If you’ve ever tuned in to a podcast for entrepreneurs, you understand exactly what he’s talking about. It is no secret that work environments nowadays are characterized by high levels of competition and incredibly streamlined business processes and workflows. Subsequently, it has raised the overall benchmark of recruitment, resulting in modern-day organizations being populated by talent that are as skilled as they are flexible. So, when it comes to abilities and skillsets, there isn’t really much to tell them apart.
American business magnate, industrialist, and founder of the world-renowned Ford Motor Company, Henry Ford, once said, “Coming together is a beginning; keeping together is progress; working together is success.”
What is drawing the line between these companies then? Team collaboration and articulate communication. A team full of bright minds will never be able to achieve their highest potential unless they learn to coordinate and sync their operations with one another. For a company to achieve its long-term targets, it is crucial that all of its employees must work together as one coherent unit. Moreover, the onus also lies on team leaders to ensure that the interests of the collective are prioritized over the self, and conflicts resolved amicably.
It comes as no surprise, thus, that companies these days are putting a lot of focus on organizing workshops and activities that promote team building and collaboration. In the segments below, we talk at length about a set of highly effective team building workshop ideas that you can try implementing at your workplace at the earliest. Read on to find out more about them!
Are You Paying Attention?
This is an interesting activity that educates as well as tests your employees on their active listening skills. It is recommended by many Podcast for Entrepreneurs out there as well. Form teams of 5 or 7 to start the game. Once the teams are formed, seat them all at different tables. Now, select one member at random from each team. They’ll be the designated speakers for this task.
Ask them to prepare a speech of about 7-10 minutes on an extremely tedious topic. The script doesn’t have to be original, the participants can refer to Wikipedia or any other online resources for composing their speeches. However, the speech needs to be punctuated with a few random and completely irrelevant lines every now and then. Speakers must be careful with the frequency of this random material so as not to make their presence absolutely obvious.
Once the speakers are done preparing their speeches, ask them to deliver them to their teammates. At the end of the speech, quiz the team members to check if they found anything inconsistent with the speech or whether they could detect the presence of any irrelevant content. You’ll be surprised by the number of people that are caught off guard in this activity. Conducting this activity every now and then goes a long way towards improving the active listening of your team members.
Sorting Timelines Podcast for Entrepreneurs
This task is an excellent method for testing how familiar teammates are with one another. And it is extremely simple to conduct as well. Gather all the different teams operating in your company in one place.
Put about a meter’s distance between each team just for the sake of distinction. Once the teams are assembled, give them a parameter, suppose height, and ask them to sort themselves accordingly. They are free to sort themselves in either ascending or descending order.
Repeat the exercise with different parameters such as the number of countries they have visited, number of children or pets they have, number of years they have spent at the company, and the like. Not only does this task give you a chance to assess the sorting skills of your employees, but also helps you understand how familiar they are with each other in the first place. Conducting this activity once every few months will help improve the communication skills of your employees by a great deal.
Pair Up
This task is ideal for improving team bonding. Assemble your employees and ask everyone to pair up with another individual of their own choosing. Once the pairs have been formed, ask them to sit on the floor with their backs to each other.
Following this, ask them to reach behind their backs to grab hold of each other’s arms. On the count of three, ask them to get up on their feet, while maintaining their grip on one another. If you wish to make this task more interesting, then you may pair individuals hailing from two completely unrelated and non-overlapping departments.
Make A Perfect Square
This is a great activity for improving team collaboration. You need to have ropes that are at least 5 meters long in order to conduct this game. Start by dividing your employees into teams of 6 or 8.
Tie the ends of the ropes together and hand them over to the teams. Now, ask every team to stand in a circle while holding the rope. Make sure that every member of every team has a grip on the rope. Once the circle is formed, ask them to place the loop on the floor.
Next, ask every participant to blindfold themselves and take 5 steps back from the rope. While still blindfolded, ask the teams to work together to change the shape of the rope from a circle into a square. In the process, you get to assess both the communication as well as coordination skills of the different teams at play.
Tune In To A Spotify Podcast
Aspiring to become an entrepreneur has always been challenging, and it is especially more challenging today because every industry is super competitive more than ever. At this time, irrespective of the field you specialize in, aspiring entrepreneurs need all the help they can get. Podcasts have proven to be quite effective in this arena lately. They help guide aspiring professionals and provide entrepreneur advice for beginners.
This is precisely where Podcast for Entrepreneurs like Masters of Scale, StartUp, The Ambition Show, etc. come into the picture. These are the best Podcast for Entrepreneurs today. So go ahead and check them out on Spotify today!
