Globally, organisations constantly innovate to remain competitive. Resources are heavily invested in acquiring talent, but one crucial aspect frequently goes unnoticed: teamwork. Everyone wants to grab the top spot, but achieving this through individual efforts alone is almost impossible. It would help if you worked as a team to succeed in today’s globalised world.
Let’s say that you have an experienced and hardworking team. Recently, however, it has struggled to maintain its performance. Team members seem to be losing some energy and motivation, and morale is declining. One way to re-engage your team is through team-building activities.
In this article, we discuss why team-building is essential and list some tips you can use to make your team-building events a success.
Team Building Activities
A team-building exercise aims to make employees more aware of one another’s strengths and weaknesses. Team members must share experiences to operate like well-oiled machines, especially under pressure.
Many team-building exercises fail since teams feel like they are just going through the motions. You cannot establish a connection without enough engagement. Team building is all about developing that connection, so team building exercises that do not do this are wasting the company’s time and money.
Team building events tend to get a bad reputation. When ‘team building’ is brought up, some people imagine a mandatory event that no one wants to be a part of.
However, they can help people bond, improve teamwork, and identify individual strengths and weaknesses when done right.
There are two main types of team-building events: indoor and outdoor. Generally, you’ll conduct indoor activities during regular business hours or on weekends. This is the reason why indoor activities are generally more formal or severe. Team retreats, on the other hand, typically involve outdoor activities. Retreats are usually more active and enjoyable than weekend workshops held indoors. Business takes a back seat in favour of bringing the team together and having fun.
Importance of Team Building Activities
Give employees a new perspective on each other
Employees spend much time with each other but rarely interact beyond their tasks. By spending a day away from the office, employees can get to know each other better and get to know employees they don’t normally interact with.
A person can’t get to know you if all they discuss is work. Employees can talk about their personal interests and families with the office behind them. As members of your team become more familiar with one another, they will feel more connected. The work environment can be exhausting and stressful, but having fun with your co-workers can make a huge difference.
Enhance team performance
Workplace projects that require teamwork benefit from team-building activities, as they enhance team communication. Through team building activities, team members learn more about one another’s abilities, weaknesses and interests. A company’s future advancement can be made more successful with this understanding.
Create a trusting environment
A team’s effectiveness depends on trust. A sense of trust allows people to open up and feel safe. Consequently, collaboration and communication are improved, and members don’t fear exposing their vulnerabilities.
How to Make Your Team Building Event a Success
1. Assess the needs of your team
To plan a team-building activity, you must determine your team’s strengths and weaknesses.
You can ask the following questions as a guide: Do certain people have conflicts within the team that lead to divisions? Are team members in need of better communication? Is it necessary to learn to cooperate rather than compete? Is a morale boost needed for the group?
This will then allow a variety of activities to be selected based on the issues raised by the questions.
2. Identify a goal for each activity
Plan activities with specific objectives to allow your team to learn what they need to know. Depending on your team’s needs, you may want to hone their direction-following abilities, improve their problem-solving skills or enhance their leadership potential. As a result, you’ll be able to organise your activities better and instil the right message in your team.
3. Consider suggestions and feedback
The employees themselves could be a source of suggestions for team exercises. By asking for feedback and suggestions, you can determine your initiative’s direction and what you can do to improve it. Your next step should be to create feasible activities for all employees based on their recommendations.
4. Ensure that the activities are inclusive
Team-building activities should be accessible to everyone on the team. It’s crucial to consider exclusionary factors when planning such activities. Being inclusive may mean avoiding physical taxing activities, alcohol-related events, and the like.
5. Respect personal time
Many organisations plan fun events after work hours or on weekends. However, most employees dislike when their employers invade their time. Employees don’t just dislike attending job-related events on their time off. They may have prior commitments, and rearranging them for non-urgent work puts an undue burden on them.
6. Avoid overscheduling
When it comes to building an effective team, frequency is key. When team building isn’t done often enough, the payoff won’t be high enough to justify the effort. But if you do too much bonding, your employees may become drained. Consider monthly or quarterly activities. These could include volunteer events, corporate retreats and culinary events.
7. Collaborate rather than compete
Engage your employees in team-building games where they work together. When you have too many competition-based activities, participants may lose focus on the team-building activity’s core message. Splitting your team is inevitable, but let them focus on problem-solving rather than competing.
Ensure a Successful Team Building with Chordiem
While you’re participating in the team-building event, remember to have fun! It is important to strengthen your team relationships and promote teamwork in the workplace.Need a corporate events manager to assist you in organising an effective team-building event? Chordiem is your best bet. Our team of corporate events planners and experts can help you come up with games for team building and make your team building ideas a reality. Contact us today.