Team Facilitators for Play Bigger Teams
10x Team Experiences
Wise managers don’t just play Spider Webs, Trust Fall, and Obstacle Courses. These are the same-old, same old games offered by amateur team-building providers clueless about improving team performance.
Begin with the end in mind. Focus on business goals, changed behaviors, and winning mindsets. Wise managers think different and play bigger. I have been helping corporate managers in the Philippines design and facilitate 10x team experiences.
Why Build Teams
Today’s workplace faces many problems.
Many employees are disengaged; they are too busy coping with stress and deadlines that they don’t have time to plan for team building exercises that improve performance.
Too many things keep falling the cracks.
One department head won’t cooperate with another. Managers find themselves spending huge amount of time mediating subordinate disputes. Such symptoms often lead prudent managers to realize that it’s time to hold another team-building exercise.
Unfortunately, one-size-fits-all team building packages can’t help you. Contrary to popular but wrong belief, team building isn’t an event or a series of activities.
It is the responsibility of team leaders to build teams every day.
A team-building event cannot make organizational problems disappear. In fact, most team building programs that many of us have experienced can only provide away-from-work intramural experiences.
However, well-planned and excellently-executed team building experiences can provide your team with many benefits.
High-performance teams get things done better and make things happen. Although most team-building efforts are geared towards building a stronger relationship, the real purpose of team building is to help a team fulfill its purpose.
Yes, the first measure of a successful team is its ability to deliver what it is created for. Professional team building facilitators can help.
Teams fail to achieve the highest potentials when leaders do not know how to work with other leaders.
Most executives are members of several teams that are made of peers who have different functions in the organizations.
They belong to senior management teams, commercial teams, marketing teams, research teams, product teams, project teams or ad hoc teams formed around specific and immediate initiatives.
Cross-functional teams are typically charged with developing and driving the implementation of the organization’s strategic directions.
Solve Big Problems
Executive teams are tasked with solving big problems for the organizations.
Yet, many executives do not practice collaborative communication, problem-solving, and decision-making skills.
Either they do not know, or their environment does not encourage them to practice collaboration.
Team leaders are either your best or worst team players. They are also your best and worst models for everyone in the organization.
Many executives are trained as individuals to win against all odds. Sometimes, they see other members as hindrances to their goals.
This is why some executives compete against each other.
They compete with each other instead of helping your organization compete with your competitors.
This attitude forces them to give more importance to competition than cooperation, to be on top of the organization, rather than to lift up your organization.
They model what you hate the most.
Ineffective team members cannot be effective leaders.
Executives can only preach what they practice. They cannot give what they do not have. If they do not know how to synergize efforts with their peers, the best that they can do with the teams they lead is to mouth words like teamwork, unity, cooperation, service, and collaboration.
You know when they are doing it wrong: they complain much about their members. They do not coach employees. They do not motivate. They do not empower.
You can’t allow these problems to continue.
We expect that leaders know how to work together. They would not be in their leadership positions if they were not high performing individuals. Besides, every leader must have mastered the soft skills necessary to become team leaders.
Well, the soft stuff can be harder than you think.
Many cross-functional peer-to-peer teams find problem-solving and decision making naturally difficult.
For example, while the Vice President of Engineering is typically well equipped to provide clear direction and produce compelling and analytically sound decisions, his or her skills are usually functionally bound and mostly authority-based.
When these persuasive and knowledgeable functional advocates come together to shape or govern the strategic direction of their companies, they find their collaborative skills inadequate.
They must collaborate.
The collaborative leadership skills required in the peer-to-peer environment are often inconsistent with functional leadership.
We must recognize that in many organizations, the environment encourages competition, not cooperation and interdependence, among departments.
Leaders measure his success based on the rank of his or her department in the accomplishment of key result areas. They hoard information. They give false information so as not to give other departments the opportunity to outrank them.
This attitude is not everywhere but it has its cousins and sisters that stunt corporate growth.
Develop team leadership.
The usual culprit, of course, is that organizations do not have rational team leadership development program outside of their annual company outing.
