Having fun doesn’t have to be expensive.

Here are a few ideas:

•  Have an office putting championship. Set up a small miniature golf course in your office on Friday each week and have a tournament.
• Play a game of “Big Team Pictionary” using flip charts and markers. Divide up into two large teams and play a game.
• When the weather warms up, pick one Friday afternoon each month and take the team to the golf course and play a scramble format tournament.
• Take the team to Indian Mary park and play disc golf.

I have lots more ideas that I’ve successfully used with many different kinds of teams including boards of directors, sales and marketing and finance teams — so I know they work. If you want me to help you plan a fun day with your team, give me a call.

Do you have some fun things that you do with your team that you’d like to share? If so, please send them to me and I’ll share them with this group.

I suggest have at least a 30 minute meeting with each person that reports to you at least every other week.  Generally, I would suggest dividing the time equally between tactical and strategic issues.  The first part of the discussion can be an update of key activities and issues while the second part of the discussion should be focused on how the employee is progressing on the longer term goals for the month, the quarter, or the year. EVERYONE should have long term goals — linked securely to the goals of the company — that they are focused on.  Some of these goals should also be focused on the development plan of the individual.  The meeting should always be open and unintimidating so you can get to the real issues that will ultimately affect effectiveness and achievement of goals. 

Regardless of what you talk about — setting aside a regular time to sit, uninterrupted, together with regular frequency is vitally important to morale and effectiveness.

Color Powers?

Fiery Red = Hard charging, goal oriented get it done energy.

Sunshine Yellow = Social, have fun with it energy (look closely, you can read it!)

Earth Green = Deep, caring, empathic energy

Cool Blue = Process, data, information oriented energy 

Try this:

Have each team member, independently, write down all the things they LOVE, or WOULD LOVE to do at work.  Also, have each team member write down all of the things they DO NOT LIKE DOING.   

Next, have each team member identify with one of the colors on above. 

Finally, have a team meeting and have everyone share their lists.  Have a facilitator write down each persons LOVE TO DO, WOULD LOVE TO DO  and DO NOT LIKE DOING items.  As a team, consider how you might move tasks around to fully take advantage of the Color Power of your team!! 

Simply sharing this information will put you miles ahead and will make your office a happier place.  Doing something about it will make things even better!

Managers, Business Owners and other Team Leaders often hold on to the fun tasks — even though the business would be better off if they let them go.  Why would the business be better off?

• Team members who actually are supposed to be performing this task will feel empowered and engaged — instead of like they are constantly have the rug pulled out from under them.
• The job may be done more efficiently — freeing the business owner up to lead, develop and direct the business.
• Your business will appear more legitimate and professional to customers when tasks are consistently and appropriately positioned within your team.

If you are holding on to the “Fun Stuff” examine your tasks and consider truly delegating at least some of these tasks to your team members who could do a great job and make the overall team more effective.  Team members will appreciate your sacrifice and you’ll immediately experience higher levels of performance and satisfaction.

Do you feel compelled to have rules and policies that govern every aspect of how your business runs?  Do you have guidelines in place that anticipate every contingency and guard against team members taking advantage of your company? 

Nothing kills teamwork faster that a big thick book of rules that seem cold and restrictive — and have no real clear reason for existence other than attempting to control behavior. 

We are ALL different — and have different ways of working and finding the path to solutions and results.  Certainly there are areas where you need policies, rules and procedures — but wherever and whenever possible question the aim and the result of these rules WITH YOUR TEAM MEMBERS.  

Allowing all members of your team to have a hand in setting the necessary policies will increase the feeling of connectedness and buyin of your team — and will dramatically increase whatever results you are looking for.

Keep the rulebook thin. 

Focus on results. 

Allow, respect and learn from the many different ways of approaching the job at hand.

Many business owners, leaders and managers see their role as applying their expertise to fixing things that are broken, getting projects back on track or generally putting out fires.  It feels really good to be able to clearly see where your team is going wrong and be their magnificent hero in fixing it up.  In fact, it’s SUCH a good feeling that many business owners, deeply believing only they possess the most true and complete knowledge, get adrenaline rush after adrenaline rush by coming in and saving the day. 

This is not the way to get your adrenaline fix.   Bungee jump, take a raft trip or ride your bike really fast down a hill — but don’t get in the pattern of continually jumping in to pull your team members out of the fire. 

If this is happening in your business, you need to get to the core reason — and you can do it pretty easily by calling your team together and exploring the reasons why this is happening.  It will boil down to: 

1) Bad processes that need to be explored, understood and fixed

2) A need for training

3) Fear — of the owner in letting too much information out.  Fear — of the team member in going out on a limb

4) A need for empowerment — team members need to be left alone to learn from their mistakes and to be able to have the freedom to complete the task in their own way 

There may still be EXTREME times when you need to jump in — but they should be rare — and you should always set them up to be supportive, learning experiences.  Debrief the experience and extract the learnings.  Use this as an opportunity to examine business processes and adjust them as needed. 

Whatever path you take — do it openly and in a spirit of continuous improvement using the full power of each and every team member.

Need help?  Want to discuss teambuilding options to move your team to higher levels of engagement, empowerment and success? 

I have lots more ideas that I’ve successfully used with many different kinds of teams including boards of directors, sales and marketing and finance teams — so I know they work. If you want me to help you plan a fun day with your team, give me a call.

Do you have some fun things that you do with your team that you’d like to share? If so, please send them to me and I’ll share them with this group.

