The most important asset to any company is its employees. They are the backbone of the company, which is why it’s essential to make sure your team feels valued and appreciated.
It’s unfortunate that the thought of ‘team building’ has become increasingly less exciting, or even seen as a waste of time. Despite this reputation, team-building is one of the most important investments you can make for your people. It builds trust, mitigates conflict, encourages communication and increases collaboration.
Effective team building means more engaged employees, which is good for company culture and boosting the bottom line. Team-building is as adventurous as you want to make it, which is why we’re sharing a few thoughts to consider before you start planning, and the benefits you can hope to see as a result.
Don’t Force The Corporate Stuff
The most successful team-building events are the ones that don’t feel like a typical day in the office. Activities that overtly aim to draw in leadership lessons, or practical takeaways are often less successful. Spending time together, sharing an experience or working towards a common goal allows conversation and bonding to happen organically and far more effectively.
Team Building Is Not A Splurge, It’s An Investment
At the end of the day, you want to provide an activity that resonates well with your employees. You don’t have to overdo it, but don’t skimp out either. You want to leave your team feeling appreciated and valued, which ultimately lasts longer than the activity itself.
Team Building Boosts Employee Engagement
According to Museum Hack, employee engagement is one of the most crucial elements of a successful business. It demonstrates how much employees care about the company’s mission, and how hard they’re willing to work to ensure the company succeeds.
Team building is a great way to boost employee engagement, morale, and show employees you care about their well being. Teams with highly engaged employees earn two times the annual net income of companies with low engagement levels.
Team Building Can Help You Attract And Retain Top Talent
Kathy Caprino at Forbes wrote an article describing how mega companies like Uber, Facebook, and Salesforce use team building to their advantage. One of the most insightful parts of the article came from a quote by team building expert Jenny Gottstein, who says the following:
“Interestingly, we’re seeing companies use their strong corporate culture as a bargaining chip to recruit the best and brightest talent. When applying for jobs, millennial employees are not only assessing their salary and benefits, but also whether or not they relate to the working environment, and enjoy rolling up their sleeves next to their peers. As a result of this culture shift, team-building is being used as a marketing and recruitment tool. Often we will produce games for prospective employees or interns of large companies as a way to show off the perks of the company’s working environment.”
Team Building Improves Communication
There are a wide variety of team building exercises, and most all of them require communication. Whether it’s strategizing, coordinating, or solving a problem, the need to communicate is inevitable when it comes to team building exercises.
Let your employees engage with one another naturally, and watch their relationships grow!
With quality team building activities, you can foster unity among your team members and make them feel acknowledged and appreciated.
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