If you’ve ever worked at a cubicle job you know the feeling of isolation even when you’re on a team. The reality is positive team engagement is critical to a successful execution of your company’s objectives. Therefore, it is incumbent upon leaders and team members to build an environment where team members have faith in each other’s ability and feel invested in the team’s success.
These eight techniques that will be discussed shortly help build a positive and productive team environment. Think about pulling a rope – if it’s just you pulling that rope, it’s awfully heavy. However, if it’s many hands pulling the rope, the load is considerably lighter and it takes less time to actually pull the rope. These techniques are all about fostering the right attitude for success – a positive attitude where everyone is focused on the same goal and believes in each team member.
Here are the eight techniques:
This seems paradoxical, but nothing feels isolating like walls. Set up your office so that team members can see each other. Offices with glass walls and doors provide privacy but allow transparency. Instead of feeling like you’re on an island, you’re team will feel when they have something they need help on the person on the other side of the glass can help. Of course, not all settings are office settings, but when there’s the ability to see the team members as much as possible, this builds that feeling of investing in each other and positive feelings.
Keep Meetings Short and Objective: Let’s face it – most people don’t like meetings and these meetings turn into whining sessions. Then people leave meetings feeling worse than when they started and dread the next meeting. The way to fix this is keep meetings to a set time – for example 20 minutes. Make the topics known – for example, sales goals for the upcoming month. People will feel energized and ready to go because they won’t have a chance to bring in complaints and instead will know what they need to do.
Team Events: These events don’t need to be big formalities – something small like a weekly lunch where the supervisor buys goes a long way towards building camaraderie.
Do Each Other’s Job: One way team members can gain appreciation for what everyone does is to work in each other’s role for a small time. This helps build appreciation for team members as well as build the overall team’s skill set – this comes in handy when someone is sick or gets promoted.
Professional Development: Have your team go to workshops together. Being out of the office and in an environment focusing on building skills allows team members to build their interpersonal relationships and feel more invested in each other and the company objectives.
Mentoring: Having team members mentor others is critical to getting new team members up to speed and feel as though the team invests in them. Plus, it sets a standard that supporting each other is the expectation for the team.
Empowerment: Make sure that your team is empowered and doesn’t have to check with supervisors on nearly every function. This feeling of being able to handle their responsibilities improves attitude and morale for the whole team. However, don’t empower them too much because that could lead to encroachment upon the responsibilities of other team members.
Recognizing Success: When a team meets goals, it is imperative to celebrate that success. Make sure the celebrations are varied so that the praise doesn’t become rote. The team appreciates being recognized for working hard, and this reinforces that behavior.
Keeping your team positively engaged is critical for the success of a company. The positive engagement promotes positive attitudes, and if nothing else your workplace will experience those doldrums far less than others, which means you’re far more productive
