I Love Team Building

On Saturday my daughter Molly, age 6, wanted to run a lemonade stand. “What a perfect opportunity to teach her about business”, I thought. I asked her what she wanted to do with the money that she made. She replied, “I want to give it away”. Wow.

To help her identify where to give the money, I asked her a few questions to narrow it down. I asked if she wanted to help people, the earth or animals. She said, “people”.

Me: “What kind of people”.
Molly: “Kids”.
Me: “Kids who don’t have much, or kids who are sick”.
Molly: “Kids who don’t have much”.

After seeing some news coverage of the cyclone disaster in Myanmar, Molly decided to give her profits to help children in Myanmar. In case you are wondering how to get money there, despite the resistance of the local government, visit Avaaz.org

So on Saturday morning, we helped Molly set up the lemonade stand. With the help of her 5-year old brother, Simon, she raised $40.50 which we immediately donated online.

How this relates to team is that I had the chance to observe the two kids in action. I was gardening, so I wasn’t really helping them much. The two of them worked together brilliantly, naturally using each one’s strengths. 

Molly is shy, so Simon would recruit passers-by with his opening line: “Would you like some lemonade?” he’d shout to people on the other side of the street. Molly would add either “…or some iced tea?” or “…it’s for kids in Burma”.

Molly would usually pour the drinks while Simon made sure everyone paid. If they had a disagreement, they resolved it quickly and focused back on the customer and delivering their service.

I also noted that when Simon lost interest (he’s only 5!), the system broke down…Molly had a much harder time getting customers because she didn’t have Simon delivering the opening line.

It was great to see them work together and using the skills and behaviours that are sometimes so hard to come by in organizations. Things like: allocating roles, collaboration, leadership and communication.

They were a great team and Molly’s leadership in raising money for charity was particularly moving.

Marjorie Treu at TeamFusion has a good posting about going over the boss’ head and how that impacts team dynamics.  Check it out.

Another TeamTube submission. This one had me laughing!

Check it out and if you like it, be sure to rate it 5-stars and favorite it on YouTube.

Dislike meetings? Me too. Unless they are:
- productive;
- enjoyable; and,
- focused.

In our organization, we’ve significantly reduced the number of meetings we have and we’re all much more productive. We now primarily share information by email and phone.

Seth Godin advises us to skip the next meeting. I’m not sure if you should just “not go”, but perhaps you should convince your manager or your team that you can share information in a more efficient way.

Check out E&Y’s recruiting / team building video that I think misses the point. Obviously they are trying to portray an upbeat, unified team environment. Have a look and ask yourself if this video makes you want to work for Ernst & Young. Have a look in particular at the comment trail underneath the video and how it’s overwhelmingly negative.

E&Y would have been better to put video cameras in the hands of those employees and ask them to make their own recruiting videos. That would be much more authentic and at the same time a great team builder.

Here are the first three videos submitted to the TeamTube Video Team Building Contest. They were created by 3 teams at Evergreen, a Toronto-based non-profit.  This is pure teamwork in action!

Nutty by Nature: Call of the Nature Nut

Evergreen Mulch Song

Race to Evergreen Brick Works

Enjoy!

Team building company Critical Pathfinders is pleased to announce that Evergreen, a Canadian not-for-profit, is the first client to participate in TeamTube, a unique new team building program.

On April 21, 2008, the day before Earth Day, three teams from Evergreen gathered at Evergreen Brick Works, located in the Don Valley, in order to create the first-ever videos to be submitted to the TeamTube video team building contest. 

In the contest, teams of five or more people from organizations create two to five minute videos that must have something to do with the concept of team. These videos are then submitted to the TeamTube group on YouTube. The videos then compete with all other submitted videos to collect the most “favorites” on YouTube. There are a number of prizes including the opportunity to choose the recipient of a charitable contribution.

You can see Evergreen’s fine submissions at: www.youtube.com/group/teamtube  If you like what you see, do them a favour and favorite the videos (you’ll need a no-cost YouTube account). The Evergreen participants are now spreading the word to collect favorites for their videos.

Your group can participate in TeamTube too…there is still a lot of time until the contest closes.

TeamTube’s uniqueness as a team building program is the online component. The messages created in the videos are in the public domain and could potentially be viewed by hundreds, thousands or even millions of people.

Whether you refer to it as ‘web 2.0’, ‘social networking’ or ‘user-generated content’, there is no question that the web is a different place than it was five years ago.  Companies need to have as much positive online messaging about their companies as they can get as they now control only a small percentage of all online content.

Evergreen is a not-for-profit organization that makes cities more livable. By deepening the connection between people and nature, and empowering Canadians to take a hands-on approach to their urban environments, Evergreen is improving the health of our cities—now and for the future. Since 1991, it has engaged people in creating and sustaining healthy, dynamic outdoor spaces across Canada - in schools, communities and homes.

