Teamwork is an essential component of corporate structure. No matter the business strategy, managers and directors are looking for one thing from every team: excellent performance. More often than not, teams have to work at cooperating better with each other. Thankfully, corporate team building events present a fun and challenging way to improve teamwork, productivity, and motivation.
Corporate Team Building Boosts Motivation
The effectiveness of working in a team is under constant debate. We’ve all experienced the downsides of working in a bad team, and being forced into one probably won’t bring out the best response in most people but research does show that the simple fact of knowing that we’re part of a team motivates us to keep working through tough challenges.
“It is also striking that it does not take enormous effort and change to create this feeling of togetherness,” says Priyanka Carr, one of the researchers. “Careful attention to the social context as people work and learn can help us unleash motivation”.
Wandering further into the psychology of motivating and moving people, we find that it’s uniquely human traits that fuel us to do our best work. Namely, these elements are:
~ Fun
~ Inspiration
~ Helping others
~ Self-care
Yvon Chouinard the man that dreamed up Patagonia Clothing pays careful attention to all of these factors within his company. With a radically different yet incredibly successful business model, he has encouraged fun, self-motivated individuals to work autonomously for over 30 years. Teamwork is required throughout the process but his employees work it out between themselves and it works great.
Based in California, Patagonia’s employees enjoy a policy where they’re encouraged to drop their work and head to the beach when the surf’s up. Far from being a waste of time, this activity recharges the Patagonia crew. After all, the wonders of being in nature have been proven many times to motivate, inspire, and improve well-being; all through some fun in the sun.
Team Building Activities For Small Groups Produce The Best Results
When it comes to dream-team size, bigger isn’t always better. In fact, it’s hardly ever an advantage to have large teams within the corporate environment. Richard Hackman, a Harvard professor and leading expert on teamwork unveiled research that shatters the misconceptions surrounding the perceived magic of teamwork.
According to his research, the perfect team to take on any corporate challenge is one that:
-> is small in size
-> has worked together for a long time
-> has a healthy dose of conflict around the work (not each other) and
-> works face-to-face in the physical world
Max Ringelmann, a French agricultural engineer discovered the correlation between group size and productivity nearly 200 years ago. His simple experiment was a tug ‘o war, testing how hard individuals pulled vs teams of 9. It turned out one was stronger than many in this regard-placing individuals in big teams produced the phenomena that today’s psychologists have dubbed “social loafing.”
Unfortunately, a team with social loaves is hardly likely to perform to dream team standards. These individuals lack the motivation and care for their work that is essential for success. More often than not, they’ve lost sight of the end goal, and the purpose of their work and job role is unclear.
Teams experiencing such behaviour from individuals are ideal candidates for an out-of-office team building event. Combining the change in environment with a series of puzzles and challenges that are designed to get teams working on the end goal is an experience that reminds employees what it’s like to work in a great team.
Corporate Team Building Events
By giving your employees the opportunity to experience a fun, challenging, series of tasks through team building, you’ll drastically boost their spirits and your company’s productivity. Without the pressure of corporate structures and expectations, team building events give your employees a chance to work things out independent of managers, bosses, and other overseers.
Employees are the building blocks of any corporation. Strong teams are the essential foundations for any well-run business, and more often than not, it takes work to strengthen them.
An independent team is truly a dream team, running smoothly, getting things done, and cooperating with each other. We enjoy seeing this phenomenon unfold through both our IRL Team Building Events and our Virtual Team Building programs, and have had an overwhelmingly positive response from individuals and corporations who have lived these activities for themselves.
Would you like to offer your staff the opportunity to improve within their teams? Contact us to see how our corporate team building events can help them shine.