Your team isn’t saying mean things to each other — but there aren’t alot of positives floating around either.  There’s tension in the air — probably because you and your team are burned out from working too hard, for too long — and there doesn’t appear to be light, or a rest area, at the end of the tunnel.  You haven’t done anything fun, or really laughed for……..ever it seems.  Also, you feel the emotion “between the lines” of the tasks and communications happening with your team.  There is a “heaviness” in the air — and you’re not quite sure what to do about it. 

Sound familiar?  Well, if it does, it may be time to CLEAR THE DECKS!! 

Regardless of how effective you feel you are at getting the tasks of running your business done, you need scheduled, planned times to disconnect from the hectic day to day of your business to step back, evaluate, breathe and look at the big picture.  When you do this, you have the opportunity to CLEAR THE DECKS of different points of view, hurt feelings and issues that have been swept under the rug in order to get the urgent things completed.  

Here are a ideas for how to do it: 

1) Once a month, take your team out to lunch — have broad discussions as to how they feel and what’s going on.

2) Once a quarter, take a day and do something fun with your team.  Disc golf, river rafting, golfing, family fun center — whatever — do something fun.  I suggest having a short session in the beginning of the day where you reconnect the team with the vision of your business — and get input on the strategic direction and the issues you are facing — then, spend at least 2/3 of the day cutting loose and having fun.

3) Make sure you are having regular 1:1s — and that you are leaving some of that time open for team members to share their thoughts and feelings about the way things are going. 

Of course — to be truly effective at CLEARING THE DECKS — you need to do it regularly and in a completely open environment — where all thoughts can be freely shared, discussed and processed. 

Good luck!!

Want help scheduling a CLEAR THE DECKS session?  Contact me!

Your team attends a workshop and you all get engaged and excited by the material and activities.  Ideas are flying around — flip chart paper is being written on and getting taped on the wall — you all definitely have ideas you can see being applied to your business.  You even make preliminary plans to implement some of these changes when you get back to the office.

You get back to the office and you talk about the experience some, but, as the experience fades into the past and the day to day needs once again dominate your attention,  you gradually lose the vision and go back to your old ways of doing things.  It’s discouraging. 

And then… as you reflect on the experience every once in awhile you come to the conclusion that, regardless of how good it feels to attend a workshop or event, it really ultimately doesn’t change anything — so it’s a waste of time and money. 

World class athletes aren’t made in a day.  You don’t learn how to play an instrument and make beautiful music by attending a one day workshop.  Making changes in how you do things as a team in your business follows the same principles. 

To make change — you need to SUPPORT CHANGE.   Here are a few ideas: 

• Before you organize or attend an event ask yourselves — what are we trying to accomplish?  What is the core reason we are doing this?  To simply get away, disengage and have fun? (A GREAT goal, by the way) ; To address a key issue we are dealing with?
• At the event, decide how you are going to collect and summarize the information
• When you return, set up a meeting to debrief the event — extract any key learnings and decide what you are going to do to implement changes.  Don’t force yourself to come up with things to implement here.  It may very well be that you learned nothing implementable — have the courage to admit that and learn from it.
• For each change you decide to implement — DECIDE HOW YOU ARE GOING TO HOLD YOUR TEAM ACCOUNTABLE.  This is one of the basic rules of goal setting — you can set aside a chunk of time in your weekly meetings to update progress.  
• Treat the change implementation as you would any project — set timelines and follow them.
• Change is usually not easy — but if you get in the habit of holding yourself accountable to the goals of the effort, you’ll develop a wonderful way to keep your team and your business fresh.

I have lots more ideas that I’ve successfully used with many different kinds of teams including boards of directors, sales and marketing and finance teams — so I know they work. If you want me to help you plan a fun day with your team, give me a call.

Do you have some fun things that you do with your team that you’d like to share? If so, please send them to me and I’ll share them with this group.

What the heck do YOU do all day?  Do you have the feeling that no one else truly understands what you do?  You’re probably right.  Have you ever wondered what other folks on your team do all day?  Does it seem like they just should be able to get the work done — but for some strange reason they can’t?

While it may be true that we can ALL improve our productivity, chances are we simply don’t comprehend fully what our teammates do.  A wonderful way to pull together as a team is to “walk a mile in each others’ shoes”

So, with the realities of running a business on a day to day basis — how do you do that?   

Here are a few ideas:

• If you can — spend a day, or an hour, or 15 minutes with a co-worker understanding what they do by being their assistant, or shadow.  This works well if relationships are already strong and folks don’t feel threatened AND you can create the time. 
• Switch jobs for a week.   This works well for folks who do the same thing, but with a different team or set of customers. 
• Have a teambuilding day where each team member runs through their job, task by task, and presents the details of how they do what they do.  I also encourage folks to share what they feel to be their strong points on how they do their job and where they have challenges — then, if you have created an open and non-threatening environment. 

There are wonderful benefits to walking a mile in the shoes of your teammates — you truly will develop a new level of empathy and understanding, which will bring you closer together — and more productive. 

You will see powerful ways to become more productive and efficient.  And — you’ll have a blast!! 

I have lots more ideas that I’ve successfully used with many different kinds of teams including boards of directors, sales and marketing and finance teams — so I know they work. If you want me to help you plan a fun day with your team, give me a call.

Do you have some fun things that you do with your team that you’d like to share? If so, please send them to me and I’ll share them with this group.