Presidential leadership headline

In these days of downsizing, organizations are seeking value for their dollar when it comes to employee-development activities. With this in mind, Cooper Fitness Center devised a way to save corporations money while turning a profit for itself. Through its Teamwork program, Cooper provided a cost-effective program for club members, corporations and nonprofit organizations that promotes teambuilding, group interaction and physical agility.

With a 33-acre campus in north Dallas, Cooper Fitness Center allows neighboring companies a reasonable alternative to expensive travel to exotic locations for employee development. In addition to a state-of-the-art health club, the campus includes a 63-room guest lodge, conference rooms and a research clinic.

The Teamwork program is similar to a ROPES (Reality Oriented Physical Experiences Services) course, in that it tests participants’ physical and mental limits while promoting group activity. Programs are custom-designed to meet client needs and can be delivered at the Cooper site or at other locations, including hotels, conference centers, retreats or at the client company’s facilities.

To keep interest high, the activities include an element of fun. One of the exercise courses, for instance, requires participants to crawl through a “spider web” without stirring the interest of the sleeping arachnid.

The idea is to gauge the groups’ ability to contend with success and failure, the theoretical failure in this case being the prospect of waking the spider and arousing its appetite.

The program’s success exceeded Cooper’s financial expectations. The initial goals were to attract a minimum of 18 groups and generate revenue of $42,500. At year-end, they had brought in 36 groups and more than $52,500, surpassing their projections by 24 percent.

Not only did participants receive a program that was priced based on their specific needs, they also received valuable experience in the fine arts of problem-solving, creative thinking and cooperation.