Organizational Excellence Through Music

Business oriented, Motivational, Speakers, Team Building, Blues, Words & Music, Innovation, Outstanding Perspective, Communication & Negotiation, Marketing & Advertising, 2010s

We improve a meetings performance through remarkable friendly entertainment!

Energize Your Workforce — Engage Their Creativity — Music Teamwork Consulting — Innovation and Music  

March 2014 Press Release (click here)

Cutting edge music teamwork consulting that engages your people with innovation and music as they write and perform original songs about their business issues, and move into action to make an impact on those issues in innovative, creative ways. In addition to providing conference music, our world-renowned signature program brings event music with a teamwork consulting component for fun and results.   Get Your People Up On the Stage.

OETM is a collaboration between great musicians and experienced organizational consultants who bring a uniquely powerful mix to clients’ programs and events. And while we are definitely entertaining, we are not mere entertainment. Rather our music events are a powerful catalyst for teamwork and organizational change — using a variety of musical genres as our toolkit — to help organizations become higher performing, more innovative, and just plain cooler places to work.

How It Works

OETM is a powerful, interactive process that uses team development to bring people to the next level of engagement – out of their heads, out of the box, and into a more powerful place of participation. And while we are definitely entertaining, we are not mere entertainment. Rather, we are a powerful catalyst for change – using the blues, and a variety of musical genres as our team development toolkit – to help organizations become higher performing.  

Each OETM event is customized for the specific needs of your organization. We work with you to get clear on your objectives and how you would like them to be supported. As part of the process, we write a custom song for you. This song will be performed as part of your program, priming the business innovations pump as your people get ready to write their own songs. It also serves as a check point to verify that we understand what your event and/or team development issues are.   The format and duration of each program ranges from a 2-hour after-dinner edutainment to a multi-day training and consulting intervention program. The focus is on your people getting an opportunity to identify their key issues, and express them in collaboration with their teammates in a blues song.

The process helps put issues on the table, helps identify common ground, and causes a reframing of the issues and your people’s perspective on them as they work together to craft the lyrics of their songs. And they have a great time doing it.   In longer sessions we take time to explore the issues, brainstorming business innovations, looking at new processes, and finding empowering ways to go beyond the business blues.  OETM is facilitated by experienced organizational/team development consultants including skilled blues musicians.  

“In tune with the needs of corporate America” is how CNN described us. And as our many Fortune 500 clients tell us, we are perfect for team development, corporate messaging, new product launches, sales rallies, learning retreats, change initiatives, company celebrations, and business innovations off sites.   Yes OETM is fun. Yes OETM is energizing. And, yes OETM is cathartic. But even more than that, it’s a powerful learning experience. How so? Because the process of writing and singing a meaningful blues song – in a room full of co-workers, on demand, and under challenging time constraints requires the same skills and competencies that will be expected of your entire organization in the rapidly changing marketplace.  For example: collaboration, communication, teamwork, business innovations, creativity, decision-making, leadership, “followership”, generating-accessing-and implementing ideas quickly, and producing results in an unfamiliar medium with limited resources in a short amount of time. 

Bottom line: each OETM event is an insight-invoking business simulation, a “holographic mirror” in which your workforce gets a good look at how they,  

  
and, of course...Celebrate success

Read more for Program Options, Top Ten Challenges Your Company/Association May Have and How We Resolve Them Together!

Program Options

Option 1: Blues Interactive  

Our renowned signature program. A mix of our band’s performance and audience interactive songwriting (in which your people write and sing their original blues songs about company-specific issues.) This service includes one custom song about your organization that we will write and perform ice breaker. Approximately 2 and 1/2 hours.

Option 2: Rock The House  

We’ll help teams of your people write rock ‘n’ roll songs about their work issues and they’ll have a chance to perform them with our band. Using the global language of music, and the energy, creativity, and honesty of rock, participants tap into heretofore unutilized resources to get fully engaged and aligned—passionate about their work, living their values, and responsible for results. This is a great team builder exercise. One custom song included. Approximately 2 and 1/2 hours.

Option 3: Rock Star

Call it Idol, Voice or Factor or just a chance to glitter in the spot light. You become the star! This service is built upon the talent that lies deep in your organization. OETM takes individuals that choose to perform and we rehearse them, then they perform onstage for their colleagues with the OETM band. This can be done in a competition or in a concert type of format. The enthusiasm and appreciation of the audience for their co-workers performing is amazing and inspiring and serves as a great team builder. Performers of all types participate, even drummers!

Top Ten Challenges Your Company/Association May Have and How We Resolve Them Together!

