What kind of image do you conjure up when someone mentions the phrase “team building.” If your head starts spinning with visions of trust falls, rock climbing, playing with legos or some other game type of activity, you’re not alone. That’s what most people think of when they hear those words. And along with that comes a lot of rolling eyes and groans about wasting time.

It’s a shame team building has such a bad name because of poorly executed experiential team building days that became so popular in the nineties. Experiential team building can be the catalyst that causes a breakthrough in a team if done correctly and integrated with your team’s regular objectives and goals. But the biggest problem with them is that they typically occur only once a year. That’s not enough to maintain your team. Team building is definitely not an annual affair.

Let’s think back to why you have a team in the first place. Your team was created with a specific purpose — to accomplish a project, or focus organizational efforts in a specific direction, or to accomplish a certain goal. These activities take place every single day. And so should your team building.

Here’s what I recommend to help you build your team.

• Develop a set of ground rules that define how your team members are supposed to behave. These are things like communicate openly, be on time for meetings, meet commitments, and resolve conflict effectively.
• Create an environment where your team ground rules can be carried out. This should include both a virtual and face-to-face space that allows for plenty of interaction in your team.
• Set up a regular schedule of meetings, about once a month, for the sole purpose of monitoring your team’s health. The objective of these meetings will be single thread — to talk about how effective the communication methods are within the team, or discuss what processes are working or not working, or to determine whether meetings are effective or not. In other words, monitoring your team health focuses on the interactions of your team that enable its goals to be accomplished.

When you consider team building as part of your day-to-day activities, your team will be a healthy one that functions well together to accomplish its goals.

What do you think? Let’s talk about it. Please leave your comment.

I currently work as a Research and Development Analyst for an insurance company, but I am desperate to move into a management role preferably within the industry or in another. So far I have persuaded my boss to put me in charge of handling compliance matters on an ad hoc basis, and he has reluctantly agreed to this. Besides this, how can I move into a management role? I have no formal management skills but hold a Masters degree in Business Management, where my thesis was on Managing Diversity. Should I do a short course or something? Thanks in advance.

The Team Doc Says…

Two things bother me about your message. First the you are “desperate to move into a management role” and that your boss “reluctantly agreed” to put you in a role you desired. These are not good signs.

I think you need to examine why you are so desperate to get into a management role. You can do that by evaluating what it is you think you will be getting from being in that type of role. Are you looking for power, status, more money … something else? Determine your motives before you move to the next step. You could use a leadership assessment to help you here.

To achieve success, it’s important to have the support of your supervisor. Schedule a meeting to discuss why you want to be in a leadership role and how you can contribute to the success of the company by being in that role. Ask your supervisor what improvements you need to make before moving into a leadership role and set goals to achieve those improvements. You need to prove to your supervisor that you are competent for a management role by showing what you can do to enable the organization’s success. (You might want to pick up a copy of my free goal setting guide.)

What do you think reader? Please leave a comment with your suggestions.

New to an agency with little turn-over. Most have been there for three years or longer performing only one task. I’ve started trying to have people learn responsibilities of others in case an individual who performs a task no one else does is not at work. I’ve guaranteed that learning another’s responsibilities did not warrant them to perform those tasks unless an individual who generally performed that task did not come in to work. I’ve met some resistance from 4 of 15 individuals. They want to be reimbursed for the additional responsibility if they are to perform the task, whether or not the responsible individual does not report to work. The majority of the individuals accepted my idea and are trying to help me in motivating the resisting individuals. I’ve planned to move forward, but continue to encourage the ones resisting to participate; I’ve explained the benefits for the individual and the department. How do I negotiate if the four individuals choose not to learn?

The Team Doc Says…

Assuming these tasks are interchangeable from person to person and no special education or skills are needed, I don’t think you need to negotiate.

Unless your company is bound by a union agreement, most jobs include a statement identifying that the person will perform other tasks as required (or something like that). Which means you can just tell them to participate or face the consequences. That said, I wouldn’t go the strong arm approach until you’ve tried other options. Not knowing for sure what you’ve tried, some of my advice may be repetitive. Here goes.

1. Make sure everyone “gets” the big picture. The main reason a company has employees is to accomplish a goal. Goals are broken into tasks with are typically spread around the company by some sort of logical grouping of jobs. I think it would be worthwhile to have this discussion with your entire team. Often team members have a tough time seeing how they fit into the big picture of the company and this will help them understand.

2. Explain the driver behind the cross training. I call this an explanation about the dump truck theory. In other words, if a team member got run over by a dump truck (yes, I know – morbid), the work of the team could not be completed. If the work of the team could not be completed, it could potentially sink the company. And who wants that to happen?

3. Cross training makes team members more valuable (and normally provides job security). Often people don’t want to learn new skills because they’re afraid. And they don’t want to teach others their skills because they’re afraid. You need to talk to each of these team members to determine the real issue. Most don’t look past the end of their nose and discover that the more they know, the more valuable they are to the company (so it’s tougher to be let go in a down turn). But to make this work, you need to have a plan — a method to the madness if you will. Make sure you identify the critical skills (not all skills are critical) that could stop the company cold and prepare cross trained team members.

If, after all of this, the team members refuse to cross train unless they are compensated, you can make the cross training a condition of their employment with the company and if they don’t comply you’ll have to let them go.

What do you think reader? Please leave your thoughts in a comment.

I work for an international NGO with matrix teams across 50 countries. How do you ensure goal alignment when staff have two bosses ? How do you manage conflict of priorities, time allocation to the line manager and the dotted line manager?

The Team Doc Says…

This type of organizational arrangement is becoming more common across all industries. With the advances in technology, teams can be dispersed across many locations and managers can have responsibility for different groups — many have shared responsibilities as you have indicated.

So what to do? Communicate. Hands down, that is the single most effective behavior that will make you and your team successful. Your managers could have competing priorities and if that’s the case, your team will get stuck in the crossfire. Not a good thing.

It’s important that you take the time to set team goals that align with organizational goals. Then have a joint session with both managers to ensure there are no conflicts.

Set aside some time at least once a week to check in with each of the managers to ensure you are on track to meet their expectations. If you sense the slightest bit of misalignment, take care of it right away.

What do you think reader? Have a suggestion to add? Please leave a comment.

What team building activities would you suggest for teenagers? I work for the YMCA and am going to pitch a class on Team Building for teenagers. Any suggestions?

The Team Doc Says…

Today’s teens have been raised in a team building environment. From preschool on, they were taught to work together and collaborate to get the best outcome.

Rather than focusing on activities, how about pitching a program?

I don’t think today’s young people understand how team building skills would transfer to the workplace. You could help them make that transition by focusing on the key elements of a team — goals, accountability, communication, diverse skills — around a business scenario.

Make a game out of establishing a business environment and having them create and manage the business using team skills. I’m thinking along the lines of what Junior Achievement does. These skills would be very valuable for them to grow into the future.