The Business Challenge

Every year, Great Eastern strives for originality and “something different” in its anchor corporate-culture building program.

The Solution

Synchronising with the “amazing race” theme of Great Eastern’s program for this year, Zimerick developed an exclusive application fulfilling the program’s objective.

The objective was building bonds amongst colleagues while they go through thick and thin together and promote camaraderie through the excitement of a time-based competition. Introducing a virtual race Great Eastern Amazing Race (GEAR), on top of the physical race, provided a unique proposition
for the program.

GEAR is an interactive virtual game where up to 4 teams, each with an iPod touch, race against each other around a virtual map of Singapore. The game can be played with 1 to 40 players as single players or teams in a relay sequence. Prior to the race, participants can personalise their avatars by taking a photo. Once all players are linked up, the race begins! At various cross-roads, participants are required to pick the path with the correct corporate value. A wrong answer will cause the avatar to explode and lead to a 10sec time penalty with participants taking on a different race route. The first one to complete the race will be the winner.

Though a seemingly simple game, GEAR is a race packed with lots of fun and content for participants. There are myriad little details that add layers to the game, such as incorporating various distinctive aspects of Great Eastern like the company’s mission and vision statements and properties in Singapore. The race is also made more realistic with side elements like fish appearing in the sea, flying birds and even a traffic camera that reflects racing speed.

GEAR is different from other Apple device apps in that it allows for real-time multi-player interactivity hosted on another iPod. This also lowers the cost of the game to the organisation while introducing a multi-media hand-held game as a special feature of the team-building programme.

The Results

GEAR was “something different” and the unique proposition to Great Eastern’s corporate-culture building program this year. As part of the program’s agenda, GEAR aptly encapsulated the company’s vision, mission and core values into an Apple application that was both engaging and educational. Positioned as the icebreaker activity for the program, GEAR was highly effective in creating excitement and high engagement levels amongst the employees.

One could tell the camaraderie spirit in play as the teams took group photos and ‘geared’ themselves to start the race. From the word “GO”, loud banter, cheers and laughter filled the room as the teams raced frantically to the end. Learning points from GEAR were quickly absorbed in a fun and non-obtrusive way. Employees’ evaluation of program has increased in satisfaction by 3.5%.

Great Eastern graciously shared how GEAR is used during its pilot training session.
See it in action!