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Focusing the Creative Collaboration Process

Written by on January 29, 2009 · Leave a Comment

Creative Collaboration for Team Performance

Creative Collaboration is a process through which a team can generate highly innovative ideas with excellent buy-in from the members of the creative team.

The Process of Team Creativity is as follows:

  1. Focus – Focus the team on the task/problem/process, etc…  Take the time to be sure the team is clear on the objectives.
  2. Generate Ideas – Brainstorm ideas, categorize them, and define a system for prioritizing their importance
  3. Decide – Based on the team’s priorities, select the ‘best.’ ideas and how to implement them.
  4. Act – Define the action steps necessary to implement the ideas, and follow through with acting on them.
  5. Follow-up and Renewal – Be sure to check in and measure the successes and failures of your action plan, and if necessary, go back to the first step and take a fresh start.

Of all of these steps,  STEP 1 – Focusing, is the key to success.  Without a clear definition of the objective you are trying to accomplish, everything else falls flat.  I was reminded of the validity of this fundamental need for clarity during a recent workshop I attended.

The topic of the workshop wash techniques for facilitating strategic planning retreats, led by a facilitator who provides high-end packages for some of the leading Fortune 100 companies in the US.  She was very knowledgeable, charismatic, and I am certain that she provides an excellent experience for her clients.

As she took us through a mock strategic planning session, I was reminded of the importance of focusing the creative collaboration process.  Our group (all professional facilitators and experts in our own right) was tasked with brainstorming ideas for dealing with the following situation:

“60 minutes before you are to meet your group, the meeting room is flooded with an inch of water.  You can not move to a different location and you have two clients in the group who are wheel chair-bound.  What do you do?”

Here is the process she took us through:

  • We spend 5 minutes brainstorming ideas for how to deal with this situation.
  • We write our ideas on large colorful post-it notes, coming up with at least 5 reasonable solutions.
  • Each team (there were 7 teams of 5) sends one member up to briefly explain their team’s solutions and put them up on the ‘sticky wall.’
  • Once we have assembled our 35 solutions, 2 volunteers group similar solutions under general topics, narrowing down the results into 7 categories.

Everything up to now is textbook creative processing, for strategic planning purposes or other team collaboration.  The next step, of course is to prioritize the categories, further narrowing down your results.  Unfortunately, this is what actually happened:

  • The facilitator asks us to ‘prioritize the categories in order of most realistic solutions.”
  • Individuals in the group discuss how to prioritize the categories, but are unable to agree on a definition for ‘most realistic solutions.’
  • With a lack of agreement on what they are trying to achieve, individuals and small groups begin to turn away from the process and bicker amongst themselves.
  • Although some individuals share their ideas about the definition of ‘prioritizing,’ no one is reporting the ideas, so they are quickly forgotten, and sometimes repeated.
  • The level of frustration in the group rises and the number of people who are ‘checking-out’ grows.
  • The facilitator, who has run out of time for this scenario (oops!) moves on to the next topic.

Wow!  What a great example of the need for being clear (focus) when undertaking the creative collaboration process.  If the team, and/or the facilitator had simply taken the time to clearly define the question, and write it down for everyone to see, the creative process could have moved forward.

Focusing the Creative Collaboration Process

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Making the Case for Team Building

Written by on January 24, 2009 · Leave a Comment
gmv mouse trap challenge250 Making the Case for Team Building

Mouse Trap Trust Exercise

Over the years I have had the good fortune of working with groups from a wide variety of fields and populations – from youth camps, schools and Scouts to NGO’s, small businesses and government agencies.  The individuals who contact me to secure a team building program usually have a general idea of team building and often have a general goal of getting to know each other, enhancing interpersonal communication and building trust between the members of the group.  They may have previously participated in an activity that was billed as a team building event, but they generally have mixed feelings about the efficacy of the actual team building component, as opposed to the obvious recreational aspect.  So, this begs the question:  What is team building and why should we do it?

