“Creating genuine moments of collaboration and communication between colleagues” is the promise of Sophie Paternoster, the founder of Solifi, her company which designs and delivers team building workshops in Brussels. In a market where the profusion of what’s on offer rivals its originality, Solifi has chosen gastronomy and the pleasures of the senses to differentiate itself. An obvious choice for this qualified brewer and hedonist by nature.
In-house workshops
According to Sophie, gastronomy is an excellent medium for team building. In addition to being “a unifying universe”, sensory experiences are also “very well suited to highlighting the strength of the collective”. Solifi’s flagship gourmet quiz, created in-house, is a perfect example of this. During this friendly competition, which consists in testing the 5 senses and general culinary knowledge of participants divided into teams, “players quickly realize that collective scores are much higher than individual ones”. It’s a concept that can easily be transposed to the corporate world, where the objectives to be achieved call for the participation of everyone. In a different style, his “Diversity Arena” workshop, designed for groups of 60 to 200 people, aims to create interactions between the entire vertical range of organization charts, from technician to CEO, “particularly formative situations because they are so rare in everyday professional life”.
A certain approach to human relations
Strengthening cohesion between employees, easing tensions and, above all, “creating trusting behaviours that will flourish”, Solifi works on the human side…with a touch of levity. Its trademark? Sophie uses humor and fun as “relational facilitators”. In short, relax to better involve. A keen observer of the sector since completing her studies, she has observed “the increasing digitalization of professional relations”, the difficulty managers have in training their teams, but also, more and more frequently, “a desire to return to more human contact in the workplace”.
“Highlighting local products is part of Brussels’ cultural and economic influence”.
Belgian culinary heritage in the spotlight
In addition to its gourmet quiz, Solifi offers two other gastronomic workshops: a cocktail workshop and a beer tasting, “one of my passions”. Even if she allows herself a few exceptions “so as not to offend anyone’s sensibilities”, Sophie makes it a point of honor to showcase the diversity of the country’s brewing heritage, “with an educational and relaxed approach”, to surprise connoisseurs while also appealing to those who are less so. An almost artisanal approach to team building. Finally, as a perfect polyglot, Sophie runs her workshops in French, Dutch or English, an indispensable asset for reaching her core target audience of “medium-sized and large companies as well as international groups”, but also, on request, to lead conferences or moderate debates.
