offer and therefore I was sitting literally in a room in the Slovakian nowhere with the people, who were completely new to me, just a few days before the New Year’s Eve. The first day was all about the names and getting to know each other. Great opportunity not just to learn the name of the person sitting next to you, but also to step out from your comfort zone and approach a completely unknown person to you and chat with him or her. Just after one day, those “strangers” became my friends. Days before the New Year’s Eve were all about the theory of the group dynamics, team roles, public speaking, facilitating. Well If you are like me not really into hearing lot of theoretical stuff, then trust me, this was amazing. The trainers we had explained the theory during various activities which demanded a lot of movement, teamwork and task finishing. Everything done in an amusing and interesting approach. I could easily recognize afterwards my usual role in a team, my mistakes in body language and public speaking, my weak and strong points. Amazing. The peak of the whole training course was New Year’s Eve celebration. There were tasks to create a program for the celebration, to decorate the common room, to prepare the food and beverages. All should had be done by us. We had to divide ourselves into groups, facilitate the preparation and prepare everything in very limited time. That was the part, where we put the things we learned during the previous days into the practice. And I believe that we did great. Even that it was exhausting, thanks to the knowledge we gained, we could manage all the tasks and welcome the New Year 2020 in the best possible way. We had a talent show with a lot of nice performances and many of us were truly amazed by what the others can do. The highest peak of the night was of course New Years celebration, which was very strong experience for a lot of people. Imagine, for the first time celebrating New Year’s Eve not just in a foreign country but also far away from your family. The following days were focused mainly on the evaluation of the process and learning some new tricks on how to fight stress, tiredness or shyness. You know, time runs so fast and this amazing week was fast just like a blink of an eye. Full of new knowledge, but more importantly with a bunch of new friendships I was returning home. More confident, self-sufficient and motivated into the work that was in front of me. I would like to thank everybody once more for this fantastic week and opportunity and would like to recommend to everyone to try such a thing.
Roman Jordán
