Friday, 19 February 2010

Team Building With a Quiz Night

Great teams make things happen more than anything else in organisations. McGregor's X-Y Theory explains why empowering teams get the best results. It's more about attitude and behaviour towards staff than processes and tools.

Great teamwork is born from concentrating on the employees within that team rather than the task they are doing. By concentrating more on the employee and making sure that's right, more often than not the task will just happen.

Employees working together, for each other in a team is a huge resource for any company. They are more important than the individual skills they possess, the processes they follow and the policies of the organisation. They become part of a great team when the team as a whole decides to do something for themselves, not by being told they must do it but because they have decided this is what needs to be done and by achieving this goal they will make a difference.

There are many team building exercises that can be done, ranging from expensive team days out to inexpensive drinks after work. This article looks at using a quiz night as a team building exercise

Choosing a quiz night for a team building event could be a good idea and here's why.

It's inexpensive. You can create your own quiz if you have the time and inclination, or you could buy a quiz pack for a couple of pounds online. You may wish to charge a fee for entering which could also cover costs of a few beers or pizza.

Secondly, it's flexible - you only need a couple of hours after work, either in the office canteen or down the local pub (if you go to the local pub you may also be able to see if you could get the landlord to donate a free drink to the winner on account of the extra trade you'd bring in!).

Thirdly and most importantly people will have to work together and pull in the same direction in order to win the quiz. Without even knowing what they are doing all of a sudden they are giving opinions on answers, joking with colleagues they perhaps wouldn't usually talk with and reasoning together with the common goal of getting the answers right.

They can also be used in the wider organisation context. I've been to corporate quiz nights where there is a condition that you can only have two members of the same business function in your quiz team, therefore ensuring that people across the business meet each other and are almost forced (in a non-forceful way!) to interact and find out what they do.

Bringing business functions closer together on a personal level can help bring transparency across the organisation and that can only be a good thing.

The main end product here is that people get to know each other as people, rather than colleagues. This is so important because once you start knowing people and liking them, it's almost second nature to want to help them, and it's when everyone in the business is striving to help each other out is when the business becomes great!

Visit quiz pack for profession quiz packs for all events, including team building exercises.

Free quiz questions and answers can also be downloaded here - just click the link!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jon_T_Brown

Sunday, 14 February 2010

Fundraising With a Quiz Night

Getting the questions right:

When writing a quiz I always try to keep the questions as varied as possible. There is always a quiz round and the questions are from all eras to make sure no age groups are excluded. The subjects should be as interesting as possible, including subjects such as science and nature, TV and film, music, art and literature, etc.

You also don't want to include too many questions that people won't be able to guess. If someone doesn't know the answer, they should at least be able to have a pop. People are here to enjoy themselves and having too many difficult questions can actually have the opposite affect - you don't want to make your participants feel stupid!

I try to include the 20-60-20 rule. 20% of the questions asked will be relatively easy, and I would expect most people to get. 60% are of average difficulty and another 20% are quite hard, to separate the winners from the losers.

If you decide to write your own quiz there are plenty of free resources online to enable this. Be prepared to put in the time though to ensure you have a good range of questions and to ensure the answers are accurate. It may be worth buying a quiz pack from a reputable supplier as they only cost a couple of pounds and can save you hours.

Organisation:

Plan in advance! Make sure the accommodation is adequate, with enough tables and seating for all. On the night ensure there are enough pens and that you have printed enough answer sheets for participants. If necessary, ensure the PA system works and make sure you have spare pens and answer sheets.

Is it worth it?

When thinking about how much it could raise obviously the more people involved the better. A quiz night with 100 people attending for example could raise as much as 500. Charge 3.50 for entering (350), lay on some sandwiches and beverages and you could make at least another 200, minus the cost of the hall and prizes. The numbers could look even better if you get people to donate the prizes!

Quiz pack provides profession, downloadable quiz packs for any event. Find free quiz questions and answers - just click the link!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jon_T_Brown

Tuesday, 9 February 2010

Make Money Organising a Quiz Night

Quiz nights can be a fantastic way of making some extra money. Whether you want to increase the takings behind a bar (if you're a landlord) or want to raise some money for your children's school quiz nights are fairly simply to organise and can make a decent amount of money.

The more people you get, the more money you'll make. Pretty simple, eh? Therefore, advertising is key. How you go about this will depend on the venue and your target audience. If you are planning on running it in a local pub get the landlord's permission to put up some posters.

Another great way is to get contacts is put a large jar on the bar with a sign saying "Drop your business card in for your chance to win BIG prizes". This should get a number of email addresses so you can then email them with the details of your quiz, including of course, the BIG prizes you have mentioned...

If the quiz night is going to be held for a parents evening at a school, or targeted at some other club or group of people then send out letters or flyers telling them about the evening and prizes.

