Thursday, February 25, 2010

The Importance of Indoor Team Building Activities

Corporations around the world have learned that one way to improve productivity and enhance cooperation within their ranks is to schedule team building days where employees are paid to participate in exercises away from work that are designed to encourage teamwork and strengthen the bonds between team members.

While many employees look forward to such days with anticipation because they expect some extravagant outdoor activities, it is very important not to overlook the importance of indoor team building activities.

While outdoor team building activities are normally quite exciting, it is also possible for the message that managers are trying to communicate to be lost amid all the fun.

Indoor activities can be just as exciting and just as much fun while being carried out in a setting that reinforces the lessons being taught.

It is generally easier to create a scene indoors that uses the visual, auditory, tactile, or other sensory stimuli to reinforce the point of the activities being engaged in by forming a link in the minds of the participants between the sensory stimuli and the game or activity.

It is often a standard practice to include some sort of motivational speech that contains an outline of which team functions are going to be worked on and strengthened before the actual activities begin.

It is not at all uncommon, when putting together a group for the first time, to schedule indoor team building activities of a nature that allow the group to break the ice and get to know one another.

The indoor setting provides for a level of proximity that is much more difficult to achieve outdoors. Therefore, members of the group are more or less forced to get to know one another and to redefine their own personal space in reference to the other members of the group.

Another important aspect of these activities is personal safety. By their very nature, many outdoor activities are more dangerous to individuals in that there is a greater chance of injury if even one team member fails to do what is required.

This is not necessarily the case with indoor activities. These activities usually never leave the floor, thus eliminating the risk of falling. They also do not normally involve any type of projectile they can achieve enough velocity to do a person harm.

While outdoor team building exercises are often more energetic and in many cases more entertaining than indoor team building activities, the importance of these indoor activities cannot be overstressed.

They can provide for a group to develop their ability to work together as a team in a safe, controlled environment and provide for the team members to be placed into closer proximity to one another than would be possible outdoors.

By : James_Carruthers

No comments: