How can team building activities be effectively assessed for leadership development?

Sometimes not putting a label on it is the best thing a leader can do. Rather, use your observations and intuitive nature to gauge what other human-beings, like yourself, might get out of that activity. If you’re on the fence, just ask your team their thoughts. It doesn’t need to get more complex than that!

When evaluating team building activities for leadership development, it's crucial to focus on their impact. One effective way to assess them is through post-activity feedback and reflection sessions. Encourage participants to share their insights on how the activities enhanced teamwork, communication, and leadership skills. This open dialogue can provide valuable feedback for future improvements and ensure that each activity contributes to leadership development effectively.

In my early corporate days, I'd recall being the dodgeball strategist in school, not the fastest thrower. It rings true in the boardroom. There's a corporate myth: the loudest voice is the de facto leader. Yet, leadership wears many hats. Assessing team dynamics isn’t just about who commands the room. Who's the silent strategist? The peacemaker? The spark of motivation? As in childhood games, it's about valuing diverse strengths. In the corporate maze, we must recognise that leadership isn’t limited to the corner office. As we climb the corporate ladder, it’s essential to remember that leadership can often be discovered in the quietest corners.

Defining clear and actionable objectives prior to implementation cannot be overstated when assessing the effectiveness of team-building activities for leadership development. For example, If the intent is to level-up collaborative problem-solving, then the activity must be tailored to refine this skill and then test application. The assessment should focus on the participant's ability to engage in the process, with qualitative data offering insights into leadership dynamics. This includes observing how leaders navigate challenges, the strategies they employ, and how they influence and support one another. This may take the form of a rubric or post-activity interviews, observations or focus groups. Begin with the end in mind!

Before the team building activities, conducting a pre-assessment of participants' leadership skills would be helpful to define the objectives. This could be done through surveys, self-assessments, or interviews to establish a baseline. Using the pre-assessment date, ensure that the team building activities are designed with leadership development in mind. Activities should promote collaboration, communication, decision-making, problem-solving, and other leadership skills.

The traditional teambuilding mostly just focus of team spirit engagement. Often, each individual has been overwhelmed with daily task and the communication/customer (internal/external) journey are often neglected. By selecting appropriate programme and tool may be helpful to let the team understand cross function learning help out. Lego Serious Play (LSP) is one of the great tool to let team understand cross function and having fun.

Recently, our team building focused on clarity and connection aligned with our goal of improving as a hybrid organization. We anchored it in a storytelling activity. In small groups, we played Storytelling BINGO, sharing stories about our hybrid work experiences. It was fun, helped us see our humanity, commonalities, and was an excellent book for a larger strategy conversation we were about to undertake.

Consider the softly spoken, reserved members of your team and make sure they are not taken over by more extroverted personalities. Finding ways to build emotional intelligence is key as well as making everyone, regardless of their style of expression, to feel seen and heard. This is particularly important in mixed gender and ethnicity teams.

One of the best ways to measure relevancy is to be clear about the individual’s need first - before planning the group’s needs. When both are factored, then successful outcomes are generated. For example, how are you expecting your neurodivergent team members to participate if the activities are weighted in an extroverts or a neurotypical’s strengths? They are immediately disengaging and not bringing their full self to the exercise because they were not even considered in the first place. Which defeats the purpose of the activities.

Each type of activity has its own purpose, benefits, and drawbacks. Picking the wrong one can deflate team morale in a heartbeat. It's essential to consider your team's unique composition—introverted or extroverted, diverse in terms of age or background—to ensure your chosen activities resonate with them. This is not just about ticking boxes; it's about creating an environment where your objectives can realistically be met.

The feedback in a team building activity is like an accountability process; to check in on what works, successes, and what is not working so the team can come up with a solution that works for the following week. The results are easily listed in an email with day and date in the subject line. this is done every week until completion, 1. What is the project and when is it due 2. Last week: what tasks were completed 3. Any tasks outstanding? Why? Reflection. 4. Support offered by way of other solutions to compete the task. 5. What are the tasks slated for the following week. Now the team has in simple emails the tracking of the team building activity, by date. Over time we do not remember all the solutions we have created.

The post-activity feedback session is more important than the actual activity. You need to lead the group in discussion in such a way that they identify the lessons learned themselves. This is where you check alignment with the objectives you set prior to the intervention. Did you manage to achieve your goals and did the "aha" moment kick in? There is nothing more rewarding than watching the penny drop and the eyes light up.

