Competitive Much?
We just completed a food drive for St. Mary's Food Bank at work and it brought out the best in us. And, maybe a little bit of the worst in those of us who don't like to lose.
Our charity team came up with a great idea to increase participation this year. They set it up as a challenge between the North side of the street and the South side (we have a bunch of buildings as part of our campus).
One of my colleagues offered to match her team's donations up to a certain amount. She then emailed the other leaders in our building with the details. Several of us chimed in with more offers to match and several others put in some good amounts of cash as well. We raised a LOT of money.
The best part for me was that I just had to write a check - she did all the shopping. I admit it, I'm fundamentally lazy.
She then posted pictures on Facebook of her shopping results and tagged in some of us from both sides of the street.
I might have started some trash talking by posting the count to date and posting "I'd say the Southsiders have some catching up to do!"
The end of the competition was at 3 PM. The official counter was on the South Side and, ten minutes before the deadline, they brought in several hundred items.
Our charity team came up with a great idea to increase participation this year. They set it up as a challenge between the North side of the street and the South side (we have a bunch of buildings as part of our campus).
One of my colleagues offered to match her team's donations up to a certain amount. She then emailed the other leaders in our building with the details. Several of us chimed in with more offers to match and several others put in some good amounts of cash as well. We raised a LOT of money.
The best part for me was that I just had to write a check - she did all the shopping. I admit it, I'm fundamentally lazy.
She then posted pictures on Facebook of her shopping results and tagged in some of us from both sides of the street.
I might have started some trash talking by posting the count to date and posting "I'd say the Southsiders have some catching up to do!"
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| This was Wednesday morning. |
More money was collected, more shopping was done and more pictures were posted.
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| A mid-day shopping spree. |
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| This was the count after lunch today. The South had risen but it looked like we had it well in hand. |
Freaking sandbaggers!
It was the Marketing people, I'm sure. They sandbag their sales goals, too. ;)
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| Final count. |
We lost by 40 items. 40 freaking items.
One of my colleagues and I went out to Dairy Queen to drown our sorrows. We were truly morose. But, even an M&M Blizzard wasn't enough to soothe my soul. Sigh.
When all is said and done, the great news is that we almost tripled our original goal and did a fine thing for the folks who are served by St. Mary's.
The not so great news is that I had to endure the winners' trash talking. I'd like to say I would have been more gracious if we had won but I'd probably be lying.
Oh, in case you were wondering, we're already planning our strategery for next year.
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