Teambuilding australia

http://youtu.be/gAPiSz5GS3Q

Teambuilding australia

http://youtu.be/gAPiSz5GS3Q

Corporate Training is not just Team Building.

Many think that a corporate training program will actual create a team, or build a team to be greater. Well, this not necessary the case. Training should be delivered to address a purpose and to attempt to 'kill two birds with one stone' can cause confusion, lower the quality of the program and miss the mark - its a risk to try to conquer too much in a training agenda.

Corporate Training really focuses on the business needs and courses to address specifics, the theory  aspect of the topic, yet sometimes miss the practical implication and illustration of the outcome, teaching  groups about computer skills or products, service technics etc. Team Building is more general, an experience allows the team to see the benefit of working together, and how much better a group work when aligned as a team.

But is Team Building Corporate Training? well its not actual 'sold' as an actual skill or course, many still perceive the wording as fuzzy, or a fun 2 hour session at a conference. Allocating the spend per head still not obvious in ROI accounts - yet to spend $$$ on a Word training program is essential! Where the team could be enhanced, is send a few people on the Word Training program and allow the to cross-skill upon their return to the team - now thats a free team-building activity and a great ROI.

We know how and what is needed to create a great group to work as a unit stronger - its whether a business sees the difference and understands the priority in their needs.

Teambuilding Australia prides itself on being up front on their delivery, offering a ROI and outcome focused proposal.

Team Issues

The Elephant in the Living Room There is a popular analogy today that refers to "the elephant in the living room". This phrase is an amusing way to talk about a very serious matter, un-discussable team issues. What makes an issue un-discussable is anyone's guess. It could be that the unmentioned issue will create embarrassment for someone, might surface unwanted conflict, or is simply a topic that team members don't know how to broach. Much like an elephant in the living room, the unmentionable issue gets harder to ignore over time. The longer it goes unattended, the messier and larger it gets. It eventually interferes with team functioning like an elephant in one's living room would hinder a normal lifestyle. Although the issue is never directly confronted, it takes team energy and focus away from the job, and preoccupies the team with a disruptive distraction. As you might suspect, to move the elephant out of the team living room you must deal with it. The first step in doing so is to acknowledge that it exists. This means that someone on the team must be brave enough to bring up the issue and accept the consequences involved with shedding light on the subject. The person who does so should be ready to hear others deny that the issue is real, and that it has relevance to team functioning. Despite these protests, the party who sees the issue must be able to provide tangible evidence that the undisclosed topic is indeed pertinent to team success. It is necessary to remember that un-discussable issues remain so because they pose a threat to something or someone that the team values. Be as discreet, kind, factual, and non-judgmental as possible when surfacing the issue and you will increase the likelihood that the topic will be addressed rather than swiftly swept under the carpet again.

New Teambuilding Program

Graffiti Skool Teambuilding

Creativity in a can!

Looking for that visual edge, or another way to creatively express your values in the form of a tag or your logo, then enrol in Graffiti Skool.

Graffiti is regarded as a form of expressive visual art, the name for images or lettering scratched, scrawled, painted or marked in any manner. We allow your team to develop their own graffiti using many methods of creativity.
With expert tuition, teams get to explore the creative side of Graffiti street art.
Following an introduction, teams are given equipment to design their work. Safety equipment is provided and with guidance from an expert, teams learn and create their very own graffiti art piece.

5-500 pax - any time, location, anywhere....

Basic Team Working's

Basic Team Working

What is a team anyway?

-A team is a small number of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose, performance goals, and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable

-Small Number

-Complementary Skills

-Common Purpose & Performance Goals

-Common Approach

-Mutual Accountability

Ten common teaming problems

-Floundering

-Overbearing participants

-Dominating participants

-Reluctant participants

-Unquestioned acceptance of opinions as facts

-Rush to accomplishment

-Attribution

-Discounts and "plops"

-Wanderlust: digression and tangents

-Feuding members

Five issues to be considered in team building

1. Interdependence

This is the issue of how each member's outcomes are determined, at least in part, by the actions of the other members. The structure of the team task should be such that it requires cooperative interdependence. Functioning independently of other team members, or competing with them should lead to sub optimal outcomes for the entire team. Tasks that require the successful performance of sub tasks by all team members are called divisible, conjunctive tasks.

