Personal and social skills are becoming increasingly important in vocational education. There is a steady increase in the soft skills required of apprentices and employees in retail.

Team-working competencies are one of the most critical competencies in the retail sector. Communication, teamwork and co-operation are vital to working processes within retail.

• Through the case study, you can create points of conflict embedded within a realistic communicative situation. You can adjust and regulate the intensity of the conflict if required.
• The hands-on team exercise enables students to identify strongly with the situation and the problems involved.
• The main focus of the ‘Building a cardboard box’ team exercise is intensive collaboration within a team. Students rely on each other and coordinate their individual actions before and during the exercise to jointly make the cardboard box.
• Team members often have a different understanding of the same problem or topic. The exercise helps them to learn to listen and respond better to their team partners.
• The team exercise generates a constant flow of information between team members. The teaching and learning arrangement helps to improve communication between team partners.
• The mutual support between the students is facilitated through the teaching and learning arrangement.