Now, let's assume you've had a successful marketing campaign you will now want to write or buy a great quiz. If you have the time you could create your own quiz, but a lot of people don't have the time or inclination for this so the other option is to buy a professional quiz pack online. There are plenty to choose from and can be of a much higher quality than if you tried to create your own.

If you do want to write your own quiz pack then you must keep to these rules: Include questions from different generations so as not to exclude people. Don't make the questions too hard or too easy. Make the questions interesting. If someone doesn't know the answer to the question but wants to know, this is a sign of a good question.

Some people will come along just for the challenge of the quiz, but good prizes will only help the popularity of the quiz night. If you are holding the quiz in a pub you may be able to persuade the landlord to give the winners some free drinks (after all, your quiz is bringing him a lot of extra trade!). If the quiz is to raise money for a school or charity try to get prizes donated. If all else fails, you could give a cash prize, but this will probably come out of the profits.

How much can a quiz night make? Well it's not rocket science - the more people you have the more you make. Let's assume you have 50 people in the quiz, each paying a £3 entrance fee. That's £150 straight away. If you are the owner of the pub you may also get twice the normal takings behind the bar.

If you have hired a hall out or its being held in a school hall you could then start selling beverages, snacks and chocolate bars. That 50 people will probably spend between £2-£5 each, resulting in an extra £100-£250.

The bottom line is that you could make anything from £150 to £400 from a single night, and that is assuming you only get 50 people turning up. Double the number of people taking part and you can double your takings. So get 100 people there and you could make £800! Pretty good for a night's work!

Visit quiz pack for profession quiz packages for all events. Get quiz questions and answers here, including a free quiz pack worth £2.99!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jon_T_Brown

Make Money Organising a Quiz Night

Quiz nights can be a fantastic way of making some extra money. Whether you want to increase the takings behind a bar (if you're a landlord) or want to raise some money for your children's school quiz nights are fairly simply to organise and can make a decent amount of money.

The more people you get, the more money you'll make. Pretty simple, eh? Therefore, advertising is key. How you go about this will depend on the venue and your target audience. If you are planning on running it in a local pub get the landlord's permission to put up some posters.

Another great way is to get contacts is put a large jar on the bar with a sign saying "Drop your business card in for your chance to win BIG prizes". This should get a number of email addresses so you can then email them with the details of your quiz, including of course, the BIG prizes you have mentioned...

If the quiz night is going to be held for a parents evening at a school, or targeted at some other club or group of people then send out letters or flyers telling them about the evening and prizes.

Now, let's assume you've had a successful marketing campaign you will now want to write or buy a great quiz. If you have the time you could create your own quiz, but a lot of people don't have the time or inclination for this so the other option is to buy a professional quiz pack online. There are plenty to choose from and can be of a much higher quality than if you tried to create your own.

If you do want to write your own quiz pack then you must keep to these rules: Include questions from different generations so as not to exclude people. Don't make the questions too hard or too easy. Make the questions interesting. If someone doesn't know the answer to the question but wants to know, this is a sign of a good question.

Some people will come along just for the challenge of the quiz, but good prizes will only help the popularity of the quiz night. If you are holding the quiz in a pub you may be able to persuade the landlord to give the winners some free drinks (after all, your quiz is bringing him a lot of extra trade!). If the quiz is to raise money for a school or charity try to get prizes donated. If all else fails, you could give a cash prize, but this will probably come out of the profits.

How much can a quiz night make? Well it's not rocket science - the more people you have the more you make. Let's assume you have 50 people in the quiz, each paying a £3 entrance fee. That's £150 straight away. If you are the owner of the pub you may also get twice the normal takings behind the bar.

If you have hired a hall out or its being held in a school hall you could then start selling beverages, snacks and chocolate bars. That 50 people will probably spend between £2-£5 each, resulting in an extra £100-£250.

The bottom line is that you could make anything from £150 to £400 from a single night, and that is assuming you only get 50 people turning up. Double the number of people taking part and you can double your takings. So get 100 people there and you could make £800! Pretty good for a night's work!

Visit quiz pack for profession quiz packages for all events. Get quiz questions and answers here, including a free quiz pack worth £2.99!

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jon_T_Brown

Monday, 8 February 2010

Guessing Answers for Quizzes

To guess the answer to quizzes.

Any male quoted is Oscar Wilde, any female quoted is Dorothy Parker, any comedian quoted is Groucho Marx, any writer is William Shakespeare.

Any foodstuff is cheese. Any meat is pork.

Any body of water is the Pacific (it's so huge!).

Any country is usually the country the quiz is set in, sad to say. But any culture is usually Greece. Any range of mountains is the Himalayas.

Any mammal is antelope. Any food producing animal is pig. Any bird is an eagle-features on flags, etc. Any extinct creature is a dodo. Any dinosaur is a brontosaurus. Any insect is usually a bee or ant.

Any book is the Bible. Any science book is A Brief History of Time. Any novelist is Stephen King in the US and Agatha Christie in the UK.