"We are building a team." The word "team" with the word "house" - or any other word that can be built and will replace the more than a few minutes - and most reasonable people want, is a structured approach to pursue.
Plans are prepared and approved. People will receive copies of the plan and the efforts to make sure everyone understands them. Progress will be monitored through the plan. The lessons are on track to be used to get better to be learned the nextPhase. Everything else at best, mediocre results and underachievement.
Why is team building so often treated in an ad-hoc? You would not bricks and mortar out, they show a good time and expect that they arrange themselves into something better, only because she had a nice break. So why expect to do a group of people to be better?
The only answer to this question with any merit is that you can not think of stones and the people can. Which sounds like management ofAbdication. Or, perhaps, manage the reliance on luck. It certainly does not sound like a structured approach.
So if the people off for fun is not team-building - what is it?
Traditional removed tag options are Team Spirit exercises - and this is different. Take a group quad biking, paintball etc, and it will help bond the participants through a shared experience. You can even use a portion of the education budget to justify the assertion when it has helped them develop asas a team. Just do not believe it - or you will be disappointed that more closely while the group is not more to explore effectively.
No - if you want to build a team and not just a closer relationship of the individuals, you need a structured process. You need to decide before you start, what improvements you want and can realistically expect to achieve the team. Next you can decide how long it will take to achieve these results.
Often, fun remains a key objective of such a meeting. If it is theonly one - or only with a desire to be the team closer together - the organization of a meeting Team spirit is an ideal solution. However, if your expectations are higher than the amount - then you need something more structured.
So what are the main characteristics of a true team building session? I propose that we carry the following 7 steps to success:
1) Have specific session and the long-term goals and know how the meeting objectives lead to the fact that in the longer term Ones.
2) Use aattractive and diversified job base that each participant enjoys something he or she is doing is bringing.
3) Use an activity that commitment as it has achieved real parallels to the workplace and relevance to the conference goals.
4) Choose an activity which is the same kind of skills and team approaches that need to be needed in the workplace - albeit one that is removed from the work itself.
5) Check with the help of an independent (internal or external) agents - atenabling all levels in an equal footing and avoid it, like a "sermon join from above."
6) Debriefing with a predefined process that will be preached in work highlights parallels and allows participants to their own learning rather than to extract to.
7) back with a good practice for the transfer of learning to the workplace, ideally within the debriefing themselves integrated.
If none of these seem important, you are probably a pure pleasure bonding session. Whetherthat a trip to the next (or most?) bar or something that the group an experience that all its members not matter, offers much to enjoy.
But if one of them obviously is not important, then I suggest that had them all. Should one or more will be missing your team building session will be called into question. And that is a word that sits well next to mediocrity and underachievement.
Copyright 2005 Sandstone Limited
