Planning Successful Team Building Events
Interview with Pat Whelan, of Team Dynamix
“It’s easy to get good players. Getting them to play together, that’s the hard part.”
– Casey Stengel
While the recession brought severe cutbacks in the events and meeting planning industry, some meeting planners and vendors have found creative solutions and managed to keep their doors open for business.
The biggest challenge was finding ways to sell an event to reluctant buyers, and then to plan a successful event, given limited budgets and the need to deliverable a valuable and memorable event.
We asked Pat Whelan of Team Dynamix to talk about his team building business, because Team Dynamix has seen steady and strong growth in the past two years, despite the recession.
Q: Despite the economic downturn and cutbacks on meetings and events, your business is growing steadily. How do you explain that?
Pat Whelan:
Well, during a recession and with large layoffs, employers have an even bigger job of keeping up their team spirit for the employees still on the job. The budgets are tighter, and employers want the event to provide value and measurable results. So, the types of events employers are asking for are changing.
Q: What has changed in your industry in the past five or ten years?
Pat Whelan:
I’ve been involved in team building for the past fourteen years. In past years, participants would be excited about attending a teambuilding event. It was new. Some people still view teamwork building as waste of time, a corny throwback to the 1990’s. You might remember the days when a charismatic positive thinker led people on a walk through fire, or hug fests with complete strangers.
Team building events were being thrust on people by well meaning employers. Yet, often the event did not really address the issues a team was facing. So change didn’t really occur after the event. People became jaded and less interested in attending these events.
The biggest change recently is that because of the economy and layoffs, people are looking for ways to give back to their communities. People want meaning at the end of the day, and they want to feel good about how they spent their time.
Today’s events have to provide more of a purpose, so that people come away from the event not feeling like they wasted their time.
Q: You mentioned earlier that buyers expect a team event to provide value, purpose, and measurable results. What kinds of events deliver that promise?
Pat Whelan:
First of all, effective team building events requires activity, creativity, flexibility, experienced planning and, most of all – fun. A team event or program can be done achieved in as little as one hour – a successful team building event does not require an eight-hour day or full weekend.
Most organizations looking for a team building program want to improve and develop their team trust, communication, accountability, creativity, morale, and culture.
Certainly, the event must be meaningful, cost-effective, and deliver measurable results. One way to achieve these goals is to design the program around a community service focus.
In the past few years, events that adapted team building activities that gave back to community organizations have been very popular. We organize community service projects for companies, where the events are philanthropic and based on needs of the client.
These kinds of events unite people towards a common goal. Everyone leaves these events feeling great about themselves, the program and their company.
Q: What types of team building events are popular? Can you give some examples?
Pat Whelan:
We’ve done a lot of programs with a community service focus. Teams may build bicycles, make blankets, stuff and decorate animals and camp packs, create artwork, and build storage equipment to donate to local schools and groups that serve children. We’ve run “Build Your Own Golf Course” events, where participants build mini golf courses using canned food goods as the obstacles, with all the food donated to local food banks after the event.
Specific examples of programs include:
Lexus Nexus – Camp We Care
Lexus Nexus gave their employees a full day “Lexus Cares” Day – everyone in the company participates in a volunteer event. A lot of projects were created where people could choose an event that fit for them. Team Dynamix set up some of the events, the company setting up others.
Helping Local Schools
Recently we worked with a group of 300 people for a large company who spent a few hours refurbishing a school with painting, gardens, library, and food bank.
Carnival for Caring
We’re planning a two hour carnival event in South Florida to benefit Haitian children. 400 employees will run the carnival. Some will build teddy bears and others will make blankets to give to kids. As the event leaders, we coordinate the teams, sign up the clowns, get the costumes, games, props, and food vendors. Two to three hundred local kids from orphanages and group homes will come and have fun at the carnival where they’ll experience game booths, bounce houses, slides, food booths, face painters, and clowns.
Fun team games
These programs are about playful competition. Events are designed to bring out the kid inside. Working in teams in fun competitive events, co-workers strengthen relationships and appreciation for each other.
For example, in one memorable event, we had a group of twelve managers get together, after their sales meeting, to build boats out of PVC pipe, float noodles, blue tarp, and duct tape. In the interest of fun, they raced them in the swimming pool.
Popular “cooking” contests involve the teams competing to make the best chili, salsa, sangria, or cake.
Other programs use situations we face at work in games to improve communication, trust, and problem solving.
Q: Thousands of vendors offer specialist team building so, how does a meeting planner find the best hire the best team building event company? What if they have had a bad experience in the past planning a team building event?
Pat Whelan:
It’s really important to hire a reputable team building company. We all know that when if the vendor fails to deliver a successful event, the meeting planner fails to meet their client’s expectations.
Here’s a checklist meeting planners can use when evaluating whether to hire a particular vendor for a team building event:
1) ___ Current: Can they provide an event that deals with today’s teamwork issues?
2) ___ Customized: Will they tailor a group event to address specific issues the team is facing?
3) ___ Flexible: Can the event facilitator adjust the event if timelines are shortened or lengthened, or if some of the activites are not well-received by participants?
4) ___ Diverse: Do their events suit all ages, genders, ethnicities, and abilities?
5) ___ Unique: How unique are their programs? Are they delivering programs that were popular 10 and 20 years ago, or can they deliver a new approach that your client may not have experienced in a past event?
6) ___ Fun: Are the events fun? This is often the most overlook part in planning a team building event.
7) ___ Purposeful: Will the event have a specific focus such as getting to know each other, improving communication, rewarding service, and relieving stress?
8) ___ Tasteful: Is the faciliatator experienced and well thought of?
9) ___ Widely Focused: Will the event accomplish multiple goals with one event, and provide a variety of activities that appeal to several types of participants? This gives great value, and everyone feels refreshed by the exercise.
10) ___ Event Staff: Does the vendor hire their temporary event staff via an ad on “Craig’s List,” – or do they hire from a reputable staffing firm?
11) ___ Hidden Costs: Are there any overtime costs, costs for microphones, travel costs, material costs? Ideally, all of these items would be all inclusive in the cost of the program.
12) ___ Reliable: Does the team building company have excellent references and a proven track record? Can you rely on them to show up and deliver a great event?
Q: Do you have any other advice for meeting planners on successful team building events?
Pat Whelan:
Sure. Before designing a program, we consider several key factors. Meeting planners need to know their audience, most importantly. They must also make sure any vendor they hire to deliver and event also understands these factors:
1) Audience: An event planned for a sales team would be different than one planned for an administrative, or management team. Consider the activity level and abilities of the participants.
2) Core values: What is the company’s core values? (Make sure the event is aligned with those values.)
3) Team Issues: What problems had the organization / or team had with past events?
4) Time: How much time is scheduled for the event? A good team building activity can be delivered in less than 2 hours.
5) Goals/Results: What are the goals of the company? What results are they expecting from the event? Programs should be designed to match those goals.
Note: Pat Whelan, of Team Dynamix, designs and delivers team building events for clients across North America. For more about Pat, visit TeamDynamix.net