What are Team Building exercises and what is their purpose?

Team building can be accomplished through a variety of activities, ranging from the simple and basic, such as unique bonding exercises before or during meetings, to complex multi-day simulations, trainings, or retreats carefully organized by professional associations. or companies specializing in such programs. These latter large-scale team-building exercises or less intensive variations thereof may include seminars, workshops, or conferences. Many team building ideas fall somewhere in this range and can also include an internally planned day doing outdoor activities like paintball, ropes courses, or orienteering. Team building can also be accomplished through healthy competition, such as organized baseball or soccer games against other businesses or organizations; or through events such as community service projects, carried out for good socially valuable causes.

Team building is now widely recognized and accepted as an important and feasible variable in many, if not most, group settings where performance depends on how well the group unit works together. The focus of most team building efforts is to bring out the best in the team to ensure positive communication, good leadership skills, development and progress for both the individuals within the group and the group as a whole. In addition, the ability to work cohesively and closely as a team to achieve a specific goal, reach a set goal, or resolve issues and problems is enhanced.

Although they are used in many settings, such as classrooms, to teach school-age children the value of working well with other children and to impart valuable social and group skills to these children, the value of team-building exercises is more pronounced in business and corporate settings. . This is because, in general, work environments tend to be highly focused only on people and their personal goals according to their roles within the organization. Rewards and recognition often highlight individual employees and their own accomplishments, rather than recognizing interdependent workers as a whole unit. Therefore, creating effective teams, or building a good team, with an emphasis on broader organizational goals than just individual achievement, is a challenge for many companies.

Therefore, it is not enough to gather a team and simply organize a day of fun and revelry for the company or for a team member with no clear objectives. It’s also not enough to play a few games to break the ice and leave it at that. There needs to be a greater and deeper focus on the team as a whole unit. In order for teams to come together in a cohesive way and for these exercises to work properly, the team members themselves must also be individually convinced that these exercises will also benefit them.

At its core, then, team-building exercises are generally understood as a task or a variety of tasks designed to develop the individuals within a group in relation to the organization, to hone and improve each participant’s ability to work. with the rest of the group as effectively as possible. possible. The main objective of such team building exercises is therefore to help and guide groups or teams to become more cohesive units of individuals working together effectively to accomplish given tasks.

To this end, there are reasons and benefits associated with participating in team building exercises, which can also be seen as ways to meet the ultimate goal associated with these exercises, which is to build an effective, productive and cohesive team. First of all, team building can start with improving communication and the level of interpersonal relationships between colleagues or within the corporate group. Team building ideas to improve communication are essentially problem-solving exercises or activities that are designed and geared toward improving communication skills among group members. The exercises are often problem-based, which means that teams are assigned particular problems that are most effectively solved by communicating well with other members of the group. The goal of a facilitator hoping to improve communication is to create any exercise that highlights the importance of good communication in team performance. The exercise should also show any potential problems with the communication flows and possible solutions to overcome them. Improving communication between team members builds better teams, just as well-built teams feature good communication.

Another benefit of team building exercises is their usefulness in helping team members learn to solve problems or make decisions more effectively as a group. The focus here is on groups working together cohesively to solve given tasks that are presented as difficult problems or that require the group to decide on complex issues together. These exercises may require creative approaches on the part of the group, and a concomitant benefit of the process of working together on these difficult situations is that participants may come to learn more about their own strengths and weaknesses, as well as learn more about the styles and opinions of their peers. colleagues. . In addition to teaching the team and team members strategies to regulate themselves and reach a pleasant consensus, this discussion process on difficult topics will undoubtedly go a long way in identifying and effectively utilizing the strengths of each team member. , so that the team is at its most effective in delivering the required performance.

Therefore, the team must learn and practice effective and productive collaboration with other team members. This may require adaptability and trust on the part of team members and can be achieved through team building exercises that focus on adapting to changing circumstances and trust-inducing exercises among group members. A primary benefit that can arise as a result of adaptable team members who trust each other and communicate well is that it will therefore be easier to get all team members on the same page. This is when it might be possible to instill the values ​​and goals of the company or organization above individual achievement.

Second, but nonetheless significant, team building exercises, when done correctly and well chosen with a clear goal in mind, can make a workplace more enjoyable for employees and a more likely happy worker feel encouraged, energized and motivated to improve productivity. of the company.