Motivating Employees with Team-Building Exercises

Team-building exercises can improve employee relations by motivating employees and strengthening morale. Team building can also improve employee productivity, increase communication and strengthen solidarity within a company.

 

Improving teamwork, however, is not as simple as gathering employees off site for a game of paintball (one of the more popular team-building exercises). Successful team building should be tailored to your employees' personalities and the goals of your company. It can even be directly related to the work at hand.

Team-building exercises sometimes get a bad reputation as being "corny" or forced. However, there are many creative options for team building exercises other than the "name game" in the conference room! Your team-building exercise reflects who you are as a company, so plan it wisely.

Being part of a team can improve employee motivation: As a team member, employees feel they are part of the bigger picture. This only works, however, if the team has a specific goal and employees are allowed to "own" the project.

Teamwork functions best if the team knows it has some say in the final outcome of the team project and that the company will recognize the team's contribution to the corporation. Conversely, lack of clear goals and leadership, fear of reprisals and a lack of recognition all work against motivating employees.

Teamwork does not suggest lack of leadership. A team should have a clear leader, and each member of the team should have specific duties. The team's project should have a clear timeline, vision and mission statement. Knowing why a project is important helps foster teamwork and improve employee relations.

Team-building consultants are readily available and often deliver enjoyable and educational team-building exercises for both employees and management.

However, it's important to remember that each company has unique employees and employee relationships. Managers ultimately know their employees better than outside consultants and should select teamwork exercises based on the needs and interests of their unique workforce.

For instance, for one group of employees, paintball may be a fantastic way to foster teamwork and improve employee relations. A second group might have a great time playing paintball but come away from the experience with no real increase in teamwork. A third group may hate competitive games such as paintball, and the experience may actually damage employee relations.

In other words, team-building exercises need to be chosen with care. Most employees (and managers) have been forced to take part in workplace activities they dislike at some point, often in the name of team building. Negative experiences can make employees suspicious of team-building exercises, so choose activities that reflect the needs and personalities of your team.

Team-building exercises serve a number of purposes. Team building can be as complex as a week-long white-water rafting tour or as simple as a ten-minute icebreaker to introduce team members to each other.

No matter what type of team-building exercises you choose, they should have specific objectives. Team-building exercises can:

Icebreaking team-building exercises often resemble simple party-games. For instance, as a "get-to-know-me" exercise the team might play "Two Facts and a Fib." Each team member writes down two facts about themselves and one untrue statement. The rest of the team then has to determine which is the false statement based on what they know about the individual. Other icebreakers include games to help remember people's names (be creative!) and memory-retention games.

One of the most challenging aspects of team-building exercises is actually creating a team-building exercise from scratch. The process requires teamwork, interaction, creative brainstorming and evaluation skills.

You may wish to involve employees in this procees. Have employees separate into groups and devise their own exercise, along with an explanation of what the exercise is designed to strengthen (team building, motivating employees, improving employee relations, etc.). Each team then leads the other groups through their team-building exercise.

Resources

Business Training Works. (2002). Creative icebreakers, introductions, and hellos for teachers, trainers, and facilitators. Retrieved October 5, 2007, from the Business Training Works Web site: management.about.com/cs/adminaccounting/a/teambuilding

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Wilderdom Store (2006). Team building activities, initiative games, and problem solving exercises. Retrieved October 5, 2007, from the Wilderdom Store Web site: wilderdom.com/games/InitiativeGames.html.