From my perspective, a ‘team’ can be as simple as an assembly of individuals whose purpose is to work together on a project or towards a common goal.  In order to be an effective team, there needs to be a level of trust, good communication, and shared responsibility.  The team will generally face multiple conflicts such as challenges to leadership or lack of group commitment.  Overcoming these challenges allows the team to grow and evolve, and taking part in a well presented team building program gives teams an arena in which to make this evolution.

The tools and techniques used by team building providers are not as important as the facilitator’s ability to lead a team in identifying its strengths and opportunities for growth.  NEXTeams uses a combination of experience-based activities and traditional meeting-style techniques, but the true value of its facilitation comes through the conversations that organically emerge during the process.  These spontaneous and often passionate discussions are where the change in the group dynamics takes place.

Team building, if done well, can be the catalyst to change within an organization.  The only way that this change can be significant or lasting, however, is through effective and timely follow-up.  The follow-up process helps the team to take the lessons learned during the team building activities and build upon them during the day-to-day interactions within their organization.  Follow-up enables the transference of the gains made during the actual team building event.

See Our Team Building Program Options…

For More Information Contact Eriq Powers

Eriq Powers
GO-NEXTeams
(240) 603-4150
info@nexteams.com
www.nexteams.com

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The Trouble with Team Projects

Written by on January 21, 2009 · Leave a Comment

Team Cohesion Improves Team Performance

I used to dread “group-work” in high school. I’m sure you all know what I’m referring to – our teachers would force us to “team-up” with 3 other students to collaborate on a small group project. It was expected that this quartet of misfits would bond through shared experience, put their heads together, share the work-load equally, and come up with a product that was greater than the sum of the parts. In theory, this sounds like a fantastic team building experience – in reality, this process was doomed to failure.  Here’s what usually happened:

  • awkward silence, as the group stares blankly at people they rarely associate with, let alone work with.
  • everyone sits around and acts too cool to do the work, knowing that this group project is worth 30% of their final grade.
  • one of us takes a stab at the work, while the others sit around and scratch their heads.
  • being completely mismatched and given no instruction on how to work together effectively, the group begins to panic as the deadline approaches.
  • finally, in desperation, ‘the smart one’ in the group decides to just do the work on their own.
  • the rest of the group takes credit for the end result.

Ironically, I now work with small groups who are often put together with very little thought to how well they fit, and are expected to share the workload equally. Having the benefit of successfully implemented many teambuilding sessions, I now know what was missing back in high school.  Many teachers, while well-meaning with their intentions, simply lacked the pre-requisite knowledge of team dynamics to effectively implement a “group project.”

Here is what I have learned, and many of them were missing:

  • groups that are thrown together without some sort of formal team building exercise are generally less inclined to become a cohesive team.
  • students are usually in competition with one another for grades and class ranking (think of the “bell curve” of grading), and do not generally transition easily from competition to cooperation.  Thus, the group project is an anomoly in the classroom.
  • trusting the members of the group is one of the fundamentals of effective teamwork.  If you know you can count on others, you are more likely to risk your ideas, and listen to someone else.
  • trust is easier to gain initially than it is to regain once it has been broken.  It is, therefore, important for a leader (in this case, the teacher) to provide opportunities for that trust to be built.
  • even a simple name game or other “deinhibitizing” activity can get things rolling with team cohesion.

The similarities between group projects in high school and project management teams in an adult organizational work setting are sometimes uncanny.  A fair number of teams go through the same painful process of ineffective communication and poor performance, lacking the same pre-requisite skill set as their high school counterparts.

We’ll explore simple techniques for developing team cohesion and preparing for more effective team performance in our next blog entry.  Stay tuned!

The Trouble with Team Projects

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Teamwork vs Teamplay

Written by on January 12, 2009 · Leave a Comment

Planning for an Effective Team Building Event

When planning for a team building event, it is extremely important to know what your goals are.  Is the program meant to be a stand-alone team energizer, or does your group have serious goals and critical outcomes?  Is the goal teamwork or teamplay?

