*Learn more about DECA competitions, my experience and why business professionals should volunteer their time as CTSO judges in the first post of this series and tips for role-play student competitors in the second post of this series.

Enliven Role Play Prep — Apply the Butterfly Effect or try and SNL Production Week

The traditional role play gives students a short period of time to read a new scenario, come up with a solution, present, act-out their role and gain valuable interview skills by answering questions on the fly. A lot happens very quickly and there isn’t much time to reflect on what could have been done differently. Try mixing up role play with either of these strategies:

• • Butterfly Effect—small changes can lead to really BIG changes down the line. Try taking some role play scenarios you’ve used in the past and ask the class to find pieces of information they could change out for something else. Did the scenario say you are to create a marketing plan for a Boutique Hotel? What if it was for an international chain instead? Was the company you were supposed to be working for a chain of discount hair salons like SuperCuts? What if it was an online startup for pet art like Crown & Paw? Work as a group to reimagine old scenarios and list out all of the decisions you may now need to rethink throughout the role play.
• • Saturday Night Live Today—Writers and actors for SNL write multiple sketches and create an entire show each week with their infamous production schedule. Instead of using a pre-written business scenario for a role play, ask the students to write and perform their role-play for the class at the end of the week.
  • • On Monday, they will split into small groups for a pitch meeting. This will include research, discussion, and time to designate roles for the rest of the week.
  • • Tuesday is script-writing day. Lockdown the chosen scenario and describe the perfect cast to solve the problem. Ask them to add in some twists and turns—or deal-breakers—that the judge character might introduce. This will ask students to anticipate what kinds of questions a judge might ask.
  • • Wednesday is the round table meeting. Bring all groups into a class discussion and give time for each group to pitch their role-play scenario and their solution. This is time for other groups to give feedback and brainstorm as a team what kind of visuals, data points, or ideas might make their role play even stronger.
  • • Thursday is the day to develop the role play. Students break back into their small groups to practice and create any visuals that might be effective in their interviews/presentations.
  • • Friday is showtime! Bring in popcorn or snacks and have each group perform their role-play for the class.

Download Daily Worksheets for the SNL Today activity here.

For Assessment-based Competition, Turn the Test Into a Game Show

Some students love taking tests, but it’s not always the most fun part of a CTSO. Practice tests are great, but can get dull and lose some of that real-world application that makes business courses exciting. You can find dynamic and free PowerPoint templates that help you turn quizzes into Jeopardy or Family Feud games. Many teachers also love using apps like Kahoot! to put smartphones to good use. Putting students into teams and testing their knowledge in real-time can help heighten the stakes of practice tests. Even if students are planning on competing in different testing areas, they can practice test-taking, memory, and teamwork skills needed on competition day.

Build CTSO Prep Into the Weekly Curriculum

It might seem like a lot to have to take into account state standards, 21st Century Skills, AND CTSO competition Performance Indicators/Competencies into your course. You’ve already got so much to cover and little time to do it. However, some curriculum is already aligned to CTSO competition needs and many of the projects you already love to assign and know students engage with probably do, too. Whether your school is part of FBLA, DECA, BPA or another CTSO, take time once a year to look at the skills required for a few of the competitions you know students have signed up for in the past and tie them to what you already plan to do in class. That way every project students work on can act as advertising for your CTSO and let them know they are already proving they have the skills they need to be successful in competition.

Make CTSO Prep Activities Part of the Student Portfolio

Your career pathway or course may already require that students create a portfolio at the end of the year, but encouraging students to collect and reflect on their work throughout the year reinforces that the work they do today will pay off tomorrow. Whether your students practice by taking practice assessments, doing research, role-plays, presentations, or even discussion, living the age of smartphones makes it easy to turn these activities into artifacts that prove learned skills. Students can make videos or take photographs as they practice and add them to a growing portfolio that documents learning and offers a way for students to look back at all they have achieved leading up to the competition. This experience also makes it easier for students to write or talk about their CTSO experiences in a future cover letter or interview.

Change-up Who Plays the Judge

Whether students are practicing for role-playing, test-based, interview, or project-based style competitions, taking feedback from different people and roles within their education and career journey may bring about ideas that would have otherwise never come about! If you can, inviting other teachers, principals, students from other classes, and even parents or industry professionals into the classroom to play judge for student work can again increase the stakes before the competition and will only benefit your CTSO public image.

Advisors!

Looking for more information on DECA competitions and practice assignments to prepare students for success? Request a sample of the forthcoming fifth edition of Burrow’s MARKETING, which is aligned to DECA Performance Indicators and includes DECA competition information with the Winning Edge feature, offering DECA Event-Prep Projects in every chapter.

*Learn more about DECA competitions and my experience and why business professionals should volunteer their time as CTSO judges in the first post of this series.

