Chapter 17: Team Building & Training

1. Chapter 17:Team Building & Training Dr. Patricia McDiarmid

2. Team Building • Term used to describe approaches to improving the operation of teams

3. Team Building That Actually Builds Teams • The most important step when planning a team-building exercise comes at the very beginning: you must start by identifying what challenges your team faces. • Only then can you choose exercises that will be effective in helping them work through these issues.

4. Basic Teamwork Skills • Assertiveness • Decision-making • Problem-solving • Cooperation • Collaboration

5. Issues to Be Addressed When Building Teams • What keeps teams from being effective? • What changes could improve a team’s effectiveness? • What is the team doing effectively now that it wants to continue doing?

6. Main Priority When Building a Team • Developing a strong sense of belonging to the team BECAUSE unless team members identify with each other and view themselves as a team, it will be impossible to organize them to reach a common goal.

7. Set of Approaches*** • Goal setting • Interpersonal relations skills • Role clarification • Problem solving ***Selecting the RIGHT approach to use depends on a diagnosis of a team’s problems

8. Organizational Context of Team Building • Sometimes organizations trying to implement teamwork fail to appreciate how current practices and culturemight limit the ability of the teams to operate.

9. EXAMPLE • It is difficult to promote cooperation among team members when the organization only rewards individual performances…therefore…the context in which the team operates has a greater impact on performance than the internal competencies of team members

10. Evaluation & Reward Systems • Central organizational issue for a team • Performance evaluation systems have the potential to provide a team with feedback that can be used to improve a team’s performance • Reward systems provide motivation for the team members to work together

11. Top Management Mistakes • Fail to include teamwork in goals and reward systems • Focus only on financial issues • Ignore the value teamwork can have as a means of improving performacne

12. WHY Not Support Teambuilding? • Limited by expertise in teambuilding • Lack of availability of competent persons to orchestrate team-building programs • Do not value the process of teambuilding or provide rewards for teams that engage in the process • Team members are skeptical of the value of teambuilding and are reluctant to spend time doing it

13. Let’s Take a Look at Types of Team Building Programs…

14. Goal Setting • Clarifies team goals • Develops specific objectives • Define team tasks • Establish action plans • Develop evaluation & feedback system to monitor the attainment of stated goals

15. Role Clarification • Clarifies individual roles of team members • Shared responsibility of team members • Team members must be clear on personal role and the roles of others on a team • Team members need to see themselves from the outside through the eyes of an observer or other team members

16. Interpersonal Process Skills • Team members learn to cooperate efforts and work together • Decision-making, problem-solving, and negotiation are some of the process skills team members learn and master • Process skills are best learned through activities such as a desert survival exercise

17. Cohesion Building • Foster team spirit and build interpersonal connections among team members • Increase trust and cooperation AND develops a groups’ identity • Strengthens team morale, creates unity, a sense of belonging, and pride in the team

18. Problem Solving • Team starts analyzing a problem together • Diagnostic session clarifies problems and identifies team’s strengths and weaknesses • Diagnosis stage ends with discussion as how to proceed • Action plan developed to generate alternatives and develop solutions

19. Criteria for Effective Teams • Clear/measureable goals • Roles/assignments accepted by all team members • Climate of trust, psychological safety, and support • Effective problem-solving & decision-making • Supportive leadership • Constructive handling of conflict • Open & participatory communication climate • Supportive organizational culture • Ability to monitor performance & make needed changes

20. Symptoms of Ineffective Teams • Decrease in team performance • Increase of team member complaints • Unproductive conflicts among members • Confusion about assignments & roles • Misunderstood decisions • Lack of involvement from team members • Lack of initiative, creativity, or effective problem-solving • Ineffective meetings with low participation • High dependency of the leader

21. Team Building Activity