This is where communication and action meet. In the military, we refer to this as an after-action review. During this phase, we should evaluate what was supposed to happen, meaning each person explains their understanding of the stated training. Review what occurred, what went right, what went wrong, and the outcome. Finally, we go over how to improve in the future, how we might change the explanation and performance actions, and, of course, refine communications. It is imperative that during this period managers listen to voices, implement change where able, and carry forward, to higher leadership, those ideas that benefit the organization as a whole. The idea is to use this time as a way to improve action and connections.

Yes one of the most important factors here is having someone who has expertise in deep listening facilitate these conversations because they know how to bring a detached and non-biased lens to the situation and your data will be clearer.

Yes, feedback and reflection is an essential component. During and after the activities, collect feedback from participants. This can include both qualitative feedback (e.g., group discussions) and quantitative data (e.g., surveys). Ask about their experiences, what they learned, and how they see it applying to their leadership roles. Don't sit on the data. Use it to enhance the leadership development of your team.

Usually what companies have used in someone who has a singular expertise in one assessment. There’s tremendous value in working with someone who has experience across a set of assessments and tools so that they can show you and your team members an over-arching pattern, as well as being able to deep dive into details, to show where application of the outcomes is beneficial for both individuals as well as the team.

Unless we are doing something groundbreaking, we are going to operate from an area of known knowns, so to speak. Therefore, we have a baseline for some task or action that will allow us to establish baseline criteria for performance, evaluate employee action against what is known, and modify behavior or tasks for new understandings. How well you interact and connect with people during this trial phase, which may be initial training or calibration to recent changes, will impact total leadership effectiveness. These micro-interpersonal interactions will determine your ability to influence people, solve problems, and adjust to future shifts.

The saying "inspect what you expect" always applies, but expectations must be clear and easily understood. Why? Our analysis and reports must be digestible to leaders and subordinates for execution that allows higher organizational leader to read results and adjust performance expectations in all areas of operations in an institution. Always remember the power of a solid Excel pivot table and explanation of results, but most leaders want a solution more than an in-depth analysis. The analysis intends to help you develop your leadership and will ultimately enable you to better connect with more people than those less concerned. Save these reports; as you rise through the ranks, it may provide you with insight.

While many of the examples have been about building real projects by way of a contest, simple activities such as bowling or smaller, simple activities may work all depending on your goal and where your team is. Are they just forming? Are you new to them? Are they storming? Do they need a refresh? Goals and objectives will guide you on the activities and the scope of those activities. Don't necessarily label them as a team building. They could be a mixer with a bit of friendly competition. Doing something out of the blue will require being more open about it. As a leader, building relationships between yourself and your team and between each of the members should be a regular and ongoing event.

Team-building activities are more than just fun and games; they serve a strategic purpose. When designed thoughtfully, these activities can drive performance improvements and instigate meaningful behavior change. By aligning activities with business objectives, ensuring inclusivity, and creating a psychologically safe environment, organizations can turn these exercises into powerful tools for team development. The ultimate goal is to enact lasting change that benefits not just the individual participants but the organization as a whole. Therefore, it's crucial to approach team-building activities as an investment in your team's future success rather than just another ropes course or golf outing.

Recently I worked with an emerging enterprise who slated a team building contest to create a new product actually that can be created based on the company technology. The teams presented their product with presentation to the whole company and one was chose to actually build. At holiday times teams working to provide supplies to the less fortunate is a wonderful way to serve the community while everyone has the same mission, to make life better for those in need. One other was creating gallon size bags with consummables for the homeless. Those folks who stand on the street in need. I kept half a dozen bags behind my driver's seat. They contained: Crackers, socks, sanitizer, toothbrush, gloves, water, bandaids, etc.

Assess team building activities for leadership development by: 1. Define Base Metrics. 2. Align Individual and Company Goals with Base Metrics. 3. Assess Current and Desired States. 4. Check Leadership Readiness and Participation. 5. Design Simulated Activities to Visualize and Implement The Goals. 6. Define Effectiveness Stages. 7. Ask The Team/Seek Feedback. 8. Implement The Learnings In Real Time And Conduct A Periodic Check- Comparison with Base Metrics. 9. Record The Activities-Process-Debrief which worked and replicate it for new ones. 10. Track The Ripple Effect and Rework-Realign With Bigger Goals And Values.

Let's not overlook the investment you're asking from your team. You're pulling them away from their usual tasks, and that's a big ask. Be transparent about why it's worth their time and make sure they won't be penalized for participating. It's also critical to gauge the team's current state. Will this activity come off as too little, too late? If the team is already disengaged, even the best activity won’t hit the mark. That signals it's time to take a step back and focus on open communication and listening to your team's needs.