They think that team building is not an opportunity to improve work, but to not think of work.
We believe that every team building is an opportunity to clarify and cement leadership. Of course, very few organization really think that executive team building is necessary.
Executive team leadership is your most important team-building intervention.
Teamwork is essential for organizations to succeed. Team-based organizations have recognized the multiplier effects of high impact teams.
Organizations create various kinds of teams. They have service teams, management teams, task forces, quality-assurance teams, self-directed work teams, product-development teams, project management teams, et cetera.
Organizations must harness the power of teams.
But there are ugly teams, good teams, effective teams, and great teams.
What separates these teams from each other five commitments.
- Before the Team Building Event
- We clarify the goals and objectives of the organization. We identify the actions that support goals and objectives.
- We design the program and develop the activities (including worksheets)
- We send communication to participants to set expectations.
- We define the roles as well as the performance profiles of the participants.
- During the Team Building
- 6 to 8 games that help clarify goals
- Debriefing sessions
- Action Plan/ Next Steps
- After the Team Building
- Weekly Newsletter to Help Develop Teamwork
- One hour Kamustahan three weeks after the workshop.
Five Team Commitments
I suggest that you hire an external team building facilitators to conduct these workshops.
In this two-day team building workshops, your team will be given opportunities to develop the Five Commitments of Great Teams.
Every member of the team must join this team building program. Members of newly created teams will benefit the most.
1. Commitment to Each Other
How do the members of that team behave? How do they interact with each other? What kinds of things do they say? What do they believe?
We Filipinos value malasakit. We believe that great teams have members who care for each other. That we are not on this alone.
We seldom get into this kind of team. But we know that commitment to each other transform a good team into a better team, a better team into a great team.
Using games and activities, your team will be able to
- Identity the 3 factors that drive mutual commitment,
- Assess your individual teamwork skills,
- Learn how to develop teamwork. and
- Build trust.
2. Commitment to the Mission
We have an inherent need for purpose, for meaning, and for direction. Team members get things done when they know the tasks they need to accomplish serve a meaningful purpose.
To become successful, we need targets to shoot at, roadmaps to follow, guidelines to keep on track, and a vision to realize.
Five-star teams have mission-oriented members.
They are clear about their goals, they fully trust that other members are accountable to their results, and they align their individual actions to the achievement of their mission.
For members of great teams, the mission is more than something merely to abide by, it’s the embodiment of their personal values – it’s something to believe in … and something to live by.
Using group activities, participants will have the opportunities to
- Craft personal mission statement
- Co-create team mission statement
- Declare commitment to the mission
- Commit themselves to action
3. Commitment to the Customer
You are in business because you provide solve the problems of your customers. You provide high-quality products and services.
Creating remarkable customer experiences requires a team effort.
Wow! is not just a mantra for great teams.
Wow! is a lifestyle.
This is why for great teams, delighting customers is everything. They live it. They breathe wow! They are grateful for the opportunity to serve customers.
Using games and team exercises, participants will
- Empathize with customers.
- Start using Wow! as a mindset.
- Think of happiness plus one every time.
- Create strategies for excellent customer experiences.
4. Commitment to Turn Conflict into Collaboration
Employees put in a high-pressure environment require constant interactions. Conflict comes with pressure.
Employees are human. They are emotional by nature. They get cranky. They have ideas and personalities that clash with each other.
Conflict is inevitable. Great teams know this.
In fact, great teams experience more conflict than any other teams. Because the higher “the bar” – and more intense the zeal – the greater the potential for friction.
Passionate, action-oriented people are more likely to step on proverbial toes. As a result, team members experience their share of tension.
Ironically, however, the same combination of passion and commitment that produces occasional spats is also what provides the motivation to address issues quickly and collaboratively.
Through games and team exercises, participants will be able to
- Identify obstacles, their impact on results and relationships.
- Practice assertive communication.
- Turn conflict into collaboration.
5. Commitment to Drive Results
Most jobs have some repetitive and mundane aspects – for individuals and for the teams they comprise.
