Team-building | Meaning and Definition

Team building is an umbrella term referring to various activities involved in building, developing, and strengthening social relationships within a group or team. Generally, these tasks take engagement on the part of employees and respect and rely on each other to accomplish a certain goal. Team building activities are different from team training activities which intend to enhance the efficiency and productivity of the team’s work.

Team building comes down to a few important elements such as work relationships, goal coordination, trust, problem-solving, etc. For effective group development, coordinating and unification of goals is tremendously significant within the organizations. Immense research has been done on the subject of team building and group working, in general. Famous theories associated with group development and team building are Tuckman’s theories, Benne and Sheats group roles, Belbin’s team roles, Bonchek and Steele’s thinking styles, etc.

Advantages of team building

The benefits of working in a group or as a team are many and have been averred by various studies. Some of the benefits of team building are:

•   Enhanced and effective communication
•   Higher productivity
•   Increased morale
•   Improved motivation
•   A better reflection of leadership qualities
•   Creativity stimulation
•   Enhanced mental health
•   Prevalence of respect in the workspace
•   Prevalence of trust among employees

This is not an exhaustive list of the perks of team building. Some activities considered for team building are company outings, trivia, truth-lie games, blind drawing, campfire stories, code of conduct, fox hunt, etc. These activities are a remarkable way of influencing and enhancing social relationships in the workplace. This directly impacts the company’s employee turnover rate.