Team building initiatives are one of the fastest ways to turn what your team knows into what your team does. Most leaders can describe a great team. The hard part is getting busy people to practice those behaviors until they become habits.
Over the last few weeks, we have walked through the characteristics of highly effective teams. First, we covered creating a shared vision. Then we moved on to building trust, resolving conflicts, gaining cooperation, and building leaders from within. In this post, I’ll show you how to use team-building initiatives to put all of those principles into practice.
Team Building Initiatives Teach Teamwork by Doing, Not by Hearing.
Think about the last time you sat through a lecture on communication or trust. Everything the speaker said probably made sense. You may have even taken a few notes. But by the following Tuesday, most of the team was back to its old habits.
That isn’t because people don’t care. It’s because hearing about a skill and using a skill are two very different things. Educators call this experiential learning, or learning by doing. It’s a lot like learning to play tennis. You can watch videos and read books about the perfect backhand. However, you don’t really know what you’ve learned until you step onto the court with a racket in your hand.
Teamwork works the same way. Clients often tell us, “We want our team to communicate better.” My first question is, “What would that look like?” If I walked into your office on Monday, what would I see and hear? Most groups have never answered that question. Well-designed team-building initiatives give your team a place to practice. They also give everyone a shared picture of what “better” looks like.
5 Ways to Use Team Building Initiatives for Team Development.
When you choose team-building initiatives with a clear purpose, each one can strengthen a specific stage of team development. Here are five ways to get the most out of them:
- Use team initiatives to reinforce a shared goal.
- Build trust through small, low-risk wins.
- Let healthy debate happen under friendly pressure.
- Break down silos by making groups depend on each other.
- Give emerging leaders a chance to step up.
1) Use Team Initiatives to Reinforce a Shared Goal.
Highly effective teams are mission-oriented. Every member knows what the group is trying to accomplish and why it matters. In most workplaces, though, the mission lives on a wall or in a handbook. Few people think about it from day to day.
Team-building initiatives give everyone a clear goal they can see and touch. When the whole group works toward the same finish line, people start to share resources and help each other. The best activities also connect that short-term goal to something bigger. That’s one reason charity team-building events work so well. When the finished product is a bicycle for a child, the team sees that its work together has a real impact.
After the activity, take five minutes for a quick debrief. Ask the group, “What did we do today that we should do every day at the office?” That simple question links the experience directly to your team’s mission.
2) Build Trust Through Small, Low-Risk Wins.
Trust grows in small steps. People trust each other when they see teammates keep their word, share credit, and follow through. On a normal workday, teammates may not get many chances to see each other in that light. That’s especially true if they work in different departments or locations.
Team-building initiatives speed up that process. In a couple of hours, team members get dozens of small chances to rely on each other. Someone reads the instructions out loud. Someone else hands over a tool at just the right time. Another person offers an idea that saves the group five minutes. Each little moment adds a deposit to the team’s trust account. Because the stakes are low, people are also more willing to take a chance on someone they don’t know well yet.
3) Let Healthy Debate Happen Under Friendly Pressure.
Great teams disagree. They just debate ideas instead of attacking people. That takes practice. Unfortunately, it’s hard to practice when the argument is about next year’s budget.
A timed team challenge creates a little pressure in a safe setting. Teams have to make decisions quickly, and someone will almost always suggest a different approach. When that happens, the group can practice the skills from the conflict resolution post. They listen first, look for common ground, and admit when another idea is better. Since the topic is a puzzle instead of a performance review, people tend to stay calm. As a result, those positive habits are much easier to repeat later when the stakes are higher.
4) Choose Team Building Initiatives That Break Down Silos.
There’s an old proverb that says, “None of us is as smart as all of us.” Most organizations believe that. Over time, though, departments tend to drift into their own corners. Sales stops talking to operations. One shift doesn’t know what the other shift is doing. That’s the silo effect, and it slows everything down.
We created the Build-A-Bike® team-building activity back in 2005. From the start, we designed it so that no small group could succeed on its own. Teams have to trade parts, share information, and coordinate with other tables to finish.
For example, we once ran the activity for a client in New York. Early on, participants treated their small groups as separate from the rest of the team. It was the silo effect playing out right in front of us. Because the activity forces groups to interact, those walls came down quickly. Even better, the team carried that lesson back to the office. They started sharing ideas across groups there, too.
So when you choose team-building initiatives, look for activities that require cooperation between groups, not just within them. That’s where the biggest breakthroughs tend to happen.
5) Give Emerging Leaders a Chance to Step Up.
One of my favorite things to watch during a team event is who takes the lead. Often, it’s not the person with the biggest title. Sometimes it’s a quiet engineer who suddenly sees how the pieces fit together. Other times, it’s a new hire who keeps everyone on track.
Team-building initiatives also let people lead without risk. There’s no org chart in a scavenger hunt or a team escape room. As a result, natural leaders rise to the surface. Pay attention to those people. In the post on building leaders from within, we talked about recognizing potential in others. A team activity is a great place to spot that potential for the first time.
Interaction Makes Learning Faster, More Memorable, and More Fun.
People simply produce more when they work alongside others. Think about running a 5K with a big group of friends. Then compare that to running the same distance alone. What feels like a grind by yourself is a lot more fun with people chasing the same goal. You feed off their energy, and you usually run faster, too.
The same thing happens during well-run team-building initiatives. The energy in the room goes up, and people laugh. They also remember the lessons because they lived them. Once your team feels what it’s like to work together that well, it spills over into meetings and projects.
Team Building Initiatives Help Your Team Develop Faster.
Every team goes through stages of development. You can let that process happen slowly, or you can speed it up on purpose. Team building initiatives let your group practice shared goals, trust, debate, cooperation, and leadership in a single afternoon. Follow up with a short debrief, and connect the activity to your real work. That’s how the lessons stick.
Want to see one in action? Check out this recent charity bike assembly event in Miami.
Want Help Choosing the Right Team-Building Initiatives for Your Group?
We offer dozens of team-building activities, both in person and virtual. We can customize each one to focus on the stage of development your group needs most. If you want to go deeper, try our Creating a Team Culture workshop. It combines hands-on activities with practical tools your team can use right away. To get started, fill out the form here. One of our consultants will reach out with some ideas.