While some teams are created for special, short-term purposes (new product launches, new system installations, etc.), most exist to handle the daily, routine tasks necessary to accomplish the organization’s mission.
And missions don’t change all that often. What we do is what we do. We did it yesterday, we do it today, and we’ll do it tomorrow.
Sure, we try to make improvements … we strive to do our jobs better and faster, but the nature of our work tends to remain the same.
For average teams, that can pose a significant motivation challenge over time. Repetitive tasks can be boring – if you allow them to be.
But great teams rarely make such allowances.
They have growth mindsets. For them, routine work is not a problem – it’s their mission … their opportunity to shine.
What is important to them is to drive results.
Using games and activities, the teams will be introduced to
- How to get things done every day.
- How to keep people motivated.
Every member must join.
The team-building exercises will be for two days.
I have conducted team building workshops with similar objectives for 150 persons.
I believe those with less than 40 participants will get the highest impact.
Participation is mandatory in order to receive the certificate of completion. (Not everyone needs the certificate, but full participation is always required. No observers.)
Participants who miss more than two hours of the entire program will not be eligible to receive the certificate. We start and end on time.
So, when you want to develop five-star teams — and you need the services of professional team building facilitators of Business Innovation, contact me.
I will help you.
Members of your team cannot commit to something they don’t know.
Everyone must understand the purpose and vision of your team. It is common in many Filipino organizations that employees do not know the reasons why they are doing the tasks that make up their jobs.
Trabaho lang, walang personalan. You must have heard of this before.
Unfortunately, teamwork requires that everyone get things personal.
Everyone must pull in the same direction and be aware of the end goals from the very beginning.
Clarify your team goals so your team members fully understand where your team is going.
With clear goals, you will help your team know when they are successful. Teamwork gets easier to build this way.
When goals are clear, everyone develops a sense of ownership. They also trust that everyone supports the same goals.
Clear goals foster team unity. Unclear goals, confusion.
Even teams with very passionate team members get negative results when they are not clear about team goals. Unclear goals are the less obvious cause of team conflict.
In these team-building exercises, we will help you ensure that team members are clear about your business objectives and team goals.
How We Deliver Purpose-Driven Teams
Much time, money, and energy are lost when everyone on the team is not aiming for the same outcome. Motivation and enthusiasm evaporate.
Most team building programs fail because they do not clarify goals. Another reason is that amateur team building facilitators give more attention to conducting team games.
This team-building workshop will help improve the commitments, motivation, and performance of your team members.
Before the Team Building Event
We clarify the goals and objectives of the organization. We identify the actions that support goals and objectives.
We design the program and develop the activities (including worksheets)
We send communication to participants to set expectations.
During the Team Building
4 to 6 games that help clarify goals
Debriefing sessions
Action Plan/ Next Steps
After the Team Building
Weekly Newsletter to Help Develop Teamwork
One Hour Kamustahan
Standard Program
Every member of the team must join this team building program. Members of newly created teams will benefit the most.
How to Measure Success
- Help team members identify measures of team effectiveness important to the team and the organization.
- Encourage members to develop means for assessing and reporting measures of a team’s effectiveness.
- Provide a means for team members to keep track of team effectiveness.
- Members participate in one or two team games. They’ll also accomplish TeamScores Work Sheet.
How Expectations Affect Performance
- Demonstrate the impact of both negative and positive expectations on performance.
- Encourage participants to consider how expectations affect the extent to which they reach their goals.
- Participants play High Jump or Breaking the Records. They tally their scores, then participate in team debriefs.
How to Accomplish Goals Together
- Develop cohesion within the work team.
- Explore the dynamics of team task accomplishment.
- Participants play High Performance, then accomplish processing guides.
The team-building exercises will be for six to eight hours, depending on the size of the team.
Other details
This team-building workshop is best for less than 40 participants.
Participation is mandatory in order to receive the certificate of completion.
Participants who miss more than two hours of the entire program will not be eligible to receive the certificate. We start and end on time.
When the event is held outside of Metro Manila and Calabarzon, the client is responsible for the transportation and accommodation of facilitators.
