MISSION TO ENERNOVA (DIY PACK)

Assessing Potential and Developing Performance

​By Julie Hay and Peter Emery

​Mission to Enernova can be used as a team building simulation to explore group dynamics, information handling, planning, decision-making, communication and influencing skills, team working, presentation skills, flexibility, contingency planning, risk management, time management and working under pressure. It can be used as a team development activity or run as a simulation within an assessment or development centre.

The activity requires that participants, working on their own or in teams, budget, plan and present this strategy for making a journey from one fictitious planet to another. In this way, it is possible to observe and assess the quality of their decisions on what route to follow, which crew members and equipment to take with them, what levels of fuel, food and stores they will need, and of course how they handle disruptions during the journey.​

​The opening of the initial Participant Brief reads:

"You are situated on Homebase, a station in a galaxy far from Earth, where you work for a space exploration agency. News has come in of the discovery of a new planet, Enernova, where there is a valuable source of powerful new energy that will enable your communities to thrive for the next millennium. This is a commercial opportunity for your organisation. However, you have heard that your competitors are also aware of this discovery and are expected to reach Enernova within the next 50 light years."​

Previously published by Gower in a hardcopy version that is now out of print, the Sherwood Publishing version is designed as a do-it-yourself pack. This keeps the cost down and allows purchasers to make as many copies of the various materials as they wish.

This package contains everything needed to run a range of activities. It is presented in the form of 7 PDFs: an Introduction to the nature of the simulation and how it might be used; notes on how to prepare the materials and run the simulations; a set of Facilitator Briefs for the various elements; a set of Participant Briefs; and a set of Participant Review forms that can be issued at the end of each stage of the overall activity.

It is possible to run the complete activity through the stages of: dealing with the information provided, the planning activity, making a presentation about the plan, changing the plan, and finally making the trip itself. As participants make the trip, they work to a large map on which have been placed sets of incident cards at various points on their journey.  The pack can also be used to run any of these activities separately. You can select just those components that match your assessment or development needs.

Julie Hay has over 40 years’ experience in the public and private sectors in the UK as a manager, trainer and consultant, supplemented with much experience of consulting on assessment/development centre design and providing training internationally. She has an MPhil for research into the competencies of effective managers and is a Chartered Manager, Chartered Management Institute. She is the author of The Gower Assessment and Development Centre, a three-volume collection of materials for assessment centres (also available in Dutch and Polish), and Simulations for Assessment, Training and Development, a photocopiable manual plus CD-ROM.

Peter Emery is now retired but was an independent consultant with over 30 years managerial and human resource experience with several blue chip organisations, including periods as a training specialist and personnel manager. He contributed particularly to the graphics within the publication.

PDF collection:

1. Mission to Enernova
2. Notes
3. Facilitator Briefs
4. Participant Briefs
5. Participant Reviews
6. Cards
7. Map Pages