Rubber Duck Ninja

It came to my attention that we, as TechNet Wiki Ninjas, are not the only ones proudly using “ninja”  as a “geuzennaam” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geuzen), but on the latest SharePoint conference I found out there was a company that used the term “SharePoint Ninjas” as an internal reward system. I suggest you watch the first 5 minutes of the presentation, because  I thought it was hilarious. You can watch it here: https://channel9.msdn.com/Events/SharePoint-Conference/2014/SPC296 If you can’t watch it or don’t want to, I’ll describe what happens (spoiler alert). A guy is dressed up as a ninja, apparently holding a rolled up newspaper (I’m not really sure, the video quality is a bit poor). There’s a sign next to him saying something like: “Want to fight me?”, and there’s another guy giving out a rolled up newspaper for anybody willing to do so. Now and then somebody comes along who accepts the challenge, and as soon as he or she picks up the newspaper weapon and prepares to battle, all of a sudden 30 ninja’s come out of nowhere ambushing the valiant unsuspecting challenger. I just had to smile when I saw that.

Not only that, I thought they had a great reward system as well, that looks something like this:

  • Job skills (e.g. Linked In, resume building, etc.)
  • Performance Review feedback
  • Special ninja events (lunch, happy hour, etc.)
  • Ninja callout on your Active Directory name
  • Acess to the Ninja Community Site
  • Ninja bling (water cups, etc.)
  • Extra MySite space
  • Spotlight sessions w/industry experts
  • Prioritized SharePoint help tickets
  • Access to administrative tools
  • Entry to external events (e.g. MTC tours)
  • Seat on enterprise SharePoint steering committee

I finally have to add that the rubber duck Ninja’s were absolutely great, here’s a picture:

So, a job well done, SharePoint ninja’s. As a TechNet Wiki ninja’s, I do feel we’ve got to put more effort in our good old ninja stick figures!