Introduction to Team Building Concepts

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What elements of the course were you immediately able to apply within your professional life?

Many valuable concepts were covered in the “Introduction to Team Building Concepts” course, however the main elements I was able to immediately apply to my current job were: elimination of censorship and improvement of gender-based communication.

Recently, I was elected by management to be part of a team created to boost morale and “team spirit” for our company. In the past year and a half, the company corporate culture has undergone a major shift, due to layoffs, personality conflicts, and a high turnover rate. Additionally, senior management has appeared to “breeze over” the issues that have ultimately mattered most to employees, including workload, benefits, and several difficult staff members. This has resulted in a work atmosphere that is at best, tense and at worst, highly stressed.

The prospect of attempting to create “one, big happy family” or have “forced fun” in an already hectic work environment did not appeal to me, hence I was under whelmed to be drafted for this particular team. But, my method is usually to proceed quietly and observe until I am sure of the parameters I am dealing with.

The team is comprised of two people from the Clinical division, two people from the Data division, one person from Senior Management, one person from the Administrative staff, and one person from Human Resources, and the ratio of men to women is 4 to 3. Our first meeting was a perfect illustration of what I now know to call censorship and a misunderstanding of men and women’s communication habits. A woman, who we’ll call “C”, is one of the more outspoken and difficult people in the company. C was allowed to dominate the first meeting, bully others into shooting down any ideas for change that were not within her parameters of thinking, and not understanding the way the male members of the team were attempting to communicate their input.

Needless to say, we walked away from this first team encounter with a less than fuzzy feeling about working together and a sense of not being able to accomplish positive results for the company. Prior to the next scheduled meeting, several of the team members began emailing each other about ways to make the next encounter more productive, less tense, and more fun. We knew that C had many years of experience with the company and thus had a valuable perspective to share, but her brash style of communication and tendency not to listen but to bully others and wrench control was a challenge to face.

Since our class had recently covered the issues of censorship and gender-based communication patterns, these topics were fresh in my mind. It was clear to me that these were some of the issues we were dealing with, but I was not sure exactly how to positively impact the outcome in relation to my company “fun” team. I suggested that one of the other women on the team, who we’ll call “M” and who had been able to deal well with C in the work environment, invite C out to coffee to talk about M’s questions about the team. This appeared to be a way to achieve a non-threatening, one-to-one communication on neutral ground. I believed that M would also be putting C into a role of an “expert”, which is a role she has seemingly responded well to in the company. Also, we all acknowledged M’s good-natured communication style that often put others at ease.

Several of us helped M craft a “script” to follow for this coffee meeting that would cover the issues of listening to the input of other teammates and understanding the differences in men and women’s communication styles. Because M knew that C has been previously motivated by appreciation for her expertise and that C wanted to be liked by M, whom she respected, she decided to approach C as a “trusted advisor”, rather than an “adversarial teammate.”

I am happy to report that the coffee meeting went well. M began by expressing her thanks to C for meeting about M’s concerns for the team. M asked C if there had been another time in the history of the company when morale had been low and asked C what was done about it. C was happy to relate her experiences and had some very interesting perspectives on the current low morale. She actually told M that others on the team did not appear to listen and she told her that she was very stressed by her workload and could really use a break herself. She expressed that she had seized control for fear that no one else would take it. M was careful not to accuse or point fingers, and she casually mentioned how different the male team members were in their communication styles than the women team members. C, who is not married, acknowledged that she could probably tone down her responses when dealing with male co-workers whom she admitted she often didn’t have patience for. M and C ended the coffee on a great note and C said she was actually glad M had asked her to talk because it had helped her as well!

When preparing for the coffee meeting, M and I had discussed the challenge of the question “What should we do?” in that men perceive the question to require a direct solution, while women see it as an invitation to open a discussion and negotiation. We shared anecdotes and I related how I once gave my wife a long, complex solution to a work problem and she looked dumbfounded. She said, “I just wanted you to say Poor Baby!”

I sent out an informal email to the other team members calling for a fun team meeting, for the team that was to boost company morale. Based on conversations with several teammates, I brought in cupcakes. Someone else brought party blowers, and another person brought in bubbles. We invited everyone to blow some bubbles, blow their party blower, and eat a cupcake as they entered. M explained that since we’d all be sharing the work and appreciate one another in order to help our workmates, that we’d really need to be respectful of each other. I said that we’d be brainstorming ideas and that at any time someone had an idea they could blow bubbles, blow their blower, or speak up, but we’d hear all the ideas and not dismiss anyone or anything as not worthy.

We asked for a volunteer to be the recorder of ideas and C volunteered! It was a productive meeting which lead to some small things beginning at the office as morale boosters.

It was a truly gratifying experience for me to be able to apply knowledge for my Team Building Concepts course. By making positive changes in my workplace, the environment has not been miraculously transformed, however it has become more humanistic, It is fulfilling to have been and continue to be a part of a process that has helped others.