Is your job this much fun ?!

Last Saturday I had the responsibility opportunity obligation assignment ... hmmm ... none of those word choices seem accurate enough ... or respectful enough ... let's try a different starting point ...

At work we are having a huge contest with LOTS of money available bi-weekly for anyone who is efficiently and effectively selling new insurance policies (Auto, Motorcycle, Personal Watercraft, RV, etc.)  It is called "Spring Into Sales" and for visual effect we were tasked (that word sounds right!) with creating a tree with "money leaves" to be displayed in our team area.  The details of how it should look, what criteria is used to earn the "money leaves" and other fun stuff like that was left to the individual teams or supervisors to determine.

So on Saturday (the first day of the contest) I determined that I would make our team tree and design our own personal "money leaves" (templates had been provided, but I thought they looked nothing like leaves so I didn't want to use them).  I only spent about 5-10 minutes designing the tree and the leaves.  The actual attachment of the tree to it's location (check out the pictures below) and the cutting out of "template" leaves took closer to 1 1/2 hours.  But my Saturday workload was very low (last day of the month and all my administrative stuff was done) and call volume for the reps on my team was low too, so they were all busy catching up on reading, etc.

I cut out the basic shape of the tree and then cut that main tree trunk into 3/4 inch wide strips, so they would fit on the individual blinds.  I then taped each row to the next single blind, until I got to the top of the trunk, at which point I individually cut the smaller branches so they would extend the tree beyond its base.  Overall I just love the look of the tree and it was the most fun thing I did at work that day!


 

This is the tree when hidden.



This is the tree when revealed.

 










I have to brag a little here, because it is my blog after all, but mostly because I am really pleased with how the tree turned out.  The leaves are less than spectacular, but they are simple to cut out and will look great when the whole tree is covered in them.  My favorite part is the fact that the tree is virtually "hidden" when the blinds are in their normal "open" position.  Even the "money leaves" are only partially visible (although the more we get on there the more noticeable it becomes) until the big "reveal" when someone closes the blinds.

Other teams did trees too, but I dare say NONE of them are anywhere near as creative or spectacular looking as our team tree!  I know you have nothing to compare them with, but what do you think?  Is this tree really that cool and unique or am I just getting a big ego over nothing?  Feel free to lie if you think it will make me feel better!  :)

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