Monday, March 22, 2010

Team Building

In the article “7 Steps to Successful Team Building”, it describes the characteristics to build a team. First you must have specific session and longer-term goals and know how the session goals lead to the longer term ones. Second, use an appealing and varied base activity that involves each participant in something that he or she enjoys doing. Third, use an activity that achieves that engagement while having true parallels to the workplace and has significance with the session goals. Fourth, select an activity that requires the same kind of skills and team approaches that are needed at work. Fifth, consider using an independent (internal or external) facilitator which allows all levels to join in as equals. Sixth, debrief using a predefined process that highlights the workplace parallels and allows the participants to extract their own learning rather than be preached to. Lastly, use a proven method to transfer the learning back to the workplace, ideally integrated within the debriefing process itself.

Team building is intended to improve the internal functioning of work groups. Team building can be introduced by company trainers or outsiders. The activities and workshops help improve the team’s cooperation, communication, and dysfunctional conflict. I learned that if you want to build a team rather than just bond the individuals closer, you need a structured process. You need to decide before you start what improvements you want and can realistically expect the team to achieve. Next you can decide how long it will take to achieve those results.

"7 Steps to Successful Team Building, Stuctured Team Building." Team Building Activities, Corporate Away Days, Team Building Exercises. Web. 22 Mar. 2010. .

3 comments:

  1. I completely agree that structure is needed when building a team. I feel like this is what teams that fail lack the most. Whenever I do group work, this was something that I noticed: everyone seems to group together with their friends, thinking that it would work out the best since they know the person they're working with. This was something that I used to do a lot. But even then, we end up doing a bad job in our assignments.

    Looking back at it, the quality of our projects reflected the lack of structure we had as a group. In a way, it's not so much WHO you work with, but how well everything is structured--does everyone know the goal and what their jobs are? This is what makes a group successful, in my opinion.

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  2. I agree with you Anne. And sometimes it is hard to work with your friends because this creates tensions, and you can fight with them because of work.
    I think that it is important to make a separation between your friends and your work. It will be tha same in the business world. Working with your friend or family can lead to conflicts that would not have existed otherwise.

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  3. i think its sometimes easier to work with friends because you know how they opperate, and you can talk to them on a more personal level which might actually help with productivity.

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