Jun
06
1 out of 3 employees expect to leave their jobs by the end of the year. Even though your employees might not be actively searching, 76% of them are ready to switch jobs should the occasion arise. That’s bad news. But there is good news as well: employees are loyal to their team.
The cost of non-engaged, unhappy employees is significant. Think thousands of dollars in lost productivity and lower sales. If a key employee leaves, replacement is expensive as well. Estimates start with 6 months of salary and can easily double that for highly qualified people.
So, investing in employee loyalty should pay off, right? Well, only if you do it in a smart way. The dynamics between company and employee are largely defined by the company. Employees can only count on their job as long as they are useful. Companies nowadays aren’t very loyal to employees, so it’s hard to expect loyalty to be reciprocated. The effects of financial benefits on employee loyalty are very limited and easy to copy by your competitors. But there is one thing employees feel really connected and loyal to: their team and their manager.
Empowering managers and their teams is the way to go for companies that understand that engaging employees is a key driver in success. Provide managers the tools to build great teams, including reward programs that makes sense for that team and resources that allow for team building outings and activities. Cost will go down, revenue up, and employees won’t feel the need to look for greener pastures.
Apr
16
Teams are only as good as the people in them allow them to be. Each team works differently and it is important to the health of the team that it works together and each person has an opportunity to do what that person does best. You can set up team building activities to ensure that the team is working as efficiently as possible. Here are 5 steps to make sure you get the most out of your team building activity:
1. Set clear expectations: Invite the team to the team building activity and make sure they understand the end goal of the team building. Is it to learn to think outside the box, get to know each other better, or improving communication between team members.
2. Relevant information: When planning a team building event, choose one that will lead the team to the end goal laid out in the clear expectations. Consider supporting a charity with your team building.
3. Make everyone succeed. Everyone has different strengths and opportunities for development. In the team building activity, allow people to stretch their comfort zone, but make sure everyone has a chance to succeed. (Who would want to leave a team building event feeling less motivated?)
4. Plan the event for a time that the team is most relaxed professionally. Friday afternoons with no looming deadlines tend to work well, but make sure every member of the team is considered with timing. Don’t plan an afternoon event that is scheduled to end after hours if you have people on your team who depend on leaving at a certain time.
5. Get out of the office. Thinking how to work differently or get to know each other works best when you are outside the normal routine as much as possible. WishWish has a ton of great ideas to do something fun – pick something fun that supports your mission and go do it together.
Share other ideas for successful team building in the comments.
Mar
12
WishWish is all about happiness. We site research all the time that shows how doing fun things improves business, team work, family relationships, and generally makes people happier. Something else that makes people happy is doing something for others. The best part is that you can do them both at the same time!
Have you ever considered tying together doing something fun and volunteerism in the office? Consider helping a nonprofit whose mission matches the mission of the company (for example, a group of nurses could do something fun to raise money for breast cancer research, or a construction company could volunteer for Habitat for Humanity.)
Benefits would include:
- Building teamwork and camaraderie among the team
- Doing something fun together
- Helping the community as a whole
Have you ever done something for a nonprofit as a group at work? What did you think about it?
Mar
06
Intuitively, I say absolutely not – but I was intrigued enough to read this article siting the top 5 reasons why most team-building events are a waste of time.
Sometimes people get so much into the fun of the team-building activity that they forget the point of it. Many people love competitions, but the idea of team building is to work together, not against each other. The key to a successful team building activity is for it to meet your overall goals.
Have you had any great (or horrible) team-building activities to share with us?
Nov
01
Every business faces a variety of challenges. Many companies hire experts to come and talk to teams to help people think “outside the box” to develop solutions and to build a stronger relationship among the members of the team. But what happens next? After leaving a good seminar or training session, you may have walked away with ideas on how to solve hypothetical problems. But do you remember those techniques the next time you have a challenge?
I propose that you don’t need to take an entire day to solve pretend problems. Solve real problems at a weekly meeting instead.
Schedule your meeting outside or in a location that is not traditionally used for work. This will help get people out of their normal mind set and (hopefully) allow the creativity to flow a bit more.
Here is a problem solving game you can use with an actual problem you are having.
Point of View
- Write your problem in as few words as possible on a large piece of paper and place it in the middle of the table/room.
- Give everyone a stack of Post-it notes and a pen.
- Have everyone restate the problem in their own words or from their own point of view on a Post-it and stick it to the larger paper.
- Using different language to state the problem can help think about it in a different way.
- Each person should take someone else’s Post-it note and be assigned a different point of view (for example, the first person takes one Post-it and is assigned to solve the problem from a public relations point of view, or management, or sales, etc.)
- When you are solving from that point of view, do not think consider other points of view when solving the problem. Consider only how the problem is worded in the Post-it that you have, not how it was worded originally or how you worded the problem.
- Give a minimum of two solutions, maximum of three. If you have more ideas, choose your favorite three.
- Once everyone has given their solutions, they should be stuck to the larger paper.
- Continue this two or three times.
The leader (be it a project lead or manager) should take all solutions (without regard of which point of view was used) and read them allowed. Once all have been read, spend 15 minutes as a group adding to information or ideas.
The leader then has several new ideas for possible solutions. Be sure to follow up with the group to let people know which solution is being used and thank them all for input.
Potential results:
- There will likely be several possible solutions to the problem to try, thinking from several points of view
- The team will remember the experience of solving the problem in a positive manner.
- Employees may be more willing to “think outside the box” for a solution.
- If the employees feel as though they are part of the solution, they may feel more committed to the company’s success.
This is just one problem solving idea. What are some of the ideas you have seen? Do you ever use the team building activities in your work life to help find solutions?