Know your audience

Even though you may only have a short time to read through your role play scenario, you should immediately write down who YOU are in the scenario and who the JUDGE is. In many cases, the Judge is cast as a high-level position at a company. They might be a CEO, VP, CFO, or a Director. You will most likely be at a lower level than the Judge, either an employee or a vendor hoping to work with the Judge’s company. Keep in mind the Judge’s role when pitching new ideas or strategies. You may make mistakes that can affect your 21st Century Skills or Overall Impression scores:

• • Insulting the company’s previous strategies directly insults company leadership.
  • • Don’t: Describe your idea as an obvious move from outdated or dull practices.
  • • Do: Pitch your idea as a new venture that enhances or creates new opportunities for the company.
• • Defining business/marketing/finance terms without applying them to the scenario undermines the Judge’s role.
  • • Don’t: Begin or end a presentation by providing textbook definitions of key terms. A CEO, VP, or Director doesn’t need a business lesson. They want your expertise to convince them your plan will help their business.
  • • Do: Make sure to cover all of the talking points listed on your scenario sheet as they relate to the scenario.

Example: 

The scenario requires the student to describe the purpose of SWOT Analysis.

Don’t just say:

“And now, I would like to define SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis is used to help a company make business decisions by identifying strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.”

Apply your knowledge to the scenario instead:

“We can use SWOT analysis to prove that the decision to rebrand your hotel chain is the best decision for your company to increase clientele. Let me show you how.”

Leave time to organize your notes in chronological order.

There are many methods for successful and efficient note taking, if you are studying for a test. But in a role-play competition, you have little time to build out a presentation that you will have to deliver in person. As most students leave their notes on the table as they present, I’ve noticed that students with clean, step-by-step notes, end up with higher scores. Why?

• • Clean notes make it easier to maintain eye contact.
  • • When your notes are scattered across the page, connected by arrows and exclamation points, your eye has to search for your reminders to make sure you are hitting all of your key points, instead of connecting with the Judge.
  • • It’s easy to tell when you are at the end of your presentation, and quickly wrap up with a conclusion.
• • You are more likely to hit all of the key topics in the scenario.
  • • Even if you are a great speaker, make eye contact, use appropriate hand gestures, and have a firm, but comfortable handshake, MOST of your score still comes from including the topics outlined in the scenario.
  • • If your notes are in an outline, it’s much more difficult to skip, miss, or forget a great point you want to include.
• • This outline can be repurposed as a visual agenda.
  • • Judges are tasked with listening for key words that indicate you have addressed the main topics on their rubric for each scenario. Showing the Judge your outline provides a visual that quickly helps them check off necessary talking points and focus on your speaking skills and creativity instead.
  • • Starting with a quick agenda verifies that you understand the purpose of the presentation and will ultimately satisfy their questions.

Example:

The scenario requires the student to:

• • Discuss varying types of promotions in the hotel and restaurant management industry.
• • Discuss the similarities and differences between a hotel chain and boutique hotel.
• • Explain the risks and benefits of rebranding. 
• • Suggest a marketing strategy for attracting current customers to a hotel chain that has rebranded to compete with boutique hotels.

1. Introduction.
   • • Greeting
   • • Goal of meeting
   • • Agenda
2. Promotional Strategies in the Hotel and Restaurant Management Industry
   • • Connect to the scenario (describing several promotional options, but ultimately settling on one or two for this scenario)
   • • Describe your chosen strategy in more detail.
   • • Include a research point why this is the right strategy (if time, draw a quick chart or graph that emphasizes your point.)
3. Similarities and Differences between Hotel Chains and Boutique Hotels.
   • • Connect to the scenario (introduce traits of boutique hotels by describing an imaginary competitor and describe traits of hotel chains by describing your company’s chain.)
   • • Point out the attributes of the competitor that you want to include, enhance, or consider for your hotel chain.
   • • Include a research point why this is the right strategy (if time, draw a quick chart or graph that emphasizes your point.)
4. The Risks and Benefits of Rebranding.
   • • Connect to the scenario (describe possible risks of rebranding your hotel chain and end with the benefits you expect to see.)
   • • Make sure to show how the benefits outweigh the risks in this case.
   • • Include a research point why this is the right strategy (if time, draw a quick chart or graph that emphasizes your point.)
5. Marketing Strategy.
   • • Connect to the scenario (describe your innovative marketing strategy for your hotel chain)
   • • Make sure to explain why your strategy will work in this case.
   • • Include a research point why this is the right strategy (if time, draw a quick chart or graph that emphasizes your point.)
6. Conclusion.

If there is time, use your scratch paper to create visuals that are valuable to your presentation.

