Four Ways to Create Connection within your team:
Trust is a foundation for successful teams. In order to trust each other, people need to know each other within a team. Today's blog post includes four quick activities you can use to create connection within your team. You may want to bring one of these into an upcoming team meeting, or use at an annual retreat session.
1. On a rotational basis have each team member provide a short (and informal) presentation about their work/role, priorities and what connections they see between their work and others on the team. This might only take 10-15 minutes of the meeting, and can be invaluable in helping each team member get to know each other, as well as understand the myriad of priorities which exist on the team.
2. Use a visual deck and have each team member select a photo of what their vision is for either their work or the team. Use the same question for each team member. Enabling people to choose from photos often makes the sharing feel less risky than leaving the question hanging wide open. CoachingToys.com has a variety of decks to choose from. I've also spotlighted the Conversation Sparker Deck we have created which includes both photos and questions team leaders can select from.
3. Ask each team member to share one thing about their past experience that they are really proud of. We know that allowing people to lead from strengths boosts productivity and also positivity within a team. Another way to phrase this question is "What is one strength you bring to the team?" See past Teams365 posts on strengths here.
4. Have people create a logo which represents what they uniquely bring to the team. I call this the personal logo activity and expand on it in my book Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010).
This month bring consider bringing in one of these activities to your regular meetings. What's the impact for team members - in the short term? Longer-term?
Trust is a foundation for successful teams. In order to trust each other, people need to know each other within a team. Today's blog post includes four quick activities you can use to create connection within your team. You may want to bring one of these into an upcoming team meeting, or use at an annual retreat session.
1. On a rotational basis have each team member provide a short (and informal) presentation about their work/role, priorities and what connections they see between their work and others on the team. This might only take 10-15 minutes of the meeting, and can be invaluable in helping each team member get to know each other, as well as understand the myriad of priorities which exist on the team.
2. Use a visual deck and have each team member select a photo of what their vision is for either their work or the team. Use the same question for each team member. Enabling people to choose from photos often makes the sharing feel less risky than leaving the question hanging wide open. CoachingToys.com has a variety of decks to choose from. I've also spotlighted the Conversation Sparker Deck we have created which includes both photos and questions team leaders can select from.
3. Ask each team member to share one thing about their past experience that they are really proud of. We know that allowing people to lead from strengths boosts productivity and also positivity within a team. Another way to phrase this question is "What is one strength you bring to the team?" See past Teams365 posts on strengths here.
4. Have people create a logo which represents what they uniquely bring to the team. I call this the personal logo activity and expand on it in my book Effective Group Coaching (Wiley, 2010).
This month bring consider bringing in one of these activities to your regular meetings. What's the impact for team members - in the short term? Longer-term?
Have a great week,
Jennifer
Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized
Authorized Partner of the Everything DiSC and Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team
Leadership | Teamwork | Retreats | Coaching Skills Training
(416)996-8326
Starting Soon - Teams365 Coaching Groups - new groups starting in August and September
Jennifer
Jennifer Britton
Potentials Realized
Authorized Partner of the Everything DiSC and Five Behaviors of a Cohesive Team
Leadership | Teamwork | Retreats | Coaching Skills Training
(416)996-8326
Starting Soon - Teams365 Coaching Groups - new groups starting in August and September
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