San Marcos Unified School District administrators and other district employees will meet today with parents and community members to discuss the district's proposed mission statement.
The draft statement reads: “The San Marcos Unified School District is an innovative and collaborative community providing an unparalleled educational experience. Through an engaging and supportive environment, all our students are challenged, inspired and poised to excel in their future.”
Facilitator Dean Newlund said the group has three tasks to accomplish at the all-day meeting. Participants will present the comments they have received about the statement, which may lead to changes, he said.
They also will discuss how a set of guiding principles can fulfill the statement, Newlund said. After that, participants will come up with as many as a dozen topics, such as technology, for the district to focus on.
More of such meetings are planned in the next few months.
Decemember 4, 2007
San Marcos Unified begins to set future vision
By: NOELLE IBRAHIM - Staff Writer
Stakeholders revisit mission, define core values
SAN MARCOS -- Under the theme "Collaborating Together for a Stronger Future," San Marcos parents, students, teachers, administrators and community members Monday kicked off a "visioning" session meant to set the direction of the school district.
It was the first time since 1992 that all of the district's stakeholders came together to revisit the district's mission to define its "bedrock beliefs and core values," said Superintendent Kevin Holt.
"Today is really just about taking a look at ourselves ... and having a conversation about who we currently are and who we want to become," Holt told the audience that had gathered at the M. Gordon Clarke Field House at Cal State San Marcos to begin strategic planning.
The group will continue creating a mission statement and guiding principles for the district today before reconvening Jan. 24 to develop key goals and tools for measuring those objectives. The aim is to produce a document the district can look at annually to determine areas of focus and plans to carry out the vision, Holt said.
"We'll use it to prioritize what we do," he said. "We're no longer a captive audience -- we have competition from charter schools. I'd like to be the district of choice."
On Monday, Dean Newlund of Mission Facilitators International led the group in assessing San Marcos Unified's culture by looking at the different social styles of the people involved in the district and how to meld those styles.
"First you have to become a team before you can do the work," said Holt.
After an assessment exercise, the group determined that it tended to focus more on relationships than data and should encourage more conversations about results and outside-the-box thinking.
"It's not every day we have an organization that's willing to go through a real reflective process," said Newlund. "The goal is to look toward the future with one foot in the past."
Meghin Bagai, a student representative and senior at Mission Hills High, said the exercise was helpful in recognizing the importance of collaboration.
"In order to create a vision, you have to get all sides so no one is excluded," Bagai said.
Because a school district is made up of its surrounding community, local input on the best way to educate children is important, said Shelly Anguiano-Figueroa, chief executive officer of the Boys & Girls Club of San Marcos.
"The Boys & Girls Club has a good relationship with the school district already -- their kids are our kids," said Anguiano-Figueroa. "As a collaborative partner, I want to make sure we know where they're going in the future."
In addition to the roughly 40 participants in Monday's visioning session, the district filmed 25 other stakeholders' answers to a series of questions, including their thoughts on the district's strengths, legacy, stories and areas for improvement.
While the district was praised for its quality of teachers, small-town feel and priority of putting students first, participants said, it faces challenges in responsible growth, closing the academic achievement gap, community support, vocational education and technology.
Promotional Products Business
January 2001
Cribbins Studios Presents Parade of Stars: From sales calls to moviemaking, it’s all in a day’s work for Cribbins account execs
By: Barbara Ross Fruitman , CAS
Issue: 2001jul
The evening had all the trappings of the Academy Awards—a chauffeured 1938 Packard limousine at the Roosevelt Hotel in Hollywood, California, the requisite long, red carpet and a bevy of glamorous movie stars.
The lobby of the hotel—site of the first Academy Awards presentation in 1929—was filled with movie memorabilia, women in extravagant costumes and men in period clothing.
As each couple strode up the fabled carpet, autograph seekers, paparazzi and reporters swarmed them. The scene looked so authentic, according to Walter W. Cribbins Company President Ed Johnson, MAS, that some foreign tourists at the hotel “were sure we were the real thing.”
But the 2001 movie stars were 50 Cribbins account executives, the marketing support manager, the research and creative directors, two vice presidents and Johnson himself. Even the crowd in the lobby was Cribbins folk decked out in their 1920s best and flashing Kodak cameras.
Behind the Scenes
The Black Tie Academy Awards Gala and Dinner in January was the culmination of an effort that began in November 2000. In preparation for the company’s annual meeting--themed “Parade of Stars”--the Cribbins people became moviemakers—and, in the process, mission-statement writers—with the help of Dean and Joanne Newlund of Mission Facilitators International of Cave Creek, Arizona, a mission-writing firm.
The Newlunds and Johnson visited offices in Bellevue, Washington; Ogden, Utah, and Oakland, California, and met with employees within each of Cribbins’ three regions—California, Pacific Northwest and Nevada/Utah. They spent an entire day at each office working with salespeople and employees to draft a compelling mission statement for the company.
“To get our employees to buy into our mission statement, we needed to get them involved in creating it,” says Johnson whose company has a long history of creative approaches to sales meetings and strategic planning. “The goal was to see which of the regions could produce the best mission statement—and which would produce the best 1920s-style silent film to illustrate it.”
Describing these efforts as a “team-building program,” Newlund says writing a mission statement becomes “the way in which to galvanize people. Project yourself six months out—what would be a fairly common occurrence that could derail you?”
Newlund used his customized “Walk Your Talk” sitcom to help Cribbins employees develop skits that diagnosed the current culture of the company. It also helped them develop an awareness of how they would be able to walk the talk of the decisions they just made.
Each group was charged with preparing a four-minute, black-and-white silent movie illustrating the key elements of their mission statements. In addition, members of each group had to write the screenplay, assign roles for characters, select and build minor props and costumes, and write the copy for title boards. Tips were given on making their movie including ideas for constructing the props from cardboard, foam core and spray paint. A budget of $200 was given for props and costumes with a suggestion to visit garage sales and thrift stores for ’20s era appliances, tools, hats, suitcases and clothes.
While scripting and rehearsals were done beforehand, the filming was all done in Hollywood the day before the event by independent movie photographer Bill Thompson and his film crew. Each region went through a group coaching session then moved on to the costume and makeup departments. Thompson’s crew shot and re-shot each scene several times, taking an hour and a half of filming to produce each movie.
After the filming was complete, the entire cast assembled, in costume, for the annual group photo. Red-jacketed Mounties stood in front of a boa-draped actress. A mobster in a zoot suit and white tie dangled a cigarette from his lips and fingered a toy pistol. White-bearded Ed Johnson, clad in black, wore a matching eye patch.
The Big Night Arrives
Then came Awards Night. Once inside the hotel, the guests were entertained by a Charlie Chaplin look-alike during a popcorn and champagne reception in the viewing room, where they would later see the premiere showing of each region’s movie.
The house lights dimmed, the piano player began and, as the projector flashed each of the three movies, viewers were transported back to the days of the silent screen.
Evil Earl kidnaps Sara Pureheart! The Keystone Kops arrest the Good Guys! The train inches toward poor Sara, who is tied to the tracks! Terrible trouble in LogoTown, aka Cribbinsville! Lovely Sara is saved, just in the nick of time!
The “actors” in each movie mouthed their words dramatically and held up their title message boards on cue so the audience could read the dialogue. It was melodrama at its best.
Afterwards, each person got to vote for the best mission statement (named Best Picture) and during dinner the votes were tallied. After dinner, the Best Picture was announced and it was time for the California regional office to celebrate. Elissa Pederson, an account executive in the company’s Oakland office, took her bow. Pederson, who has been in the promotional products industry for three years, says, “Pulling together to create a clear vision of your direction is really important to a company. It can’t come from above. It has to be everybody on the same level going in the same direction. That’s how a mission statement can be effective.”
In the beginning, she admits she was a little apprehensive about creating a mission statement for the whole company because a mission statement is “personal to a company. It’s like marching orders. But we all agreed this is something we could live under.”
After working through the process, she says, “If you know the philosophy of a company it can endear itself to you or repel you.” The experience “brought us into the present regarding our direction. It helped me get more cohesive with the people I work with.”
Johnson agrees. “People take ownership in this mission statement. They wrote it and they lived it.” He expects his $60,000-70,000 investment in the annual meeting to give a “wonderful” return. “When people come to a fork in the road, they should be able to refer to our mission statement and know where to go,” he says.
It’s a Wrap
Creating the mission statements and the films was a bonding experience for everyone, including Newlund. After his second experience working with the Cribbins cast (he was a trainer on the company’s Mission to the Moon exercise in January 2000), he describes them as “the kind of people who develop lasting relationships with their clients, vendors and employees because you feel special with them. It’s like being part of a big family. There was a sense of sadness after finishing this project, a letdown. I knew I probably wouldn’t see these people for a while. You want to be with them.”
After working on the project, Best Supporting Actor Dennis Flynn, MAS, who has been a senior account executive in the Cribbins Seattle office since 1983, says, “What we ended up seeing was not anything like what we expected. You have to be a lot more thoughtful. You have to keep looking at it with new eyes or you miss so much.”
Although the groups’ mission statements and their finished movies were worlds apart, he says he enjoyed the movie-making experience because “it shows you how to get people to work together and be very creative. It’s a great arena in which to emphasize teamwork and creativity, and to see what comes out visually.”