Evergreen Brick Works will be Canada’s first full-fledged, large scale environmental discovery centre. It will be a dynamic, magical place that models sustainability and is a centre for learning – through play, crafts, demonstrations, programming and innovative partnerships. The site will be animated with year-round programs and activities that include a native plant nursery, demonstration gardens, an organic food market, conference and event facilities, youth leadership and children’s camps, family programming and youth-at-risk programs.

For more information about the TeamTube video team building program and how your group can participate, visit www.criticalpathfinders.com

A team was recently created to raise money for Canadian athletes. It’s called “Unofficial Team Canada for Bejing 2008″.

Many Canadian athletes live below the poverty line and very little money is given to them by the Canadian Olympic Commission. However, the non-profit Canadian Athletes Now Fund (CAN Fund) is making a difference. 

Dan Turvill, creator of Unofficial Team Canada, has challenged 1,000,000 Canadians to step up and donate at least $8 to support Canadian athletes. More information is available at the Unofficial Team Canada Facebook Group or by visiting CAN Fund.

I hope you’ll join the team by donating $8 (or maybe $88, $888 or $8888!) and spreading the word to help our athletes get to the podium in Bejing.

The winner of the TeamTube promotion is Pooja Lal of Livewire Communications Inc.  Livewire has won a free TeamTube Video Team Building session for up to 50 people!

Now the pressure is on Livewire to come up with some awesome videos!  We’re expecting them in early June, and you’ll be able to see them at http://www.youtube.com/group/teamtube  

Also, you’ll see 3 new TeamTube submissions at the same URL as of mid-next week.  Enjoy!

Andrew

Read this post on the Coaching Tip blog about how HR departments can and should be more strategic. I’d also add that HR departments can counsel senior management on how to strategically attract and retain good quality employees by creating a workplace that people love to work in.

At Critical Pathfinders and Scavenger Hunt Anywhere we are always looking to expand our network of enthusiastic facilitators. Our staff love working with our clients to deliver team building experiences to help fulfill our vision of a world where everyone loves their work. Learn more

Have you ever looked for the perfect team building activity for your group?

Have you ever said to yourself: “I wish there was some kind of new activity…something our group has never seen”?

Critical Pathfinders is pleased to announce the official launch of TeamTube, the world’s newest team building program.

TeamTube is the world’s first and only video team building contest.  Here’s how it works:

- Our expert facilitation staff come on-site to your meeting or conference and help teams film 3-5 minute videos.
- The videos are uploaded by our technical staff to YouTube and submitted to the TeamTube group.
- Your teams share the videos with their friends and ask them to “favorite” the videos.
- The video with the most favorites wins.

What’s so good about that?  (Thanks for asking…)

There are more possible benefits of TeamTube than any other team building program I’ve ever seen, too many to list them all here, including:  team building, fun, novelty, coolness, potential for viral marketing, easier recruiting for your company, raising money for charity and the chance to win great prizes!  Learn more about these amazing benefits.

And we’re going to make it interesting!  One of the first 20 people who emails us wins a free full-service TeamTube program for their company.  Your cost: $0.00. 

Here is what you have to do:  Send an email to info@criticalpathfinders.com with “TeamTube Promotion” in the subject line.  Your program must be in the US or Canada and must be booked by April 30.  The program must take place before June 15 and can be for no more than 50 people.  Do it now!  It costs nothing to send us an email!  We’ll draw one name once we get 20 replies.

Click for more information about the TeamTube program.

See you on YouTube!

Andrew

P.S.  Send your email to info@criticalpathfinders.com with “TeamTube Promotion” in the subject line!

A team with infrequent conflict is a team that does not know how to handle conflict.  Here is a great example of how conflict avoidance can be disastrous.  Read about it at The You In Team

Good post about the importance of values and how they relate to team on Marjorie Treu’s TeamFusion blog.

A friend recently asked me to watch and rate his video, posted on a sharing service called www.filmmakingfrenzy.com  Major corporations are having video contests and they are allocating major marketing dollars to promote them.

For a popular and trendy team building program, check out the TeamTube video team building contest.  It’s team building with a video contest add-on.  Your group will love it.

After a break while battling technical challenges, I Love Team Building is back in action, thanks to the patient and professional help by CrushLabs.�

Great article by Susan Heathfield at About.com in which she shares 12 tips to building a strong team.

Tell me about your team…

Likes and dislikes?  What the team does well or not well?  Funny stories?  Cool team building activities you’ve done?  Anything interesting or unique about your team?

Please take a minute to comment.  (Comments are moderated so it may take some time for your comment to appear.)�

In the TV show “The Office”, Steve Carrel plays the manager of an office and routinely overestimates the degree to which his staff like him.

In an old episode of “Friends”, Chandler is told by Phoebe that his staff “do” him, meaning they impersonate him.

If you’re the boss, is there a chance that you are overestimating the relationships that you have with your staff? 

Food for thought.

As a team building company, it occasionaly behooves us to do our own team building activities.  Click below to watch the result of our most recent in-house team building session. It’s called “23 Reasons to Participate in TeamTube”.

Click for more details about the TeamTube Video Team Building Contest.

And if you’d like to do me a big favour, please view the video at YouTube, favorite it and rate it 5-stars.