HR MANAGEMENT - Team-Building Exercises for Efficiency in the Workplace

Team-Building Exercises for Efficiency in the Workplace

by Erin Schreiner, Demand Media

Get your employees to team up in the workplace.

In many workplaces, managers attempt to promote harmony and the building of unity by engaging workers in team-building exercises. If your aim is not only to bolster the development of relationships in your workplace, but also to amp up efficiency, select team-building exercises tailored to meet this aim. By giving your employees a break from the day and engaging them in exercises of this type, you can not only promote the development of strong team unity, but also make increasing efficiency a fun process.

Telephone

A lack of communication can hinder workplace efficiency. If you think your workers simply aren’t communicating as effectively as they should be, a simple game of telephone may help get your point across. Prepare for this game by writing down a humorous message on an index card and making several copies. Start the game by dividing your employees into teams. Have each team form a circle. Give one member of the team a copy of the card with the phrase. Ask employees to spread the message around the circle, taking turns whispering it into the ear of the person to their left. After the message has moved around the circle, allow the final recipient in each team to share the message with the group. In all likelihood, this message will have changed much from its original version. As employees laugh at the bumbled new message, they will likely learn an important lesson in the value of communication.

Productivity Races

Turn the completion of daily tasks into an engaging game. Set up a relay race of sorts in which workers must complete tasks they do on a daily basis. For example, one section of your race could have workers opening envelopes as quickly as they can, another setting up a phone line and a third assembling a piece of equipment they use daily. Divide your workforce into teams, and allow them to move through this race, completing the tasks as fast as possible.

Business BINGO

Increase efficiency by building employee knowledge in your team-building game. Create a business BINGO game by writing words germane to your business on BINGO cards. On slips of paper, write definitions that match these words. When time comes to play the game, group employees into groups of two to four. Give each group a BINGO card. Draw the slips of paper containing the definitions out of a hat and ask employees to cross of the words that pair with the definitions if they are present on their cards. Reward the first team to create a pattern of five in a row.

Procedures Race

Help your employees better understand important procedures within your workplace to enable them to more quickly complete job-related tasks. Take your procedure manual and cut it up, creating separate, un-numbered slips of paper containing parts of your procedure. Place these jumbled procedure slips into an envelope. Complete this process several times, creating different jumbled collections. When game time comes, give each group of employees one envelope and ask them to order the procedure parts as quickly as possible.