Adding visuals to any presentation will help the Judge visualize your ideas, and is a great way to get additional points for creativity. Don’t worry, no one is judging your artistic talent, however, creating visuals just for the sake of having a visual or document that doesn’t add to your presentation may seem like a failure to manage your time.

• • Do: consider drawing a graph, chart, sample or prototype to show the thought behind your decisions.
  • • Graphs should quickly show that your “research” backs your ideas.
  • • Make sure that if you are displaying survey results, sales, or units, that the growth you want to show is easy to see.
• • Do: consider drawing a sample of any ads, web pages, or apps that you may have ideas for. It’s hard to describe how something will look or work in such a short time. Drawing it out allows the judge to visualize your ideas immediately!
• • Don’t: Many students spend time making fake “business cards” to hand to the judge at the end of the presentation.
  • • Only do this if it makes sense in the scenario. (If the judge is your direct manager, they have your contact info.)
  • • Don’t do this if it takes up time for something more important, like polishing a graph or organizing your notes.

Advisors!

Looking for more information on DECA competitions and practice assignments to prepare students for success? Request a sample of the forthcoming fifth edition of Burrow’s MARKETING, which is aligned to DECA Performance Indicators and includes DECA competition information with the Winning Edge feature, offering DECA Event-Prep Projects in every chapter.

The first year I was a judge for the Massachusetts state DECA competition, I was assigned to the HTDM or Hospitality Services Team Decision Making Event. At the time, I had two years of Sales experience out of college and had recently started working as a Marketing Manager for educational materials. I was worried that there had been a mistake. I had never worked in the hospitality industry, although I do have friends who live and work at Disney World and one summer my brother ran the front desk of a local hotel. As teacher volunteers herded us to our tables to read the judging instructions, I quickly realized that it wasn’t just the students who had to read a case study for the first time and quickly prepare for a presentation. I also had a role to play. The packet said I was to be the VP of a Global Hotel Chain and the students were Marketing Managers pitching a campaign for our new brand of boutique hotels.

Call me Ms. Marriott.

The other judges read their instructions quickly and began whispering. There was a professor emeritus of Hotel Management, a Graduate student working on his MBA for Hotel Management, and another marketing professional who’d had decades of experience working with restaurants. Needless to say, I took my time reading the instructions.

But whatever trepidation I felt didn’t compare to the students who walked over to my table in twos every fifteen minutes. In under 30 minutes these fifteen-seventeen year-olds had to very quickly read the same case study that took me 20 minutes, come up with a marketing plan, a pitch, and in many cases, visual prototypes of mobile apps, of websites, billboards, and social media campaigns to build on their argument, and decide how to present to a VP OF A GLOBAL HOTEL CHAIN.

It was amazing the amount of decisions these students had to make in such a short time, all the while remembering to put soft skills into practice as they walked toward me, shook my hand, addressed me by name, and asked if they could sit to begin their presentations. 

I was floored. And so were my peer judges.

It was clear that not all students understood what kind of customer a boutique hotel might market to or what kinds of campaigns or promotions would be feasible for a national program. However, every student I saw that day was driven, organized, and I could tell, fighting the fear of public speaking, confidently pitching their ideas, and answering impromptu questions from a superior.

These were all experiences I had earned during two years of working for a large company and they did it all in fifteen minutes. I’ve volunteered my time to judge at the state competition every year since, and it’s not just because I’m impressed by the students or that I get to network with some really wonderful leaders in local business. I judge student competitions because it makes me a better marketer. 

Playing the role of the client, the HR representative, the Sales Manager or the Marketing VP forces me to change my to think about how marketing professionals work with other roles within a company. It reminds me of the goals of other facets of the business beyond my marketing and product teams. Judging competitions also inspires me to think of new ways to connect with customers. To practice pitching ideas in meetings rather than just taking directives. To think about how the e-campaign can connect to social media marketing, to the advisory boards, to the promotions, and sales training. Watching students problem-solve their way through case studies reminds me that I’m still learning too. And watching their bravery (there’s a lot of shaky hands and nervous laughter) reminds me how much I’ve grown and how secure I am to be able to take a leading role in many business conversations.

I encourage all business professionals to find student competitions in your county or city and volunteer a day to be a judge. Remind yourself how far you’ve come. Be open to new innovations and listen to a young perspective on business strategy. I promise, you’ll want to do it again next year.

Find opportunities to judge near you!

DECA (Distributive Education Clubs of America)
BPA (Business Professionals of America)
FBLA (Future Business Leaders of America)

Advisors!
Looking for more information on DECA competitions and practice assignments to prepare students for success? Request a sample of the forthcoming fifth edition of Burrow’s MARKETING, which is aligned to DECA Performance Indicators and includes DECA competition information with the Winning Edge feature, offering DECA Event-Prep Projects in every chapter.