Written by Stefano Maida
Enjoying time at work!
The real value of the Team meetings or Community Meetings
Almost everybody pass a lot of time at work, someone on its own, some others employed.
Almost everybody drop in some routine work, and almost ever, it all causes a drop down of creativity or even worst of motivation. That’s the life! … Or not?
What to do to avoid such a dropping down performances?
Of course there are many ways to go along, such as offering better work conditions, taking care of coworkers needs, promote job rotations, planning some breaking weeks, etc…
One of the more valuable ways to empower the team spirit, it is just to have a breaking week within the team itself!
Is it curious? Maybe yes, but definitely true!
Planning a good Team meeting allows to bring coworkers “out of the box” for a while; it’s a good opportunity to unleash their creativity and meanwhile continue to work for the common goals!
A week out of office… wow! What does it means? Blank the noisy surroundings out, forget the boring daily tasks, and put anxiety behind. What kind of valuable opportunity is it?
Well, leaving the problems behind for a while, is absolutely the best possible situation to recharge energy and restore the Team “in the mood”… here comes the will to learn, to share, to create.. here comes the real “Togetherness”.
So why not thinking to plan a good Team meeting now?
And what about a good Team meeting organization?
Well, the Team meeting as you know is not simply a meeting. People meet for business (and there we have a business meeting), meet to get up to date and to do networking (and there we have Conventions, Interdepartmental meetings, ecc.), but Team meetings are really something more respect other meetings.
Actually the Team leader can meet the Team almost every day, to share topics, to go on projects, to take stock of the situation, but all that is in the routines, nothing special and definitely nothing against the boring negative effects of the routines!
Team Meeting it’s appropriate for reaching many goals, it depends of the situation of each Team of course, but for sure it is a good chance to “Live a break” together, to go out of the box and clear our minds, to come back to work again, ready to increase our effectiveness!. Just for that it has to be planned carefully!
If Team meeting must be “special”, it has to be some out of the ordinary, and it could mix various activities. That “MIX” is the recipe for a GREAT MEETING producing GREAT RESULTS.
So what to do for planning an effective Team meeting?
– Assess the Team climate
– Assess the Team results
– Assess the Team needs
As a result of those 3 assessments, a SWOT Analysis will come and as a consequence you will able to know:
– What criticalities have to be fixed, so what are the areas to work on
– What strengths should be enhanced
– What working areas have to be investigated or rather exploited more
Well! Now we are ready to plan the content of the Team meeting, considering WHAT we want to achieve by the participant commitment. For instance:
– If we have criticality in the Results area, maybe we need to work on a project, so we can use some of the time to work on it!
– If we have to kick off some new activity instead, what best opportunity to do it?
– If we have to share thoughts or ideas instead, why don’t plan something about it?
But don’t forget …all that must turn out to be something really special!
Where the “Special” come? It come for sure from the attitude to “LOVE YOUR PEOPLE!”. Never forget to plan a huge amount of time for making your PEOPLE happy! And so the MAGIC MIX turn out:
– LOCATION: Find out a location which don’t remind your normal working and living environment; better if it is a wonderful place or some unique place to offer to your people, maybe easy to access special activities; what about old abandoned villages not so far from the modern world, to recreate an unique special environment reserved to your team? Or rather a wild protected natural area, where to live and share experiences for a week?
– VENUES: venues depends on the locations, the more important thing is to figure out if you need something luxurious, or maybe something cosy and friendly, or rather something… more “Challenging”! Of course also working areas or event areas have to be considered, as well as tools and equipment!
– SPECIAL EVENTS or ACTIVITIES: Here is the heart of the Team meetings, those activities that will make your meeting unforgettable; those activities which make feel YOUR PEOPLE LOVED! They will really feel part of some outstanding movies! You can plan some activities to enhance the team spirit, to empower the team competences or rather to develop the capability to work together. You can also take the opportunity to renew some project trying new ways of working, getting help from skilled people… all what you will do, it should run in a funny or pleasant way! Role plays, Business games, Team building pieces, Sport games, Challenges, Food Experiences and much more…they will strongly contribute to an awesome result!
– SERVICES: not always, but often it’s crucial to have the right services planned on the field, that’s the only way to ensure that the meeting will follow a smooth way, without any hindrance.
Whatever you are thinking, you can find a match in Italy! We are waiting for you…
