Productivity and business performance are influenced not only by correctly made management decisions, strategic plans or emergency situations. Often many of the company’s successes depend on the team: its cohesion, mutual responsibility, and respect. The more comfortable and safe the working environment is, the better employees solve all the most important tasks of the company together, as a single system.
Team building will help form such a team.
Let’s analyze the concept, the main purpose of team building and determine its importance.
What is team building?
Team building is a set of certain activities that are aimed at creating and further developing interaction within a strong team. They are conducted to establish positive interpersonal ties and improve the overall performance of the team.
At the same time, team building shouldn’t be perceived solely as funny contests, parties in the Canada casino online style, a corporate party in nature or communication in a karaoke bar, which is necessary only for team members to get acquainted and get to know each other better.
In today’s world, team building helps set up quick and quality communication between employees to increase their productivity and efficiency, and thus the business performance of the business.
The mission of team building is to adjust each member of the team so that they realize and share the goal of the company’s development and work for its achievement as a team.
Why we need team building
Corporate team building is most often implemented in large and medium-sized companies with a somewhat dispersed team (although small companies can also benefit from team building events). Traditionally, team building is needed to:
- Bring the team together. Create a “fighting spirit” that will unite everyone around the common mission and purpose of your company.
- Pump up employee interaction. Improve communication within the team, strengthen mutual understanding.
- Find a solution to an internal problem. For example, to resolve some conflict between employees.
- Strengthen the authority of the manager. Employees will be able to see the manager from a different side, in an informal setting.
- Create a comfortable psychological climate within the team and “unload” employees in difficult moments.
When is a need for team building
Despite the clear purpose of team building, not all managers realize under what circumstances it is possible to hold events aimed at developing team building. Of course, you do not always need a reason to organize such “events”. Each meeting can also be held in a more loose format. However, most often team building is necessary when:
- Employees have had low levels of motivation to work for the past few months.
- Employees often show distrust or disinterest in communicating with each other because of which the overall effectiveness of teamwork decreases.
- There are frequent conflicts between team members that interfere with the work process.
- Team members are reluctant to express their personal ideas and opinions regarding daily work, different processes and their improvement.
- A new branch or company is just starting up and all team members are not familiar with each other.
How to bring the team together
Prepare the event thoroughly. Team building is a classic event with the participation of a large number of people. Therefore, its organization should be treated as responsibly as, for example, to the organization of a forum, project or concert.
Think through everything in advance. What different resources are needed, how long the event will take, how long to prepare it, what specialists are needed, etc. Also keep an eye on your employees and their mood during team building.
When team building takes place in a remote format, be sure to check in advance the operability of all communication programs, prepare all the necessary tools, and work out the instructions. If the event is held outdoors, it’s important to take into account the weather, safety requirements, and prepare a hot lunch.
The goal is the same — everything should go smoothly and without critical obstacles. If the event is disrupted or badly spoiled, employees will get the impression that the management does not care about the organization of team building (which means that it does not care about the team itself). They may get the feeling that it’s all just a “tick box”. This will undermine the trust of your employees and also make them reluctant to participate in future events.
Properly engage employees
Not all employees perceive the team building format positively. Some, due to their character, don’t want to participate in different events, and some are skeptical of team building.
Therefore, the manager’s task is to properly explain to employees the importance of team building, as well as to increase the motivation of employees to participate. At the same time, to simplify the process of involvement, it’s possible to engage in deep preparatory work of the team, create a comfortable environment, as well as develop the positioning of team building with the help of the following aspects:
A clear team building space. Each team member should realize why and for what overall purpose team building is being introduced. And that it can be beneficial not only for the company but also personally for each employee.
The importance of every opinion. Let employees understand that as part of team building, they are all one mechanism. Everyone is equal at events, every opinion is taken into account and not criticized, there is an opportunity to speak out.
Remember the quiet employees. In any team, there are a few people who do not like to communicate and take an active part in noisy events. You shouldn’t put too much pressure on such team members and discourage them with active actions. But it’s also important to involve them in team events and team building games.
Organize events out of office also
There are hundreds of types and examples of team building activities. So don’t get stuck in one direction and organize meetings only in the office. Try to alternate the types of events and their location.
Let’s say that this month intellectual games were held in the office. Next month, organize an offsite team building. In the future, you can try to hold an event in a creative format.
When planning corporate team building events, remember two important things:
- The events should take place regularly and should be of some benefit to the team. Without being systematic, there will be no results.
- Ask employees what they would like to do and at what time. In this case, employees will be more willing to get involved in the team building process and may be partly involved in organizing the events themselves.
Collect feedback From employees
To understand how good the event was and how much the team liked the format, it’s a good idea to collect feedback after each meeting.
After some time, give your employees a small anonymous questionnaire where they can write and leave feedback about the event:
- What worked.
- What they liked and disliked.
- What could be improved.
- How the team building could be done next time, etc.
This method will allow the manager to identify how the next event can be improved, what ideas to adopt and what should be abandoned. Most importantly, don’t forget about confidentiality.
Check the effectiveness of team building
It’s always important for a manager to evaluate the team building process and understand what exactly this or that event has given his business. After all, a lot of financial and other resources are spent on each such event. So, from a business point of view, they must pay off.
It isn’t always easy to assess the effectiveness of team building. However, it’s worth calculating the possible effect at least by indirect indicators. For example, it’s worth using quantitative and qualitative metrics (values).
Qualitative metrics include the opinion of employees about the event. That is, the very feedback we talked about in the previous paragraph. Collect them and analyze them. There should be no more than 5-10 per cent negative feedback.
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