I work with clients in designing and implementing team development programs that are aligned to their business objectives.
Each month, I have opportunities to speak about teamwork and team building for company strategic planning, culture building, and sales rallies.
If you need a purpose-driven team. I recommend that you get the services of the professional team building facilitators of Business Innovation.
I will help you.
Build Play Bigger Teams
Team Facilitators must help you enable your teams to play bigger. You don’t play games that make 90 percent of your team members losers and a few winners. When you design your team experiences like traditional competitions, you are solidifying a fixed mindset about winning and performance.
So, it is wrong when some say that play works. In the hands of amateur facilitators, play can be a waste of time and harmful. This is why wise managers pick professional facilitators all the time and misinformed looked for team building packages.
I talk more about this below.
Many opportunities are wasted because some managers conduct team building programs to play games. They get team building facilitators to run team games. Team building facilitators can create for you experiences that will change behaviors.
Behaviors that will change your results.
Consider the following objectives the next time you ask a team building facilitators to design new experiences for your teams.
Team building experiences may…
- Bring people together
- Boost productivity
- Engage employees
- Build personal accountability
- Encourage creativity and innovation
- Improve team communication
- Increase sales and build champions
- Create Wow! customer experience
1. Bring people together.
Businesses are moving away from competitive work environments to cooperative and collaborative workplaces.
Undertaking regular collaborative (instead of combative) team building activities can bring people to creatively solve problems together.
While some people see team building as “nice break” from work, team-building exercises have more important purposes for the organization: it develops the team knowledge and skills of your employees.
Team building facilitators may design experiences that bring people together. Build rapport and camaraderie. Give team members the opportunity to learn more about each other.
2. Boost team productivity.
Hold team-building exercises to improve the productivity of individuals and teams. Team building exercises can be used to create the opportunity to identify ways to improve three Ps ((policies, processes, and procedures) that can affect productivity.
Using games and design thinking tools, team-building exercises encourage employees to learn to work together more effectively, reduce duplication of effort so they can work more efficiently, and focus on activities that really matter.
Do you know that you can use team-building exercises so your teams can learn how to handle workplace stress and improve time management?
Teams with disengaged and unproductive members don’t get the job done.
Team building facilitators can use games so your team members understand the principles of productivity in fun and engaging ways. Expert facilitators may also use tools that you can let your members use after the exercises.
3. Energize employee engagement.
The team-building exercises we design for clients not only help improve team skills, but it also improves team motivation.
The experiential activities we provide increase mutual accountability.
We use positive behavioral psychology and gamification so your team becomes more involved in their personal and professional growth.
4. Strengthen a sense of personal accountability.
Most people shun accountability because the word appears in the conversation mostly when people are looking for someone to blame.
Properly designed team building workshops can change mindset and behavior.
Through fun, safe, and engaging team building games, employees experience how to move from indifference to sense of ownership, finding solutions, and making things happen.
Accountability can be learned through games. Accountability is a skill that can be acquired in a team through able facilitation and mentorship.
Through group dynamics, The team building facilitators can help discover how people can change their questions so they can find the best answers, and then 10X their results.
5. Encourage creativity, innovation, and design thinking.
Encourage people to re-discover their inner creative person. During team activities, you will see them smiling and growing in confidence.
Your organization needs creative and innovative people. You need people with diverse perspectives and expertise in order to “cross-pollinate” the organization with ideas.
Team building facilitators use exercises that encourage team members to use their imagination so they can come up with creative solutions — and cultivate that creativity in the workplace.
6. Build open and honest communication.
The most obvious result of our team-building exercises is improved communication.
Enjoyable, fun activities enable employees to know each other, create a better understanding of each other’s values and break down walls of mistrust.
These exercises let them appreciate their similarities and respect their differences.
To improve team performance, team members must learn how to celebrate diversity.
Team building facilitators of Business Innovation have conducted team building programs, through games, that shows team members how to navigate across cultures.
7. Enable champion sales teams.
Every year, sales organization try to motivate people through team building. Smart managers know that team building can go beyond motivation.
