IBA Poland's 30th birthday, celebrated with sport and charity!

Preparation

Many people in our company work remotely, so we were looking for a way to bring the team together and look after its health and wellbeing by motivating people to be more active.  A year earlier we had organized a competition using the “Strava” app, but this year we were looking for a more complete solution that could engage more people.

The challenge

The month-long Activy sports challenge at IBA Poland was an exciting adventure with more than 80 participants. During that time, we covered a total of 12,000 km together on foot and by bike, which allowed us to raise PLN 5,000 for an animal shelter in Wrocław.

The challenge not only motivated our employees to lead a healthier lifestyle, for example by swapping the car for a bike or taking active breaks at work in the form of walks, but also strengthened the bonds between us, even with colleagues working remotely.

A big help in motivating each other was the social board in the app, where participants could post their activities and “like” and comment on other people's activities.

Importantly, the challenge brought together both keen athletes and people who had only just started actively looking after their health.

For many employees, the challenge was a perfect way to prepare for Bieg Firmowy, a company run.

Collecting points and competing with others in the challenge motivated me to start moving more often, and not just me! I saw my colleagues using their breaks for a short walk to score extra points. The social board was definitely a great addition, as it let challenge participants “like” and comment on each other's activities.

- Yevheniia, challenge coordinator
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The initiative was such a success that we ran it again!

The 2024 edition.

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The challenge took place again in 2024, this time with the IBA Lithuania and IBA Poland branches. Its goals were team bonding, building healthy habits and continuing good traditions combined with CSR activities.

Our shared goal was to raise PLN 5,000 for the Animal Shelter in Wrocław. 106 active employees did their best to reach it and help the animals!

Participants competed not only in teams they formed themselves, but also in national teams. This made engagement and working together to outpace the rivals key parts of the initiative.

The results were impressive: 👟 we walked 12,834.3 km, almost a third of the way around the Earth, 🚴 and cycled 7,650.7 km, roughly the length of the Great Wall of China (about 6,400 km)!

Thanks to this year's challenge, we feel that employees not only met new colleagues or got closer to people they had not had the chance to work with before, but also saw that being physically active on a regular basis is not hard. A dozen or so minutes of exercise a day is a great way to build a habit for years.

It is worth stressing that this kind of team activity makes it possible to reach shared goals wherever people live. In the IT industry, where many of our employees work remotely from different parts of Poland and Lithuania, every way of bringing people together matters a lot.

Preparing the initiative itself was not a big challenge, as we already had experience from the previous edition. Working with the two coordinators was a real pleasure for us.

During everyday conversations in the office, employees motivated each other to get going and join in. It is also worth noting that the joint participation of Poland and Lithuania was a new, sporty experience that certainly made this year's challenge not only fruitful but also really enjoyable.