2. Goal Specification

It is very important for team members to have common goals for team achievement, as well as to communicate clearly about individual goals they may have. The process of clarifying goals may well engage all of the issues on this list. Indeed, shared goals is one of the definitional properties of the concept "team." A simple, but useful, team building task is to assign a newly formed team the task of producing a mission and goals statement.

3. Cohesiveness. 
This term refers to the attractiveness of team membership. Teams are cohesive to the extent that membership in them is positively valued; members are drawn toward the team. In task oriented teams the concept can be differentiated into two sub concepts, social cohesiveness and task cohesiveness. Social cohesiveness refers to the bonds of interpersonal attraction that link team members. Although a high level of social cohesiveness may make team life more pleasant, it is not highly related to team performance. Nevertheless, the patterns of interpersonal attraction within a team are a very prominent concern. Team building exercises that have a component of fun or play are useful in allowing attraction bonds to develop. Task cohesiveness refers to the way in which skills and abilities of the team members mesh to allow effective performance.

4. Roles and Norms
All teams develop a set of roles and norms over time. In task oriented teams, it is essential that the role structure enables the team to cope effectively with the requirements of the task. When the task is divisible and conjunctive, as are most of the important team tasks in our society, the assignment of roles to members who can perform them effectively is essential. Active consideration of the role structure can be an important part of a team building exercise. Task roles may be rotated so that all team members experience, and learn from, all roles. Even then, it is important that the norm governing the assignment of roles is understood and accepted by team members.

Norms are the rules governing the behavior of team members, and include the rewards for behaving in accord with normative requirements, as well as the sanctions for norm violations. Norms will develop in a team, whether or not they are actively discussed. 

5. Communication
Effective interpersonal communication is vital to the smooth functioning of any task team. There are many ways of facilitating the learning of effective communication skills. Active listening exercises, practice in giving and receiving feedback, practice in checking for comprehension of verbal messages, are all aimed at developing skills. It is also important for a team to develop an effective communication network; who communicates to whom; is there anybody "out of the loop?" Norms will develop governing communication. Do those norms encourage everyone to participate, or do they allow one or two dominant members to claim all the "air time?"

(From Scholtes, Peter R., The Team Handbook, Joiner Associates (1988))

Which Teambuilding company?

7 Questions to ask when selecting
 a TeamBuilding company!



Buyer Beware! Many team building companies are simply recreation suppliers who know how to play games, but don't understand business.

Possibly the best way to evaluate a team building company is to ask their advice on helping you solve an actual problem your team is facing. You might be surprised how many team building companies know how to play games, and they may even know how to debrief those games, but they don't really know team dynamics in the business world. The vast majority of team building practitioners do NOT come from a business background. They come from a recreational background. Therefore, they probably do not understand your business. By asking them to consult with you for 10 - 15 minutes on an actual team building problem you will see who can deliver the goods and who can't.

Q. Can you give me some advice on a specific problem I am having with my team?

It seems that "team building" is quickly becoming a buzz word for all kinds of service providers: from clowns to sailors to wine tasting companies. Effective team building must be delivered by a company with training expertise. Too often, companies which call what they do "team building" are simply wanting to take your money and play games with your people.

The quickest way to determine if a team building company can actually help you build your teams is to ask what training assessment instruments they are certified in. At the very least they should be certified in D.i.S.C. work profile assessment and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. This question will quickly remove the fun n' games outfits from the serious team building providers.

Q. How do you help participants make connections from the activities to business applications?

There is a particular skill set involved in leading and facilitating an excellent team building program. The first skill is design and the second is delivery. Frankly, design is the easy part. Almost any team building activity can work for almost any team building issue. It is true that some activities lend themselves to particular outcomes (i.e. communication, trust, problem solving, decision making, cooperation vs. competition, etc.) but in the hands of a skilled, professional facilitator the activity will get debriefed according to the real world issue the team is facing.

