How Effective Are Your Team-Building Activities?

Many of us have taken part in team-building activities, such as trust falls, hiking, go-karting or building various different structures out of toothpicks and string.

I think I have participated in nearly all team-building activities over the course of my career.

However, whilst these activities have been fun, how many of them have actually created teams, and team spirit which has stood the test of time, or has unravelled once the going got tough?

If you want to build strong teams, then you need to use the right glue, and the strongest glue we have is Trust, and Trust is created by emotional bonds.

These are the bonds which can bind us for a lifetime and can see us through the toughest of challenges.

But to make emotional bonds we need to be able to be vulnerable with one another, to be able to show weaknesses or our softer side, and this is something which takes an enormous amount of trust.

I have just attended a training where people within the group had to share their life stories, and also who were their key influences.

As you can imagine, many of these stories included people who had passed, and many of the people become emotional during their presentation, and they showed a great deal of vulnerability, as they remembered loved ones.

The atmosphere in the room was incredible, you could really feel the emotion in the air, as person after person told their story, some in tears but all told with a great deal of passion and feeling.

At the end of each presentation, the presenter received a big hug, and the warmth of the reception let them know that they were safe and that we were honoured to share their story.

The bonds that were created in that room will last a very long time, I know that I can trust each and every one of them and that they can trust me.

We showed that trust to one another, and created those bonds, as we shared our private personal stories and showed our venerability.

Trust is the glue that binds us together, the bonds that create that glue are emotional bonds, and we need to show our vulnerability to be able to do that.

So next time you are planning a team-building event. rather than going Go-Karting, or Raft building, think about sharing some of your more personal stories, show vulnerability, show emotion and I can assure you the bonds will be much stronger.

If you want to learn more about creating highly engaged teams or being a better leader click the link to make an appointment to talk about how I can help.