• Challenge 1: 300 participants need a 2-3 hour group activity
• Challenge 2: Leadership program needs team-building event
• Challenge 3: Need something to give life to a conference
• Challenge 4: Get high-level executives into action
• Challenge 5: HR team needs to show their chops
• Challenge 6: End your conference with a bang
• Challenge 7: Communicate Your Innovative Initiative
• Challenge 8: Sales Conference needs to make a splash!
• Challenge 9: Leaders want something to capture the event
• Challenge 10: Communicate a powerful message

You have "challenges," together we have answers... Read about them on the next page!

Challenge 1: 300 participants need a 2-3 hour group activity

300 participants need a 2-3 hour program to help them engage in a fun group activity that will enhance [the] company's new objective:  “empowerment.”   POSSIBLE CAUSES  CEO decided a new direction  More of the team is working from distant locations

ACTION: Rock the House »  An interactive group activity songwriting event featuring a 6-piece band which then breaks your people into groups that write songs about innovation and empowerment.  Have the lead team sing a custom written song about your theme.

Challenge 2: Leadership program needs team-building event

Leadership program needs team-building event that is part of the program’s menu. 100 different participants every 3 months.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Banking industry giant wants to develop high potential leaders  Consulting group wants to brand their program by offering something different.  After so many mergers & acquisitions, different functions need to network and find out what’s happening in other parts of the bank.

ACTION: Blues Interactive »  100 attendees are split up into 10 groups for group activities.  FTM engages with blues interactive for innovation and creativity  Attendees write blues songs about their challenges, perform them with our band and come away energized with a new perceptive.  Quite often a dance party organically happens directly after event.

Challenge 3: Need something to give life to a conference

Creative director, producer, HR needs something to give lift[e] to [a] conference.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Sales Conference  Unveiling new product line  Awards ceremony

ACTION: House Band »  4-7 piece live band provides a “Late Night Band” format, with play on and offs for speakers.  Creates an air of excitement with innovation and slick production.  Custom rewrites or original songs.

Challenge 4: Get high-level executives into action   Get high-level executives and their direct reports into action. They think they’ve seen everything.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Merger or change initiative  Feeling the pressure from the market  New leadership wants to start off with a bang   ACTION: Beyond The Blues »  Blues Interactive group activities followed up by engagement of the participants to jump start innovation and proactive changes  Work force Energized and with an action plan in their pocket

Challenge 5: HR team needs to show their chops   HR team wants to position themselves as players at the decision-making table at large corporation.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Need to show their chops and step out in a different way  Team members frustrated—feel they can add more value to the company   ACTION: Team Jam »  Intimate, revitalizing 2-day group activities offsite  Revamping team charter, reinventing themselves, and stepping outside the box  Subgroup songs on critical innovation and strategy issues  Team brand song that defines new culture; share with internal clients

Challenge 6: End your conference with a bang   After 3 days of speakers and breakout sessions, event organizers know they’re going to be ready for something else.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Excessive PowerPoints  Cup is full  Connection happening on some levels, but could expand   ACTION: Dance/Reception Band »  Hot band for final night banquet  Get ’em out cuttin’ the rug and connecting  Time for fun and celebration  A few inspiring performances from the Face The Music breakout session to get things started with a bang

Challenge 7: Communicate Your Innovative Initiative   You’ve got an innovation and communication initiative and need to communicate by being innovative.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  “We’ve talked about this many times before.”  Pipeline is drying up  Losing talent to more original-thinking companies   ACTION: Keynote »  30- to 90-minute keynote with cutting edge content  Great sense of humor while opening the crowd to their own possibilities as innovators  Music keeps it flowing, and helps participants reframe their own assumptions

Challenge 8: Sales Conference needs to make a splash!  

Sales Conference needs to make a splash!   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Launching a new product  Sales team with talent wants something competitive and fun  American Idol has everyone wanting to get onstage…  

ACTION: Rock Star »  Talented individuals that choose to perform are rehearsed before the event. When it’s showtime, they perform onstage for their colleagues with the Face The Music band. This can be done in a competition or in a concert type of format. The energy and support the audience gives their colleagues onstage is phenomenal.

Challenge 9: Leaders want something to capture the event

POSSIBLE CAUSES  Need a cool takeaway  Want to keep the learning alive  Hold participants performances for ransom   ACTION: Record it »  Using state of the art digital recording. We can provide CD’s, MP3’s or DVD’s of your event.

Challenge 10: Communicate a powerful message   Communicate a powerful message. Stand out from the noise of all the other information being communicated to the target audience.   POSSIBLE CAUSES  Video alone is dry  Want a unique way to launch new products Help workforce deal with change   ACTION: Custom Song Services »  Basically, we write a song about your theme(s), work with you to refine it, record it, and deliver it in any format you want. The finished product is a great way to communicate a powerful message to employees, customers, clients, vendors, or the press. “If a picture's worth a thousand words, then a really great song is worth a million.”