Why So Many Team Building Strategies Fail
So much emphasis has been given to team building that sometimes we lose sight of the fact that some people simply can’t learn to get along. It’s one thing to focus on getting your team to put personality conflicts aside, but another thing to get them to work well together. This is one of the unfortunate aspects of being human and why so many team leaders or employers fail at team building strategies. It’s time to realize that you many never get team members to get along well but you can help them to get beyond all that in order to work well together.
Is it Time to Redefine Your Team Building Strategies?
Perhaps it’s time to redefine your team building strategies and objectives. Knowing that you may have productive team members who will probably never get along, why not help them find ways to peacefully coexist in the workplace? Sometimes this means getting the team away, if only for an evening, to someplace fun yet enlightening. Many companies in the Indiana book an evening at the escape room Indianapolis where there is always a mystery to solve and it takes input from all players. It’s entertaining, but one way to get everyone thinking about something other than being competitive.
A Little Competition Is Actually a Good Thing
A great number of team building efforts fail because the expectations are set too high. Again, you may not get all people to work together well but that doesn’t mean they can’t be productive members of the team. Sometimes it’s a matter of being overly competitive and that could be a problem, but it’s easier to help them tone it down than it is to get them to entirely change their personality.
Besides, a little competition is actually a good thing because it keeps most people on their toes. However, when that competitive spirit prevents the team from accomplishing their goals, something has to give and usually that something is one or more people who won’t work towards the common good because of their inability to get along. That’s a personality type you don’t need on a team.
Is There Another Position Those Hard-to-Live-With Employees Could Hold?
There are times when you have a highly skilled and motivated employee who, unfortunately, simply isn’t a team player. Some people really do work better by themselves if left to their own devices. Instead of losing all that talent just because they don’t fit the team, isn’t there some other position they could hold so that the company doesn’t suffer because of their inability to work in a team?
The point here is that so many team building strategies fail because you are expecting all people to actually work well together. Sometimes this isn’t a possibility but it doesn’t mean that a person isn’t a valuable employee. It simply means that they are in the wrong place for their specific set of talents and their innate personality characteristics. If you expect your team building strategies to work miracles overnight, you are setting yourself up for failure. Keep that in mind and you will find that the team building strategies you devise going forward will be so much more effective.
