Team Building: When Reality (TV) Hits Reality TV. Almost everyone denies watching it but the networks don’t keep airing programmes that aren’t making money. If you’ve ever thought it might be fun to be a contestant on Survivor, The Apprentice, the Amazing Race, or one of the myriad of reality TV cooking shows, it’s
Team building that isn’t customized for your business is likely to end up being just another entertaining corporate event. There is a place for corporate events but social activities are never a replacement for reall team building. Companies can improve the impact of team building with relevant, customized projects.
What a week! First the debt ceiling crisis kept the world at the edge of its seat. Then, financial woes in Europe and concerns about the Euro and the Yen. Now stock markets around the globe are spiraling downward. In the midst of this, I uncovered more incidents of wasteful spending on playtime for executives and employees by companies with declining performance. Have some executives learned nothing from the events of the past 3 years? No amount of playtime, golf, jamming in a rock band, or other placebos can substitute for good old fashioned brainstorming to tap into the collective wisdom of your team.
What a week! First the debt ceiling crisis kept the world at the edge of its seat. Then, financial woes in Europe and concerns about the Euro and the Yen. Now stock markets around the globe are spiraling downward. In the midst of this, I uncovered more incidents of wasteful spending on playtime for executives and employees by companies with declining performance. Have some executives learned nothing from the events of the past 3 years? No amount of playtime, golf, jamming in a rock band, or other placebos can substitute for good old fashioned brainstorming to tap into the collective wisdom of your team.
It’s happened before and it seems to be happening with increasing frequency. It’s the focus on instant results. “Hurry sickness” is a disease that is now plaguing corporations all over the globe. It is not surprising that this has been showing up in team building sessions in North America for well over a decade and it’s not getting any better. It’s spreading. Companies are pushing and burning out employees and expecting them to produce results in ridiculously short timeframes. When team members try to set realistic boundaries, they are branded “inflexible”. As a result, companies are losing some of their best people and experiencing alarming short-term disability costs due to the number of people on stress leave. It is not surprising that this is showing up in the approach to team building. Why spend a fortune on team building and allocate a timeframe in which it is virtually impossible to achieve results? Why pay top dollar for an expert team building consultant, fly them half way across the world and ignore their advice? I hope that every CEO reading this who expects “instant results” from their people will seriously re-think their orientation.
Is decision-making a dying art and a disappearing leadership competency? I believe that it is. It shows up in many ways. Scenario: A Canadian company sends out a bid for a major equipment acquisition. The process drags on for months. Eventually, they decide to stick with what they have. Why do companies seem to have so much difficulty making decisions these days? Why do some CEOs put their teams and suppliers through weeks of work that is then scrapped? Is decision-making a dying leadership competency? Is so why and what can be done about it? What is behind some of the poor judgement that is showing up in executive suites? Perspectives from CEOs, suppliers and consultants would be greatly appreciated.
In the spirit of Xmas, here are three gifts I’d like to pass onto you. I have received so much value from each of these three resources during the year, I feel compelled to share them with you too (the first two are free): Seth Godin’s Blog – Seth is a brilliant thinker. I receive
Check out the great article in Bloomberg Business Week this week on employee engagement. It delves into the issue of employee engagement, examining what it is, how managers need to approach the issue, and the definition of it. As Dov Seidman writes, “Employee engagement is a condition—manifested by the inspiration an employee unleashes in his or her work when he or she is deeply connected to a mission, purpose, and the values that connect us.”
Do you have best practices for how you keep your employees engaged? How do you teach your managers to approach this workplace issue? And, why are so many workers disengaged?
The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 15,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 6 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.
Executives believe in the possibilities of high-potential performers. Sixty-four percent of global leaders said they currently have or plan to implement high-potential talent management programs in 2010, according to the Pulse on Leaders survey from PDI Ninth House.
Respondents were leaders from 100 global organizations based in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific.