A few fundamental question that should be addressed before deciding on your away day include - what is teambuilding? Do I need a team building or team bonding day? I'm sure that we would like all of our teams to function more effectively and efficiently. The question is, how do we make this happen? There is great debate about the so called effectiveness of a team building day. However, if you have clearly defined objectives at the outset, this will go a great way in deciding if your money has been well spent or not.
At the start of our teambuilding workshops, we get our delegates to think of a high performing team that are in the public eye - so that the other groups can associate with it - and to then look at the characteristics they display. Some examples of the teams chosen have been as interesting and diverse as:
Manchester United Football Club
The England Cricket Team
An Orchestra
The A-Team!
Despite their obvious differences, there are a number of characteristics they share which makes them stand out from the crowd - things such as a strong identity, good leadership, clearly defined individual roles and a common shared goal are a few of many that are regularly cited. The question can then be asked - how many of these attributes can be applied to your team?
Once this is explored, it often opens a doorway for discussion into making the team function more effectively - and this is where a team building day can be so effective. It's easy to talk about what we should do, it's putting it into practice that will reinforce the learning points and this is where experiential team building activities can be so important. If the learning is backed up by, for example, a Krypton Maze activity, All For One or Leonardo's Legacy, the learning points can be practised in a safe and controlled environment. Here, lessons can be learned and mistakes made before the return to work and inflicting the mistakes onto work colleagues.
Communication, negotiation, leadership and motivation are all improved through team building. Here are the top 10 reasons for implementing this as a solution for your company.
- It improves communication between the Team members.
- It makes the workplace more enjoyable and fun. Communication exercises will involve problem solving activities that will make the team communicate with each other as they will have to solve the problems that they encounter.
- It provides motivation for the team.
- It allows everyone to get to know each other outside of the office environment.
- Team Building gets everyone "singing from the same song sheet" by all sharing the same goal. Problem solving and decision making exercises will help this.
- The tasks teach the group how to self-regulate and implement these strategies themselves. Planning and adaptability exercises can be used to show the team how to adapt to changes.
- Each participant will by the end of an activity or event learn more about their strengths and weaknesses. This will help to maximise the potential of each individual.
- The different strengths of the team members will be identified therefore enabling these to be utilized in achieving the task at hand.
- The events will help to improve team productivity.
- The activities help each individual to practice collaboration with one another. Trust exercises can be introduced to aid this.
Team Building either in the workplace or at specific events held by professional facilitators allows a company to understand the overall effectiveness of its workforce. The event will highlight any problems as well insights into each individual and the dynamic of the group. These strengths can then be implemented within the workplace, allowing your business to run more effectively.