The hard part in any team building program is delivery (facilitating). It is surprising how many team building companies simply don't facilitate (or debrief) the activities. They ask a few questions at the end of the game and move into the next game. Again, DON'T waste your money on companies like these. Instead, ask the company to walk you through their philosophy on how they debrief activities. Ask them to give you a sample of the questions they ask. Good team building companies will have a developed philosophy on how they debrief. Their strategy will make good sense once they share it with you, so don't hesitate to ask.

Q. What training assessments are you certified in?

If your people are reluctant to go to a team building program it is probably because they have been subjected to these fun n' games activities with little or no business applications. The MOST important transaction that can happen during a team building event is for your people to solve real world business problems. That is ultimately what your company is paying for and that is what your company should get.

Ask the team building companies you are interviewing how they help participants make connections from the team building activities to business problems. Good team building companies will be able to give you lots and lots of extremely relevant examples. Drill down and ask for specifics on how the team building events they use have specifically helped past clients. If they can't give you specifics, backed up with several examples, then they simply don't know how to link the activity to real world business applications.

Q. What is your philosophy on how you debrief activities?
Q. Can you give me a list of sample questions you use?

Of course the really good team building companies have a long track record of success. Many companies post client lists on their web sites. If a company does not have a client list, make sure and ask for one. This will tell you if they are just starting out (and using your company as a learning experience for them) or if they are a serious, established provider.

Q. How long have you been in business?
Q. Who are your past clients?

By asking these seven questions you will save your company a lot of money and your people a lot of frustration. Team building, when done right, is one of the most powerful ways to achieve significant breakthroughs in employee productivity. And hey, it is really, really fun too.

Call us and ask us these questions 1300 226110

www.teambuildingaustralia.com.au

Free Teambuilding Activities

teambuilding exercises:Egg Drop

Supplies: Roll of making tape, box of straws, and raw egg for each Team. Virtual money account with supply price list-listed on a chalk or dry erase board. Time: 30-45 minutes

You need to find a location where an egg can be dropped two or three floors down. Instructions: Each team is given a virtual of $5,000 allocation to buy supplies. It costs $250 per straw and $100 for every inch of masking tape. Instruct the teams to build a basket/container in which they put the egg and then drop it the two to three floors without breaking the egg. Encourage the teams to plan out their strategy before they start to buy products. All teams must stay within their budget. When the teams have completed their baskets test them out. Let them drop. Have your cleaning supplies ready!

teambuilding exercises:Scavenger Hunt

Instructions: Pick out 20 to 30 different items or information resources within the company, organization, or on campus. It is good idea to alert the other departments or individuals in your organization that this scavenger hunts will take place. Give each team a specified time to find the items on the list. The debriefing of this activity creates a bonding and the team members can learn a lot about the organization in fast time. This works great with new teams and new employees.

teambuilding exercises :Earthquake Drill

Supplies: 10-12 different size rocks and blindfolds Creating a rock formation into a unique design. Explain to the team that there has been an earthquake. Instructions: Send half of the team out of the room. Ask the team remaining in the room to study the rock formation for one or two minutes. When the time is up ask the team back into the room. Have them close their eyes. Give them a blindfold and explain to them there has been an explosion. They are blind. Explain to the team that stayed in the room, that they must now get verbal instructions from the blind team members. Using their verbal skills they must get the team to reconstruct the rock formation in order to "Save the World." This is a great communication exercise.

teambuilding exercises :Greenlighting

This activity is to look for different options and promote creativity.

Instructions: Identify a problem you would like to tackle or correct. Appoint a scribe for the group to gather all the ideas. Have the group form a circle. Tell the group that no one is allowed to make a negative comment. Like brainstorming, every idea is okay. Each member then gives his or her ideas on how to solve the problem. Only greenlighting, positive ideas are spoken. Go around the circle until all ideas have been shared. This is great idea to solve problems.