News and Reviews

News: Award for ViVA and Rolls-Royce plc
April 2008

A project forming part of sinfonia ViVA's strand of activity in the workplace has been recognised with an award to the Orchestra and Rolls-Royce plc for a project which, in the words of the business, "was set up to re-energise a weary Business Improvement team and re-establish confidence in their ability to succeed as a unit before the start of a multi-million pound project."

Project Ocean was charged with rolling out a completely new business system in Rolls-Royce Submarines business. When the project was approved, the Project Director decided a team building activity was needed to re-energise the team for the year of intense activity ahead. They discussed their requirements with Mike Saunderson, Business Improvement Specialist, Rolls-Royce Marine. Mike believed that the challenges faced by Ocean had a close synergy with the process of musical composition. Having worked with sinfonia ViVA before, he met with the Orchestra to discuss this idea. A number of options were explored and Marianne Quintrell, Education Manager at ViVA, produced a formal proposal. ViVA designed and facilitated the team away day and helped secure the Darwin Suite at Derby Assembly Rooms as a venue. A planning session was held with animateur Andrew Williams and four ViVA musicians to consider the relationship between developing a new business system and creating collaborative compositions.

The day began with the Ocean team experimenting with percussion instruments and developing rhythmic patterns to ensure the team felt comfortable working with the musicians. They worked in four small groups to compose a piece of music, experimenting with sounds and textures from a variety of instruments. Finally the pieces were joined into one featuring the whole group. A unique feature was to invite the team's families to the world premier performance, in recognition of their anticipated support for team members during Project Ocean.

A key element of the project was to produce a video record, so the experience could be re-lived by the participants to refresh their learning. A DVD was produced and used at subsequent team meetings to refresh team spirits. Each member of the team was given their own copy of the DVD to share with their families.

Looking back on the project, Mike Saunderson said: "I consider Monday [the project day] to have been a complete success. It matched the vision we discussed back at the outset and achieved all I had hoped it would. It was so rewarding to be part of an event that lifted people's self esteem, that helped build friendships and that made people smile all through the journey! I have not heard one word of negative or critical feedback about any aspect of the day. For the Rolls-Royce analytical mind set that is an incredible achievement."

Peter Helps, Chief Executive of sinfonia ViVA, added: "The success of Project Ocean with Rolls-Royce is a terrific example of how the arts and business can and should work together. Music is an incredibly powerful tool in the workplace, and we are thrilled to have our excellence in this field recognised by Arts & Business East Midlands."

Pictured (l-r): Peter Helps of ViVA; Rachel Clarke, Community Relations Manager, Rolls-Royce plc; Des Coleman of BBC East Midlands Today; Nick Whittaker, Director, Finance & Transformation, Rolls-Royce plc; Sara Blizzard of BBC East Midlands Today; Mike Saunderson, Business Improvement Specialist, Rolls-Royce Marine. © Clickers Photography.