Fairtrade: mastering policies through play and teamwork

Let’s face it – mastering policies isn’t easy. But who said it has to be unengaging? Read how Fairtrade reimagined this type of training with Kahoot!

August 22, 2018

Corporate training is one of the most popular scenarios for Kahoot!’ing in the workplace. Training in sales, new products, customer service – you name it! Even the most complex topics become more engaging as everyone gets in the competitive spirit.

Fairtrade has another interesting Kahoot! use case in training. They play to keep the entire team up to date with all policies which is vital for their operations. And they’re having FUN! Meet Chris Shelly, Executive Manager – Operations & Finance at Fairtrade Australia and New Zealand, who shares the company’s best practices.

When shopping for tea, coffee, chocolate and other products, you might’ve noticed the Fairtrade mark on some of them. This mark on more than 2,500 products worldwide means that your purchase helps small-scale farmers and workers in developing countries secure a better deal.

Fairtrade is about stable prices, ensuring decent working conditions and empowering farmers and workers around the world. Our main goal is to tackle poverty and injustice through trade.

Being a large organization working across several countries, policies are extremely important to sync all staff with how we operate, as well as help us collaborate with regulators and funders in an optimal way. Policies aren’t always the easiest content to consume, but we found a great way to master them in an interactive and engaging way – and that’s through Kahoot!

Kahoot!'ing at Fairtrade

Word spreads from classroom heroes!

We discovered Kahoot! when I attended a family evening at my son’s school. It was amazing to see how engaged all of the kids and their families were in the competition to try and get their answers in first. Adults were enjoying it just as much as kids, so I thought it could easily be a success in a workplace setting, too, since you can make a kahoot on any topic.

So, when we were then looking for a way to make our policy knowledge come to life at our all-staff meetings, I put forward the idea of hosting a kahoot instead of running slideshows or emailing documents to the team.

Introducing policies and reviewing knowledge with kahoots

Before we discovered Kahoot! for businesses, policy updates were emailed out to staff. There was no process other than an occasional sign-off to confirm they read and knew the policies, thus no way to see if that content was actually mastered.

Now, we play Kahoot! every month in our all-staff meetings, with between 6 and 10 questions on one of our policies. Our topics so far have included:

  • HR Policies
  • Child Protection Policy
  • Fairtrade Gender Strategy
  • Capacity Building Policy
  • Travel Security Policy
  • Counter Terrorism Policy

Policies contain a lot of important content that isn’t always easy to remember. Kahoot! helps learn in a simpler, more dynamic way, having some fun along the way. A lot of learning actually happens without even realizing it. Rather than listening to one person talk about a policy, it provides an interactive session that ensures that the participants are really engaged. The team’s knowledge of the policies has increased substantially, especially around HR policies.

Another advantage of reviewing policy knowledge with Kahoot! is the advanced reporting which is part of the business offering. We can share visual game reports with our funders and regulators to show them where we stand with policy training.

Kahoot! helps learn in a simpler, more dynamic way, having some fun along the way. A lot of learning actually happens without even realizing it.

Discussion and teamwork improve knowledge retention

We like playing in team mode, because discussion and teamwork help participants understand and remember content better. There are 2-3 people in each team. Since most of our questions have multiple correct answers, team members put their heads together and discuss which one they will choose. A game typically takes 10-15 minutes.

We try to include as many photos and graphics as possible in the kahoot questions: not only does it look better, but also builds a better connection with the topic. Don’t forget humor which is also a great addition to a kahoot, even with such a serious topic as policies. One answer alternative is often something funny.

Our staff team is predominately split across two offices in Australia & New Zealand, however meetings often include colleagues from other locations. By using Kahoot! together with our video conferencing, we can easily connect remote participants to the game, too.

With Kahoot! for businesses, training around policies isn’t seen as a time-consuming routine anymore. Instead, it’s a fun, memorable and, most importantly, productive team activity!

Reimagine your training strategy and do it the FUN way with Kahoot! for businesses! We offer a 50% discount on our business subscriptions for registered nonprofits and NGOs. Just select your organization type when signing up, or contact us at business@kahoot.com to redeem this offer!

Fairtrade’s recipe for success

Get inspired with this template for Fairtrade’s Policy Update training, which you can duplicate and edit to fit your needs. To access the kahoot, you’ll need to upgrade to Kahoot! for businesses!
Screen shot Fairtrade's Policy Update training kahoot template

Christopher Shelly, Fairtrade Avatar
Christopher Shelly, Fairtrade August 22, 2018

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