10 Worst Team Building Exercises

Stop others from thinking these foolish activities are team building! They are NOT.

Horrible Team So-Called Exercises

A colleague sent me this post – 10 Horrifying Team Building Exercises by Alison Green. 

It will take you 1 minute to read it.  You will be amazed at how incredibly useless these activities are for effective team building. They are indeed the worst team-building exercises ever!

You will read about

• outdoor exercises that terrorize teammates,
• a boss who deprived teammates of going to the bathroom,
• a leader’s mystical meditation seeking the temple of the dolphin and
• spitting, yes, that is right, spitting!

Right-Minded team building facilitators know these are not legitimate or real-world team-building exercises.

Top Complaint

A top complaint about team-building exercises like these is they have no bearing on how people spend their time the other 364 days of the year.

So, ask yourself whether the activity really relates to the work people are there to do.

A little better team activities

Some well-meaning people believe happy hours, bowling, or similar activities serve as “team building.”

These are nice social events, and they can certainly encourage camaraderie. But please, do not call them team building. They, too, are not.

Hit or miss team building

In “experiential play” scenarios, teammates typically go to an outdoor playground-type facility. Together, they experience either low-element games (played on the ground) or high-element exercises (constructed on poles).

In these settings, the teacher is accountable for providing a successful experience.

Ideally, participants gain new understandings from their time together that will benefit them and the team. In reality, though, while some team members may enjoy the experience, many do not.

Other team activities such as games, can be fun. But just like outdoor play activities like the Egg Drop game are not true team building, and their results are limited.

Can be helpful – team building

Educational and training events can be helpful for teams. In this team-building approach, teammates attend some kind of lecture.

For example, an instructor might teach guidelines for resolving work process problems using the Six-Sigma method. Or they might teach one of the personality type style indicators, like DiSC.

Once again, the instructor is responsible for creating a successful training experience.

The hope is that participants will use the guidelines they have learned to build better teamwork. Sometimes this works, and sometimes it does not.

Best of the best: Real-World Team Building

Instead of yet another so-called group bonding activity, teammates attend a customized, real-world Right-Minded team-building workshop, This workshop, using 12 necessary steps, is designed specifically to meet their real-world needs.

Above all, the 12 steps are, by far, one of the most successful characteristics of effective team building.

In this workshop, team members discuss and resolve their real teamwork challenges. All exercises and discussions result in practical Work AgreementsA Work Agreement is a collective teammate promise to transform non-productive, adversarial behavior into collaborative teamwork behavior..

These Agreements outline how teammates will collaboratively work together to achieve their team’s business goals while respecting shared psychological values.

With Right-Minded Teamwork, teammates and the workshop facilitator are jointly held accountable for a successful team-building experience.

Afterward, instead of merely hoping teammates will use their new knowledge on the job, teammates make firm, collective commitments to follow their new Work Agreements to improve their teamwork.

Real progress is made together. That is Right-Minded Teamwork.

So, what are legitimate team building and exercises?

First, Right-Minded Teamwork is a legitimate and real-world team-building process based on a proven 5 Elements continuous-improvement method. Check it out.

Secondly, the Right-Minded Teamwork’s 12 Steps process for designing a real-world team workshop will show you how to design the best exercises for your team’s needs.

These processes are, for sure, legitimate team-building approaches because it addresses real-world issues in a safe and accountable way.

And please let me know if I can help you change the minds of those misguided, wrong-minded (but hopefully well-intentioned) people.

To your success, Dan Hogan