My mentor told me, that as far as his experience is concerned, the two most crucial things in a business are maintaining relationship with your team members and the BIR. I’m confident with the latter since we are paying the right taxes. But as I begin to see, the former is indeed difficult.
To make an asset employee stay in an organization takes more than just salary. To easily terminate is not also easy unless you are willing to pay the employee’s dues as mandated by law. Hence, it is very important for any organization to be cognizant of how to take care of employees and make itself profitable by building the right team.
To build an effective team, an organization must first create the experience of team work. Team work is the result of a shared culture and pride of belonging to a particular group. When an employee feels that she is part of something larger than herself and her contributions are valued, she then works with others to make her share of accomplishing the organization’s goals and objectives.
Experts on team building share valuable specific insights on how to build an effective team. If your team building efforts are not living up to your expectations, perhaps any of these areas may have been neglected:
Leaders’ leadership style – Any team depends largely on its leader. Hence, leadership style and techniques are very crucial. Are they as effective as you think? Are they accepted by the team? For example, I thought that my leadership style is already okay. But in our team building activity with Bohol Child Head Start, my members told me that I am bossy and demanding and it affects how they work. I had good intentions but my team perceived it differently and it affects team effort.
Setting Clear Expectations–Leaders of teams must clearly communicate expected outcomes and should continually support efforts to achieve these objectives in terms of money and resources. Hence, during our activity, I strived to let them see where we were going as a team and what we hope to achieve. And they supplied the values and strategies on how we should get there.
Knowing team members – I already heard that most shepherds know their sheep by name. But I never believed it until I met one from Tibet. And like any team, the leader needs to know each member’s background and potential so she is able to effectively position the employee where she can make best a contribution.
Commitment – There is no commitment without involvement. When a team member understands and feels that the team mission is important, she exerts effort to share to the fulfilment of the mission. Coupled with recognition of this effort, this makes the team member deeply involved and committed to the team’s shared goals.
Creative Innovation – An important area where team efforts are fostered is the amount of freedom that team members are allowed to create and innovate. When they have enough leeway to modify the status quo, teams become more stimulated and engaged. This will pose for a challenge which will enable them to be creative and grow.
We all belong to a team, may it be in an organization, communities, or families. Hence, for all of us, we are both team members and leaders. Therefore, we share the responsibility of understanding what makes a team work and how to build it stronger.
P.S. Team building is both a science and an art. If you wish to improve your teams, do team building activities. We can assist you on that. Just call or text 416-1248 or email me at kitbalane@boholchild.com. (By Kit Nemenzo Balane)