Copyright © 2006 The National Learning Institute

Rob worked as a qualified, but junior physiotherapist in a busy hospital.  He along with three of his colleagues were asked by their manager to discuss amongst themselves how they would like their rosters to be organised (i.e. who would do what shifts etc.) and put forward their proposal.  Rob and his colleagues were very happy with their final choices as they had considered all of their personal and professional needs and felt that their decision was the best for all.  A day before the new rosters were to start, Rob found out by rumour during his lunch break that their roster recommendations were not to be implemented.  Worse still, the rosters decided on by their manager did not suit any of the four.  This decision by their manager resulted in a severe lowering of morale within the team and created a culture of mistrust with management.  In future, they would be very wary of any suggestion from management.

Ever been a member of a work team where the manager threw a difficult problem over to the team to solve only to see the manager implement a completely different decision to that of the team?  If the implemented solution affected the ongoing congruence and cohesiveness of the team, how did this make you feel?  Why does this happen and is it a legitimate management strategy for group decision making?

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Copyright © 2006 Deborah Torres Patel

Thorough meeting preparation alleviates anxiety. Good planning guarantees that meetings are relevant, don’t overrun and aren’t held back by uniformed, boring or disinterested attendees.  Follow these 19 timeless tips to keep your meetings on track and on time.

When preparing your agenda …

1. Identify the aim of your meeting

2. Put the most important items first

3. Establish a clear outcome for each point

4. Judiciously choose meeting invitees.  Ask yourself, “Who should attend?” “Should attendees be present for all or just part of the meeting?”

5. Place controversial points towards the end so the early part of the meeting can flow smoothly.

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

Think back over all the team building sessions that you have attended over the years.  There is a very good chance that at each and every one of them the facilitators organised your group into teams. Any that weren’t were probably small groups. Sound familiar? Why do they do that?

Well, one answer is to encourage maximum involvement from the participants. Small team sizes help ensure that everyone joins in. Quieter people will be less likely to fade into the background the smaller the team they are in.  But that’s not the only - or even main - reason.

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Copyright © 2006 Marshall House

Everyone has a unique perspective of what constitutes an “energetic meeting.” Some may believe that an energetic meeting must be lively and fast-paced; others may believe that a meeting is energetic when they leave feeling energized and uplifted.

Regardless of your own personal viewpoint of energetic meetings, you can increase the likelihood that your meetings will be more satisfying by encouraging your group to adopt certain procedures as standard. Here are some key procedures, if you want participation in your energetic meetings.

Clarify Purpose. A group’s clear purpose right from its beginning helps all other considerations and actions to become clearer.

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

More and more people are booking “all inclusive” holidays. These are the ones that have all meals and (usually locally produced) drinks included in the base price of the holiday. Providing the food is appetising and (for me) the beer is drinkable, they do just fine.

Flicking through a travel brochure the other day, I got to thinking what other commercially available offerings could be all inclusive. I decided that team building is certainly one.

“What’s new?” I hear you ask. “I’ve never had to pay for my drinks or food on a corporate away day.” Well, food and drink are not the only - or even most important - resources at an away day or conference.  The people are.

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

Organising a team building session for, say, 25 people is relatively straight forward. You have enough people to be able to choose from a wide range of activities without having so many that logistics becomes a problem. 40 people and one or two options start to drop out as the extra people can’t physically be accommodated at a specific venue or mean that a limited resource would need to be queued an unreasonable amount of time for. The majority of team activities really start to creak once you hit 50 people and 60 is an absolute upper limit for probably at least 80% or more of the options.

So what if your group size is larger than this? For example, if you are organising a team building event for the entire sales force of a large organisation?  Or even an entire company?  What are the challenges involved and how can you pick something that delivers the outcomes you want without making a Sir Elton John party budget seem tiny by comparison?

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

When was the last time that you heard the phrase “variety is the spice of life”? In what context was it used? Was it applied to experiences?  Well - it can be. Was it applied to teams?  Well - it should be! And team building can help it add that spice.

My definition of a team is one in which the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. Otherwise, it is just a collection of individuals. I find it impossible to imagine how my definition can be achieved if the team is comprised of clones os a single individual - no matter how good that individual is. Making the whole greater than the sum of the parts is about exploiting the differences between people, not the similarities.

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

What does the phrase “team building” mean to you? Quad-biking? Abseiling? Propping up the bar with your work colleagues? Allow me to disagree.

Let’s look at the word “build” and see where that leads us. The Concise Oxford English Dictionary defines the word “build” as “Establish, make or accumulate gradually”. This definition implies a sense of time passing and growth. This, in turn, implies a modicum of care and attention to maximise the growth - or at the very least monitor the development.

So what kind of process works best to turn a team building session into something that improves team effectiveness back where it matters?

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Copyright © 2006 Ike Krieger

If you want to have a fighting chance in the business world, you’d better be an effective communicator.

Here are three steps that will help you operate as a truly effective communicator.

Step #1. Know your outcome. An effective communicator knows her outcome and states it in the positive.

Step #2. Know where you are in the process. Know if you’re moving away from or closer to your outcome. Your questioning and listening skills play an important role in this step for communications awareness.

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Copyright © 2006 Sandstone Limited

When a prospective new client calls us up and expresses an interest in team building, we ask a simple question - what do you want to achieve out of it? You might be surprised at how many people don’t have an answer. After a short pause, we might get a reply along the lines of “well, we want it to be fun…” and then it tails off again.

If you don’t know what you want from a team building event, you shouldn’t be surprised if you don’t get it.  Of course, you might get lucky and hit upon the right activity to deliver the outcomes you needed even if you didn’t realise that you wanted them at the time. You might win the lottery next week as well - but it is probably best not to plan for it though. Ah - “plan”.  Now there’s an idea…

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