Want to make clients more successful? A good place to start is understanding their pain points and relating to what they go through in their daily work.

Commonsku, a promotional products business and sales software company, sought to stimulate that empathy among employees by having them build a mock presentation for a pretend end-client as if they were a promo distributor.

The exercise was aimed, in part, at helping spark new ideas for commonsku platform enhancements – and came as part of the Toronto-based firm’s most recent biannual full-company gathering, which brought together team members from across North America at company headquarters to strategize and plan for the rest of the year.

Fueled by the mock presentations, employees made platform-upgrade suggestions in what commonsku described as a working lab.

“Our team felt the pressure of putting together projects under deadline with the additional challenge of building a multi-product campaign,” said commonsku President Mark Graham, a member of Counselor’s Power 50 list of promo’s most influential people. “Navigating the platform, sourcing products, building presentations and submitting sales orders not only gave everyone a well-rounded glimpse into the client experience but allowed us to bring new ideas to the table for future development.”

The strategy meeting also included year-end planning and creative play, such as improv-led exercises and a team-building scavenger hunt around downtown Toronto.

“It’s always refreshing to bring the whole team together under one roof to solve problems for our clients and strategize our road ahead,” said commonsku CEO and Power 50 member Catherine Graham, “but it’s also imperative we do so by living out one of our values: making work fun and delightful.”