My Recent Visit to the 1Huddle HQ in Newark

A couple weeks ago, I made my second trip up to 1Huddle HQ where, in addition to the joys of being in-person at an office full of coffee and wonderful coworkers, I got to poke around the city’s evolving (and very delicious) food scene; and experience an eye-opening multi-day workshop with two incredible coaches.

Here are my top 3 takeaways:

1. Newark Tech Week

Newark’s growing reputation as one of the hottest tech hubs in the country is no surprise to those who know their history. It was in Newark, after all, that Thomas Edison created the ticker tape machine; that celluloid camera film was first produced, and that the process for making patent leather was developed.

Now, on the brink of what some are calling the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Newark has once again emerged as a hotspot for innovation and innovators. Its proximity to talent from nearby colleges and universities, and its prime location, with easy access to global transportation and New York venture capital, have combined to make Brick City the perfect environment for industry giants and dynamic start-ups alike.

And, as luck would have it, I arrived just in time for the beginning of Brick City’s annual celebration of its best and brightest—Newark Tech Week, the largest city-wide tech industry convention in the state of New Jersey!

Speakers included Newark Mayor Ras Baraka, Jessica McKenzie of the Panasonic Foundation, and Rakia Reynolds, a Newark native who is the founder and CEO of Skai Blue Media, a public relations company that has worked with clients such as tennis star Serena Williams. 

Startup companies, techies and tech-adjacent professionals all convened to discuss and celebrate the city’s diverse and emerging technologies; the culture and ingenuity within the industry, and the role tech plays as an equalizer in the city and beyond. 

It wasn’t just a celebration of the economic prosperity and vitality that tech has brought to the city, but the sense of potential and hope that Newark’s renaissance, so long in the making, may finally underway. 

2. Finding Our “Why” with Paul Epstein

The business world is full of what I like to call corporate horoscopes. 

From the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to the Pearson-Marr Archetype Assessment, there are hundreds of personality quizzes, ranging in quality, created by organizational psychologists to help improve teamwork and collaboration, develop leaders, and solve complex people problems. 

All of them are fun, a few of them are questionable, but only one has ever produced results I felt were worth serious consideration. 

That is the quiz we had the opportunity to take with longtime 1Huddle fan and friend, Paul Epstein. (You might remember him from this episode of our podcast!) 

Paul joined us in the office to tell us about his time as the “Why Coach” with the San Francisco 49ers, how he helped them find their “why,” and how we (beyond the assessment you can take here) can find ours. 

It was a blast to fill out, fun to compare results– and eerily accurate. Be sure to take the quiz yourself, and to watch this space for a more detailed write up on our results!

3. “High Ten” by Martin Rooney

I thought Sam was joking when he told me a book had been written about 1Huddle. 

I was wrong. 

Flipping through the pages of High Ten, Martin Rooney’s fictionalized account of 1Huddle’s early days, it didn’t take long to figure out who the character, Sam Raucci, was modeled on. 

If his name sounds familiar it’s because Martin– motivational speaker, Olympic athlete, author, and Founder and CEO of Training for Warriors– was our very first guest on the Bring It In podcast, 

He has known our CEO for years, since the very beginning of Sam’s career at Parisi Speed School, and spent a whole day in office with us, getting us pumped up for Q4.  Throughout his workshop it was fascinating thing to see just how big an influence the two had on each other—starting with  the many of Sam’s sayings, quotes, and anecdotes I now realize came from Martin. 

The book, for its part, reads more like a parable than it does like fiction— the characters, based on my real-life colleagues, are only thinly disguised, if at all, and the book might’ve been harder to finish had they felt more real–  like around Chapter 9, when things get tense in the “Raucci” household, or earlier, when a fictional Roger bullies a fictional Dana to tears. 

In the end, I found myself wishing Martin had told the story as himself. Brian Knight, the character in the book who acts as his cipher, pales in comparison to the real deal. 

There are very few people in the world who could have held a room the way he did ours for 6 hours, taking us through a range of workshops and activities – even, briefly, some “hypnosis”–  with boundless energy, warmth, and candor. 

Martin’s guidance has left a mark on our company’s DNA, and on our CEO; proof of a saying passed down from Martin to Sam, and now, from all of us at 1Huddle to you: “Good coaches make more coaches.”

It was a wonderful trip– if possible, even better than my first. I can’t wait to return for our team’s holiday party in December. Until then, this blog is dedicated to Justin Tubby, heroic coworker, fast and furious driver, without whom I would not have made my train.

Back to work!

About 1Huddle

1Huddle is a coaching and development platform that uses quick-burst mobile games to more quickly and effectively educate, elevate, and energize your workforce — from frontline to full-time.

With a mobile-first approach to preparing the modern worker, a mobile library of 3,000+ quick-burst employee skill games, an on-demand game marketplace that covers 16 unique workforce skill areas, and the option for personalized content, 1Huddle is changing the way organizations think about their training – from a one-time boring onboarding experience to a continuous motivational tool. 

Key clients include Loews Hotels, Novartis, Madison Square Garden, PIMCO, TAO Group, and the United States Air Force. To learn more about 1Huddle and its platform, please visit 1huddle.co.