Harvard Business Review, January-February 2012
Q: Why write about happiness when so much of the global economy is still in a funk and people are manifestly unhappy across the world?
A: Because emerging research from neuroscience, psychology, and economics makes the link between a thriving workforce and better business performance absolutely clear.
3 Facts:
- Countries are measuring happiness.
- Nobel prizes are being won by people studying happiness.
- No studies (yet) show that afraid, nervous employees are more productive overall or creative in problem solving or idea generation.
When your people:
- are challenged
- know they’re safe to bring their own ideas and fail
- can speak freely
You have a thriving organization because people at all levels will openly communicate so you know what’s really going on. When trust is high people will bring their best work, and your organization (and you) can keep growing because it won’t all fall on the lap of the founder. Will people trip and fall? Of course, but that’s happening regardless. With more effective teams you’ll all learn and ultimately make fewer mistakes. Growth is impossible without failures and errors…
What is a Team-Building Event?
A team-building event is a facilitated conversation by a neutral party that encourages all team members to examine critical success factors for the team. The primary overall result we focus on is the development of leadership skills and strategic planning.
What’s the Objective?
The objective is to improve the team’s decision-making ability, and problem-solving skills; to clearly define objectives and goals; and be more collectively effective, efficient and productive by learning how team members think and work.
How?
By having real conversations about how the team is doing, how they might do better, what the personal and group needs are; and by surfacing assumptions. This builds trust, confidence, energy and creativity; it strengthens team effectiveness, and nurtures the development of effective leadership qualities and good communication that’s honest – resulting in business growth.
Who Benefits?
Everyone! (individuals, teams, vendors, and clients) It has a ripple effect…
Some areas you can focus on…
- Clear communication of individual and group expectations for performance improvement.
- Establish and implement consistent feedback mechanisms for greater support and expansion.
- Learn to improve communication skills for more effective communication across all levels of the organization.
- Openly assess existing processes, and whether implementation is effective.
- Improve morale and leadership skills.
- Reduce stress, assumptions, and errors.
- Clarify ways to celebrate success, and nurture creative thought.
- Identify and address team strengths and weaknesses (and develop an appropriate leadership training program in response).
For a discovery call with Clarity Unlimited, click here for a consultation at no cost or obligation to you.
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Here are more details if you’d like them…
Critical Questions you might want to address:
- How does work get assigned?
- How do we ensure the flow of information to key people and departments?
- What are we good at? Where do we need to improve?
- What are some obstacles affecting the team?
- How do we take greater ownership on the team?
- What resources are being under-utilized? What unidentified resources are needed for our success?
The Process
Before the Event:
-The team clarifies their vision and definition of success through individual and/or group interviews.
-Each team member completes a self-assessment diagnostic, which helps to identify what is working and what isn’t.
During the Event:
-The team gets together for the team building session, sharpens its focus and through facilitated conversation strategically looks at what it needs to do to take the team to the next level of efficiency and effectiveness.
After the Event:
-The team collaboratively holds each other accountable moving forwards. Future team building events can be scheduled incrementally to sustain success.
EDUCATIONAL TRAININGS we offer:
- Communication
- Conflict Resolution/Difficult Conversations
- Executive Coaching/Management
- Leadership Skill Development
What makes us different?
- Global experience of 38 countries from San Francisco to Kigali, Rwanda; Honolulu to New Delhi, India.
- Corporations including Ernst and Young; international businesses including The Bar Method; humanitarian organizations including The Millenium Village Project.
- We have a perspective and ability to listen, hear and apply that is rare and vital to your organization. We don’t bring our agenda – we hear yours and help you maximize it.
A handful of clients we’ve worked with:
- The Bar Method
- California Pacific Medical Center
- Ketron Financial
- Ernst and Young
- Millenium Village Project (out of Columbia University)
- Queens’ Medical Center
- Childwatch India
- Room to Read
4 Stages of Team Growth
Tuckman’s Model of Team Development states that teams go through 4 stages of growth: Forming, Storming, Norming and Performing. When there is new leadership, new policies, staff or job description changes – teams can find themselves back in Forming and Storming. All teams organically move through these 4 stages as they grow and change; the health of the team correlates to how smooth the transitions are. A team’s understanding of where they fall in the continuum can be pivotal to becoming a high performing team, and therefore organization.
For a discovery call with Clarity Unlimited, click here for a consultation at no cost or obligation to you.