On a warm and surprisingly creative day (as days like these are best for slacking off),  we assembled a small team in the basement of our office in front of the whiteboard. Basement is our brainstorming heaven. A plain room with clean surfaces and one big whiteboard. There is nothing to distract our attention, so pretty much every idea that comes out of it has developed into a cool and successful project. Sponge is a classic example of our out-of-the-basement creative process. Our intern Dubravko came up with a simple but ingenious idea, an idea born in an e-mail conversation between him, Ida and Ana: “Hey, why wouldn’t we make education workshops in our office for students?”. A simple, brilliant question that opened a new creative approach and a field in which we could test our skills and do something good for our community.

We started brainstorming – we drew, we laughed, and we argued our ideas. The first thing on our agenda was to define means and goals, which are key in the project creating process and in setting good foundations for its success. From the beginning, we wanted to define what type of communication we will practice. We were all on the same page with this one. All of us want our reputation to be perceived as  fun(ny), but relaxed and educative. “I don’t want people to perceive this workshops as institutionalised, too serious and students with uniforms on” said one of the designers. He couldn’t be more right. The naming process… The most frustrating but yet so satisfying task. A series of good, less good or even non related terms started to show up on our whiteboard. A matrix of different values we wanted to communicate through a single name.  We decided to go with the simplest one – Sponge! It’s perky and has meaning of absorbing knowledge. Just the right amount of silliness we needed. On that first brainstorming we got what we came for: named the project, defined the communication strategy, and set some guides so our designers could create our visual identity.

If You have an idea, you do the project. That’s how things work around here. You get credit for your work, but before that, you have an opportunity to earn that credit. However that’s not an easy assignment and you can’t do it alone. So Dubravko formed a team of people, along with designers and support from “more experienced ones”. A beautiful cooperation between different sectors, minds, and approaches was heating up.

Very soon, the team devised the a strategy for the project, trying to take into account every detail that might come up in the process.

The first workshop of the Sponge project was Digital Marketing Challenge.

With the goals of spreading knowledge in mind, the sessions which included employees from different departments of the company speaking about their work were set up. The speakers, topics, headlines and the time of presentations were essential. Then we moved on to technicalities such as where the communication with students will take place (LinkedIn), how to set up our office, what snacks and drinks to buy, how to evaluate the project, when will the final party take place…

Luckily for Dubravko, the team was very diverse. With micromanagement and strategy freaks included, all the bits and pieces of the project slowly, but steadily fell into place. The design department was a huge part of the process as the guys were included in every single document that had to be created, from the first announcements on Facebook, flyers, to a large poster that will stay in our office and the certificate of participation that will be given to our participants.

THEN, WE HAD OUR D-DAY

The first applications came and the team was ecstatic. It’s not every day that you get to watch people really appreciate what you do. At the end, choosing which student associations will be participating in the workshop was a difficult task, but soon enough, they were at our door, waiting to get in and absorb the knowledge.

The very first day we included all the participants in a “get to know each other” game. We had a laugh, only to show that our way of education is through fun and engagement. Andrej, our first lecturer and an Account Assistant, held a lecture on Community Management. It was not just another run of a mill lecture. It was a discussion on what Community Management is and it’s importance. One in which everybody participated in, creating a cool study environment, unlike anything which the students were used to.

The day after we learned about being an account manager in a digital marketing agency by our account management princesses, Petra and Ivana. It was a great day, and our students knew it too. They gained knowledge many of their colleagues do not have acess to in the regular classrooms.

On the second week of educations we talked about our products, Socialpuzzle, Mediatoolkit and Socialnumbers by our product managers Josipa and Ivor. We also made a joke with Mediatoolkit choosing the article on Sponge as the most shared on the internet. Who knows, maybe this blogpost just might be it? Either way, Ivo from Traffic talked about Facebook and Google ads, and boys from the design department had a grand finale talking about what they do, why is design important and showed that design is not just “making things look pretty” but much, much more. Oh, and they had a great example on one of their best works.

We don’t want our new friends to just sit and watch, so we gave them assignments. The gang had to create online marketing strategies. The fun part is, they had to create one for their “competition”, or, other student association. Taking into account every subject talked about earlier, they came up with solutions for Community Management, accounting, Facebook ads, Socialpuzzle apps, Facebook applications and design.

NOW IT WAS TIME FOR THEIR D-DAY.

We brought everybody that participated, including their colleagues from the student associations, to a lecture hall of the Faculty of Economics and Business in Zagreb, put them in front of the lecturers from iSTUDIO and let them present their ideas. We felt the trembling voices and jitters, but also great enthusiasm, a will to present the best they can and all the hard work they`ve put into their presentations.

In short, it was awesome to watch the students implement the knowledge they gained..

WE WERE REALLY PROUD

After all students finished their short presentations, our guest Đurđica Vučković from Iskon held a short lecture while the jury graded their students. It wasn’t easy at all, but as we are reasonable adults (only when we work), the agreement was finally made and sealed.

We didn’t want to give up the winner just yet. Ida Pandur, VP External relations,  talked with all the participants. She asked them what they’d learned, what` they find was the most important part of Sponge and if they started communicating better with their colleagues… An open discussion was started and everybody joined in.

 

AND THE WINNER IS…

It was the student association eSTUDENT, the team was ecstatic when they heard their name as the winner! A fascinating moment, hearing that you won. But actually, everybody won in some way. And that’s what made this project so fantastic.

All the students were given certificates (remember them, the designers made them?) and invited to a few drinks at our office. The fact that we barely made them leave was a confirmation. We made it. We connected these young individuals striving for success. Connected them mutually and with us. Most importantly, we connected their theoretical knowledge with practice.

This pilot-project was a huge success. Sharing knowledge and connecting with the students made us realize what is around us – young people eager to work, create and have fun, just like us.

The Sponge will go on!