Team Building

Development in Teambuilding is a Sharper Development Solutions, Inc. training course created to address the needs of teams who’ve been around for a while and teams who are newly formed. It is a compilation of highly interactive exercises and activities that capture the successes of experienced teams’ best practices. The topics incorporate the difficulties associated with the development and growth of teams and the failures and frustrations teams face. Meaningful dialogue inspired by interplay of individuals will lead to the development of creative solutions.

The program is designed to provide skill enhancement in the following areas:

1. Advanced team building skills
2. Managing change within teams
3. Resolving conflict between teams and individuals within teams
4. Effective communications among team members

Development in Teambuilding can be customized for delivery in two specific skill areas: teambuilding and diversity training. Components of the program can be provided as a one-day, four-hour program or expanded two, three and/or four-part multi-day programs. Below is a description of each topic and skill area.

Advanced Team Building Skills

Duration: 2 hours
(Can be expanded to a 4-hr half day program)

This session will cover competition among team members within the same team, competition among teams within the same organization, collaboration versus cooperation among team members, building trust between teams, commitment to the goals and responsibilities of the team, dependability and consistency in the deliverables expected by internal and external customers, accountability from individuals within the teams, defining team values, energizing teams for greater productivity, individualism within teams, and strengthening connections between team members.

Several individual, small group and large group exercises will be conducted to stimulate discussion and solutions around the following:

• Diagnosing and defining problems that hinder productivity and camaraderie in the team, and producing clear paths toward resolution of those problems;
• Assessing current opinions in order to correctly identify problems in team processes;\
• Help team members to identify obstacles to building trust within a team;
• Implementing a win-win concept that demonstrates to win does not require that someone else has to lose;
• Creating a recipe for team success

Managing Change Within Teams

Duration: 2 hours

This session dissects the need and acceptance of change within teams. It addresses the topic of adaptability within a team environment, learning flexibility, avoiding personal rigidity, redefining roles within teams, redefining the team’s purpose, integrating new members into the team, and promoting the evolution of the team for the betterment of the organization as a whole.

Group exercises will challenge individuals within teams to do the following:

• Think in a different way
• Choose the best path to desired change
• Eliminate the impediments that hinder change
• Focus team learning on being “generative” rather than “adaptive”

Resolving Conflict Between Teams and Individuals Within Teams

Duration 2 hours
(Can be expanded to 4-hr half day program)

This session tackles the impediments that drive wedges between teams and individuals and cause deterrents in team accomplishments. Misperceptions, stereotypical attitudes, negative behaviors, and different personality types all contribute to a breakdown in communication in a work, family or social environment. This topic explores ways to overcome conflicts that have festered for long periods, newly introduced problems, and issues that seem to be ongoing because no realistic resolution has been espoused.

Individual and group exercises will persuade participants to reconsider how:

• Different perceptions lead to breakdowns in communication
• Team members play the “blame game”
• Negative “norms” in the workplace influence negative team behavior
• Positive “norms” in the workplace inspire a general attitude of hope and achievement
• To develop a creative plan that will enforce a new behavior while avoiding backsliding into old, nonproductive habits

Effective Communications Among Team Members

Duration: 2 hours
(Can be expanded to 4-hr and 6-hr multi-day classes)

Open communication fosters trust. Listening is as critical to building relationships as speaking. This session provides a wealth of ways to engage the team in analyses of the process of discussion and dialogue, communicating shared goals to overcome obstacles, making incorrect assumptions and interpretations when not in face-to-face contact, the dangers of non-verbal cues and verbal comments that are not in sync, ambiguous words that lead to misunderstanding, communicating better in writing, and effective word usage.

Group exercises will enlighten team members in the way they communicate with each other by:

• Helping participants to understand the other person’s emotion without necessarily having to feel the same way
• Sensitizing team members to the skill of active listening and practicing it
• Communicating with clarity to avoid misunderstanding
• Teaching techniques that help individuals to stay calm under pressure of confrontation
• Practicing delivering critical feedback

Program Design

Any four of the sessions can be presented as a stand alone training course. They can all be delivered within a two-hour time frame. All except “Managing Change Within Teams” can be expanded to four-hour sessions. “Effective Communications Among Team Members” can be expanded to as many as six hours because of the wealth of exercises and activities available around the topic of communications.

We recommend that all classes not exceed four hours in a given day. Any two topics may be combined for a four-hour half day class. All four topics can be delivered as multi-day sessions delivered over two or three days. We recommend that multi-day programs are conducted within a three-week time frame to maintain the learning momentum and produce the necessary changes for implementation within the work group or department.