Yesterday I ran a short team building event for 90 members of a local sorority.  The event was part of their yearly kick-off, and the group had a great time with the activities.  The sisters had broad goals of ‘getting to know one another better,’ ‘working as a team,’ and ‘having fun.’  In addition, they had an extremely small budget ($10 per person), very little time (2 hours), and very limited space (one room – 25×43 feet).  And yet, when the program was over, many of the girls remarked that “it was one of the best events they had ever held,” and “so much fun!”

So how did they do it?  Planning, planning, planning!

The limitations placed on us in planning this event actually freed us to tailor an event that met their needs and would be useful for similar groups.  The outcome is the evolving Mini-Challenge – a self-led rotational team building program.  Here is how we did it:

Pre-planning:

  • Made sure the client knew this is ‘just for fun’ and would not be a facilitator-driven team development program.
  • Presented descriptions for a large number of participatory team activities that are less-intense (emotional safety), less-risky (physical safety) and easily adaptable for the particular group.  The client selected 2 or 3 activities that she thought would be a good fit for her participants.
  • Mapped out the space in which to place the equipment for each activity, and presented this to aid the client in setting up the room.
  • Typed up and edited an instruction booklet that provided detailed instructions for how to play each activity
  • Provided the necessary equipment for each activity, plus additional activities in the event that a group moved quickly through the events.
  • Had the client assign small teams, each with their own ‘team leader.’
  • Got buy-in from the ‘team leaders’ in order to have them run the activities for their small teams.

On the day of the event:

  • Provided one facilitator to setup, train the team leaders and disassemble the equipment.
  • Setup the room, according to the map that was created for the team leaders.
  • Trained the team leaders, allowing them to briefly participate in order to gain a complete understanding of each activity.
  • Read through the instruction booklets and answered any questions or clarified any details.
  • The facilitator kicked-off the event with a warm-up exercise and a quick description of the program.
  • Made sure that everything was running smoothly, shot video and pictures for the clients, and ended the event with a final large group challenge.
  • Broke down equipment and cleared the room.

Voila!  The group had an excellent time, lots of fun, lots of leadership, and renewed enthusiasm for their sorority and its members.

For groups whose goal is simply to have fun in a participatory team event, a self-led rotational teambuilding program gives you a huge return on your investment.

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Team Building Event Planning 101

Written by on January 11, 2009 · Leave a Comment

Planning a Team Building Event

The staff at NEXTeams has been running quality team building and adventure instruction programs since 1998.  Over the years, we have had the privilege of working with all types of groups, under many different circumstances (we recently ran a Team Re-Energizer for 110 participants in a room that was only large enough for 75 people to stand in a circle – WOW!), and after over a thousand programs, we have learned a thing or two about TEAMS!

Many of the clients who contact us are uncertain of the goals of their teambuilder.  Some clients have been assigned the task of booking the yearly off-site, and “thought we’d do some team building.”  Others have a vague recollection of participating in a ROPES Challenge Course in school, and, while they “aren’t sure if everyone would participate…” the boss wanted them to improve their teamwork.

Things to consider when preparing to book a team building event.

  • What is the major goal?  Fun off-site or challenging and goal-driven teamwork enhancer.
  • How many participants and will they be required to participate?
  • What is your budget?  Is there any flexibility?
  • Where are you planning to hold the event?  Office, school, park, hotel, conference center?
  • What time of year will your event take place?  Do you require an inclement weather alternative?
  • Will the teambuilder be a stand-alone event, or part of a larger team development initiative?
  • What do you see as the benefit of taking part in a team building event as opposed to some other experiential activity (paintball, laser tag, a sports bar, etc…)
  • And more…

The bottom line is, there are lots of reasons to participate in a team building program, and knowing your group’s goals will help you differentiate between the myriad of activities that fall under the search term:  team building.

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