Every year the professional Western Force rugby team have a signing session to sign 250 Western Force jerseys and 150 rugby balls. These items are used throughout the season to give to partners, used as donations and as prizes. This year the task was done across two days to help break up the team into groups, the first day was for all injured players who had not flown to New Zealand for the away games with the rest of the team.
In preparation for the first signing session three interns, including myself, set up the room by moving the tables into a U shape, cove the tables with black tablecloths, organise all jerseys into piles, unpack and pump up all of the rugby balls and make sure we are stocked up on permanent markers.
All players have been given a time when they are meant to come into the signing session however we found out that only 50% of players actually follow this instruction. The first player arrived an hour early and wanted to get started whilst we were still setting up the room and pumping up the balls. He began on the jerseys and as he signed them we made sure we kept the signed ones away from the others just in case more players decided to come in early. Throughout the session there were constantly players coming in and out at different times so organisation was key here to ensure every item was signed by every player and it did not get confused. The teamwork and communication between the interns and an effective production line were the key to meeting our objectives for the day.
The second signing day was two weeks later when the remaining players were back in Perth and they were given three different time slots in which they could come in to do their signings. The largest number of players any given time was 10, each who passed on each item until it reached the end of the production line where I would put the items in the finished piles ready for the next round of players. The most challenging task was motivating players to complete the job as they were each signing their name 400 times in one sitting. Another challenge was to remember who had signed what, as some players would start with jerseys, others would start on the rugby balls and some would come half way through another groups session and join in at the half way mark of all the jerseys.
Although this task did not require me to use a great deal of my PR knowledge it did require patience and tolerance and it was a task of high importance. I feel as though I helped to contribute speeding up the process by giving a helping hand to players who had come on their own or who were behind, putting the jerseys together in a pile and ripping them away as they signed it (this can be seen in the link https://www.instagram.com/p/BCtz-Rymydq/ where Pek Cowan and myself are featured on the Western Force Instagram with our speed signing techniques).
At the end of the day we had to pack away all jerseys and rugby balls into the storage room, clean the room and pack up the tables and chairs. It was rewarding to know I had contributed to the success of the day and was also a handy way to learn more about the players and be able to put faces to names for the future.
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