Why Your Next Team Building Event Could be a Box Ticking Exercise!

“Team building sessions can make your organization a place where you can achieve great things while having a great time, with others who want the same,” said Will Gray, managing director at Hidden Door. “And that investment pays off tremendously: you end up with a company that attracts the best talent, creates excellent products and services, and figures out how to do it better, faster, and smarter than the rest.”

But Wait- not all ‘Team Building Events are Delivering This?!!

In fact, most Top Executives are getting disenchanted with the idea of team building Events.

But Why?

This Can Be Attributed To a Couple of Reasons;

1. Failure to Define

• Why Such Intervention is Necessary,
• What Desired Outcomes Must be Achived to shift the Situation,
• How are these Outcomes going to be Achieved- Deeply Dissecting the Best Approach to Incorporate the Right Transformation Process to Deal with Root Causes of the?Real Workplace Challenges; How shall we Know that we have Achieved

Follow this;- the Human Resource Professional (HR)/ Executive concerned with the development of the team has captured well the Team challenges clearly in a report. The report has strongly sighted the core issues crippling the team- rampant grapevine, blame game, the emergence of Silos, information hoarding, lack of teamwork, rising absenteeism, low engagement, dipping performance, increasing client complaints, increasing staff conflicts, etc.

What does Leadership do? The same thing they have done in their previous years- hold a team-building session. So an XX date gets slotted to travel to chosen venue, to play programmed games depending on the creativity of the identified facilitator – yes some due diligence is done to get someone with some experience in outdoor games so as to guarantee lots of fun, laughter, sweat, jubilation, and at the end of it, all members are happy and rate it as a great day!

The Team reports to the office from the event; all are happy and the joy of the session lights up the office for a little while. Then, a simple incident in the office instantly 'Reset the organization Back to Factory'. The blame game reemerges, silos take a grip, and all the challenges that the team-building sort to solve show up all over again.

What does the leadership do again,- probably wait till the next team building. The same pattern goes on yet the 'Why' (Purpose of the Activity)was not Compelling enough for anyone to bother to pay attention to it, re-evaluation is not done to unearth what was wrong with the 'How' (Approach) and why the 'What' (the Desired Workplace Changes) remained a Piped Dream. It's a useless exercise yet many organizations would rather invest a lucrative budget on it than take a dive to the roots.

This Nature of annual Team Building Activities (TBA) planned under the expectation of solving deeply engrained negative habits, behaviors, conflicting values, poor performance, lack of goal clarity, lack of teamwork and synergy, etc is really a box-ticking exercise- a Short-lived gratification at the expense of organizational long-term effectiveness.

Discernment of the root cause (Source) of the team challenges is requisite- In fact, it might require You to First Assess Your Work Culture!, then take interest in the identification of the right intervention and its Purpose, What results( Outcomes) it seeks to deliver, and How. Agreeing on Metrics is vital and at what sense of urgency.

Culture is the Real River- if it's flowing in the wrong direction, a small force of a duck swimming against it could be fun for a while, but afterward-the force of the river overwhelms

Damaris Ndungwa

2.?????Your Team Building Lacks Near Transfer!

The theory of near transfer expects effective learning to occur when the conditions under which the learning occurs are most similar to those conditions under which the actual work is completed.

When your session?Facilitator fails to complete team exercises under contextual conditions that are similar to the actual conditions under which work will be completed then the team misses out on near transfer.

A failed transfer is a prime inefficiency- and a slight occurrence at work will suddenly reboot the team to its old setting. The team is simply unable to deploy learned knowledge, strategies, and tacts to help them navigate the challenges.

3.?????Your Team Building Takes The Team Out of Team Building

?Team building sessions that focus on individual differences over similarities in terms of common goal orientation, or that focus on individuals and their individual contributions, tend to take the “team” out of “teambuilding” -what you focus on is what you get.

Team building sessions that attempt to classify team members in terms of Personality type, Communication style, Individual work preferences or strengths, “Type” of contribution- activities that classify you as a “Wolf,” “Swan,” “Otter,” “Dog,” “Snake,” or other animals in a menagerie are one such example.

Strong teams are a core subset of great culture and are built around a common purpose/ goal and deep understanding of the essence of interdependence. Each has to pull the weight in the same direction. For the whole to succeed, a smooth flow between the components is imperative. If staff A and B work together and A does not see how B's success will enhance theirs, then nothing can make A and B a team.

4.?The Session Fails to Adress Resistance and Secure “Buy-In” from Key Team Members

Mike a member of a training troop was asked to tape individual leaves back on the branches of a tree, to reenact a poem. He was less than enthusiastic about participating. In fact, he stood back from the rest, hoping that he wouldn’t be spotted, he would not have to tape a leaf onto a tree. Mike did not want to participate—that was, until Mr. Makovo, the troop navigator, warned that they were being graded on their participation. Then guess who started taping leaves in a hurry?

For any Team Engagement /initiative to be successful, all stakeholders have to see its meaningful purpose with clarity for a great level of buy-in to be established. There should be a clear demonstration of the expectation- e.g. core attributes, habits, behaviors, and routines the organization is keen on and how they impact the staff, team, and organization at large.

5.?????Team Building Skills Fail to be Reinforced

?This is a commonly identifiable Problem. Many team-building exercises are rarely reinforced after the event takes place.

Significant research shows that reinforcement helps to increase learning transfer and content mastery. Skills that are reinforced after an individual has had time to reflect and think about how the lessons apply to the job practice are much likelier to “stick.”

Don’t Just Tick The Box- Learn More on how to Build a High-Performance Team Here

?A Blue Concepts Africa Review on Team Building Programs for Emerging Workplaces, 2021,

Done by Damaris Ndungwa,

HR Professional and Lead Strategist- Learning and Development,

Blue Concepts Africa Ltd.

[email protected]