The Rewards of Team Building Away Days

Team Building Away Days – Making Teamwork Rewarding!

Let’s talk a little bit about the psychology of team building and collaboration between individuals and groups. Why is it that we’re always being told it’s an important part of the business? Does it mean anything? Surely as individuals in the workplace we can’t help but collaborate – nothing would ever get done otherwise.

Experts tell us that this is far from the case, and that even if we appear to be getting a job done in a collaborative fashion, scratch below the surface and you’ll often find that there are yawning chasms of dis-unity to be observed.

Where does this niggling dis-unity come from? Think back to the first time you experienced the feeling that “teamwork” wasn’t about individual reward. Remember the joint history project you worked on at 12 years old? How you produced all the words? Helped the kid who couldn’t draw to save his life make a reasonable set of maps of Alexander the Great’s conquests? and made sense of the chaos that was work distribution? And then…. everyone in the team got an A! How fair was that?! Your disgruntlement is probably as keenly felt today as it was then.

Welcome to the concept of teamwork. It's great! But let’s look a little deeper. What appears to be individual endeavour, is not so clear cut as it seems. As a race, we seem determined to laud the individual and forget about the numerous contributions made by everyone working alongside that person. How do we allow individuals to thrive, whilst ensuring that everyone in the team creates and contributes value?

Well structured and meticulously thought out team building activities can show individuals how to survive and indeed, thrive, in the spirit of the “team”. Team building away days with Sandstone are specifically structured to show every team member how individual skills can contribute to a successful outcome. Allowing each other space to shine is key – one team building away day can be worth a hundred days paying lip service to the concept of teamwork; whilst ignoring the fact that it may not actually be happening.