If it Ain’t Broke, Break It
According to Johnson, the company has used over-the-top creative approaches with employees since he and his wife, Tanya, bought the company from industry veteran Carl Rosenfeld in 1987. Cribbins salespeople and employees have found themselves at a car racetrack in Del Mar, California, where each got six laps in a three-quarter midget racecar, and at South Fork Ranch, homestead of J.R. Ewing of TV’s “Dallas” series. Then there was the time account execs spent the day building a house for Habitat for Humanity in Scottsdale, Arizona—chalking up 600 hours of service to the community.
“If we become merely commodity brokers, we’re gone. We cannot exist at the current level by just selling product. We must sell solutions. We’ve got to be creative and we’ve got to teach our people to be creative,” Johnson says. “In a good economy, you can make it selling ‘stuff.’ But in a bad economy, you’d better have some added value. For us, problem-solving creativity is the added value.”
He encourages other companies to think “out of the box” through training, particularly at workshops and seminars offered through Promotional Products Association International. “If you’re a creative person and have some kind of basics, you can enhance that,” he adds.
Johnson gets feedback from each of his offices through a special group of individuals. The company has an advisory council consisting of one account executive from each of the 10 offices, each with a two-year term. “We sit down with account executives in their offices and ask, ‘What kind of issues, problems and suggestions do you have?’ We spend an entire day going through the agenda, a minimum of twice a year,” he says.
The company also brings the office manager from each of the 10 offices to training sessions with the account executives. Johnson cites the “left-brain support staff and right-brain account executives who are not talking the same language” as the greatest problem.
He also believes in rewarding his top producers. While Cribbins account executives average more than $400,000 in annual sales, Johnson takes the top 12 producers out for a special dinner every year. This year, five salespeople made the list for the first time.
His justification is simple: “You have to treat your suppliers, account executives and customers absolutely the best you can possibly treat them. It comes back in spades.” PPB
The Winning Mission Statement
Account executives from the California group won Best Picture for their four-minute, silent film illustrating this winning mission statement:
As a nationally recognized leader in the promotional marketing industry, Walter W. Cribbins Company partners with corporate clients to solve their internal and external marketing challenges. Our commitment to unique ideas and outstanding service drives us to maintain our competitive advantage. Our ultimate goal is the continued success of our clients, employees and suppliers.
February 2001
Team Builing is Rocket Science: Local Firm Sents Teams Into Outerspace
Phoenix busienss Journal
The object: land safely on the moon, then colonize the planet.
That's what Mission Facilitators International uses as its team-building strategy -- asking its clients to become rocket scientists for a day.
The Scottsdale-based corporate training outfit runs its mock space flights at the Challenger Learning Center in Peoria, which has several high-tech simulators.
Dean Newlund, president of the company, believes if employees can manage that task together, then they can reach their fullest potential as team members in the workplace.
"Everyone works toward one goal," he said. "This is essentially the same system as the U.S. space operation.
"And 80 percent of the time, the same problems that show up at the office show up in the simulators," he said.
The company hosted Acxiom Corp. recently, one of a handful of Valley businesses to tackle outer space.
Little Rock, Ark.-based Acxiom, which has about 200 employees in Phoenix, provides technology that enables businesses to develop profiles of their customers and their buying habits.
The company sent 29 of its employees from its industry application development and business support units to participate.
"We really wanted to land that thing on the moon -- just about everyone took it seriously," said Debbie Arbuckle, a human resource staffer. "But it was fun, and I was the communications officer, so I got to tell everyone what to do."
Mission Facilitators offers businesses packages ranging from $4,000 to $10,000, which includes: "Blast-Off," a half-day trip; "Launching Pad," a full-day trip; and "Fly to the Moon," a two-day program. The half-day program includes two trips through the simulator to improve morale, while the more intense programs also promise to identify team-building barriers and craft solutions to them.
Newlund said the training concept, while obviously "fun," serves another vital purpose in today's workscape.
"The kind of rush to get things done is happening in the business world, and it's not bad, but it must be tempered with more planning and analysis," he said. "People aren't stepping back enough to diagnose how people are working with each other."
For each program, half the participants in a group stay on the ground in "Mission Control," and the other half are in the simulated spacecraft. Newlund splits the crews into eight teams -- each with specific functions requiring communication, coordination and decision-making between ground and "remote" crew members. A facilitator guides participants through the process.
Occasional "emergencies" are staged, such as loss of oxygen, meteor storms and high radiation. Flashing red lights add to the psychological realism.
"It's not `close your eyes and imagine,' it's fully replicated," Newlund said. "Even though people know it's make-believe, they start going into fight-or-flight response."
Newlund said many employees tend to grow bored in conventional training situations, such as speaking seminars and even workshops, while the simulator process offers a unique, adrenalin-filled experience.
"Technology today is interactive, so training has to keep in step with the kind of interaction that is happening with their jobs in technology," he said.
Newlund is a former actor who started the business in Seattle in 1996.
He and his wife moved to the Valley the following year and was contacted by the Challenger network about running a corporate training mission locally.
The nationwide Challenger Learning Centers were established in memory of space shuttle crew members killed in 1986.
The nationwide Challenger Learning Centers were established in memory of space shuttle crew members killed in 1986.
Mission Facilitators runs programs for groups of up to 34, though Newlund said he is developing one for groups between 70 and 150.
Other Valley companies that have participated include American Express Co., Charles Schwab, Arizona Public Service Co. and the Bureau of Land Management.
Newlund said the program represents a significant time in history.
"The moon mission is the last time the nation got behind something together that was positive," he said.
The soft growl of the fire-spitting engine grows into a thunderous roar at t-minus 10 and counting, shaking the craft and its apprehensive occupants.
No amount of preparation could have readied the travelers for this adrenaline-pumping journey.
Three, two, one.
The craft lifts from its platform and barrels into the atmosphere, steadily climbing its way into orbit.
Moments later, the tremors and maddening chorus dissolve into stillness, as a window slides down to reveal an aerial view of Earth. But the peace is brief.
The next real challenge -- one of teamwork and perseverance -- lies ahead.
Soon this scenario will be a reality for Valley businesses as part of a teamwork-enhancement program conducted by Mission Facilitators International Inc.
The professional development firm, with locations in Seattle and Scottsdale, uses fun and interactive methods to teach employees basic team-building principles.
"My experience has been that people participate and get more out of a training session if they're doing something and if they're having fun doing it," said Stephen Covey, founder and lead facilitator of the MFI Phoenix office. "Gone are the days where we sit back in a theater-style room with a speaker up front. We listen for eight hours, and we go home and buy their books and hope that maybe one or two ideas stick with us. That's not acceptable to me."
So Covey and partner Dean Newlund, president and lead facilitator at MFI, started the company in Seattle five years ago to creatively address mission statement implementation, teamwork and employee retention. The fruits of this effort, the "Launching Pad Simulation" and "Fly to the Moon Simulation," mirror real workplace situations and communication
But the program is heavily dependent on its location. And just where does one find a working mock shuttle and Mission Control facility?
On July 23, the Challenger Learning Center of Arizona, 21170 N. 83rd Ave., Peoria, will open to the public. The
$7.5 million state-of-the-art building houses a bevy of math, science and technology resources, including a flight simulator, shuttle workstations and Mission Control.
The first center, Challenger Center for Space Science Education, was founded in 1986 by the families of the Challenger 51-L crew in Washington, D.C., to foster long-term interest in math, science and technology and to encourage students to pursue careers in these fields.
Simulations are designed to promote teamwork, problem-solving, communication and decision-making skills.
Since its inception, Challenger Centers have sprouted all over the country. The Peoria center is the 43rd.
Built by the Peoria School District, the center originally was targeted at school-age children. But supporters of the project broadened the center's focus in the course of developing corporate and community sponsorships.
"When we went to APS (Arizona Public Service Co.), they said, `You bet we'll support this project, but we're supporting it because we value the work skills that are taught, and we want to send all of our managers through there,'" said Sandi Hicks, executive director of the center. "So then, our second major component of the center is corporate training."
MFI provides this training in several ways. First, MFI consults with the company to determine its needs and to establish goals.
"So much change is happening in our industries that companies need to know how to get people focused, motivated and headed in the same direction," Newlund said. "Companies are also looking at ways to relieve some stress, retain the good people they have. This is a way to reward them for what they've done."
Corporations can choose between half-day, full-day and two-day programs. The condensed, half-day program begins with the simulation. Participants are assigned their positions in Mission Control or on the shuttle. Each participant of the group -- 15 to 32 team members -- assume a position in the areas of robotics, technology, life support, medical, navigation or communications.
Corporations can choose between half-day, full-day and two-day programs. The condensed, half-day program begins with the simulation. Participants are assigned their positions in Mission Control or on the shuttle. Each participant of the group -- 15 to 32 team members -- assume a position in the areas of robotics, technology, life support, medical, navigation or communications.
At the half-way point of the mission, an emergency prevents the group from moving farther. The group then goes to a facilitation room to discuss communication, team-building and decision-making barriers they encountered in the simulation. After identifying the problems and coming up with solutions, the group returns to the simulator to try out their newfound communication skills.
"Everybody seems to say that the majority of the problems that come up at the Challenger Center are the same problems that come up at work," Newlund said. "After three years of doing this, we noticed that enough people were saying, `As a team, we didn't understand what we were doing. We're now better at our communication skills. We now understand our guiding principles about how we work together.'"
Corporate missions launch weekdays beginning Sept. 1.
"Human resource directors love this; it's another venue that isn't outward bound," Covey said. "Whitewater rafting, paintball -- there's always going to be somebody who has already done it. When you go through this, everybody from the CEO on down is on the same page. Plus, it's a heck of a lot of fun."