Team building experiences can actually help your team members learn how to sell, negotiate, and keep clients.
Your team can gain new knowledge on how to sell through sales training. But team-building experiences designed by our facilitators develop champion selling skills.
Enjoy the benefits of hiring professional team building facilitators to accelerate performance improvement.
8. Provide a venue for designing wow! customer experiences.
Yes. Customer experience is a team effort.
Most customer service training fails because they are based on individual efforts to serve the customers need.
Teams who care enough about customers plan and execute experiences that delight customers. You can increase customer loyalty through fun and creative team-building exercises.
Our team building facilitators use gamification and design thinking to help your team develop common vocabulary in creating customer experiences.
What is a team building facilitator?
A team building facilitator is a professional consultant who has the expertise to help you explore your team challenges and opportunities.
Organizational change can be dramatic, complex, and frustrating. Team building facilitators may help you make your team building efforts a highly rewarding journey.
As I have mentioned earlier, the first aim of any team building initiative is to improve team performance. A professional facilitator starts with a shared understanding of purpose and objectives.
Your team building experiences must impact your bottom line by equipping individual team members with the right skills, attitudes, and behaviors.
What is successful team building?
Successful team building in the workplace has more to do with ensuring the success of the team that has been given to you.
Though managers or team leaders may desire a dream team, no one really begins from scratch and get the best people.
Team building is both a journey and a process. You don’t build a team in a day. In the Philippines, what most people call as “team building” is nothing but fun events usually held offsite.
theThese are wasted opportunities to build a team.
Team building is an intervention meant to equip team members with the ability and attitude to deliver goals.
What are the different kinds of team building in the Philippines?
There are five kinds of team building in the Philippines.
Theory-based team building is conducted like a class. You get to study the definition of teams, the kinds of teams, and the stages of teams. There are talks about teamwork.
This also may include personality type tests.
This is usually conducted by a lecturer or an assessor.
Retreat Style team building has a religious component. The purpose of the manager is to change the attitude of the people through sharing and reflections.
The adventure type of team building assumes that play works. It is a choice between low-element games and high-element exercises.
These may also include obstacle courses, trust fall..and some games which has nothing to do with the development of specific behaviors necessary to improve sales, productivity, creativity, sense of urgency, and service.
This type is most popular among those who like to play but don’t want to solve work issues.
This is usually sold by events organizers, team building venues, and team building facilitators.
The fourth type are the socials. Some managers believe that night swimming, beer drinking, or similar activities will build teams.
What we know is that this type of team building is also the least effective and usually bring out the worst among drunk employees.
Game masters make you play parlor games.
Game-changing team building is the fifth type. This is what we do and there are very few of us who are doing this in the Philippines.
Though we use games and experiential activities, our mission is to help you win your game.
I understand that many Pinoys will pick those who can show them videos of games or outline of games and activities.
I give attention to those who really want to make change happen in the organization.
It is easy to find fun games, but professionals begin with the end in mind.
Where can I find professional team building facilitators in the Philippines?
Facilitators of Business Innovation are professional facilitators.
However, if you are looking for a former organization or association, there is no formal organization for professional team building facilitators in the Philippines.
This is why anyone who has the audacity to facilitate a team building may do so.
Why?
Because many have the mistaken belief that a team building facilitator only make you play games.
That is wrong, of course.
Professional facilitators for programs like strategic planning, execution, innovation, and design thinking uses tools and processes to ensure success.
Those “team building facilitators” who only make you play games can be called game masters. They are the ones you usually find in team building venues and are responsible for ensuring the safety of the participants. It is okay to use them if you are not serious about behavior change and you only want to have fun.
I lead a group of professional team building facilitators who are consultants of Business Innovation.
We use behavioral psychology, gamification, and experiential learning. In short, they have in-depth knowledge and extensive know-how in team building.
How often a company must hold a team building activity?
Quick answer: every working day!
Today’s workplace faces many problems.
Many employees are disengaged; they are too busy coping with stress and deadlines that they don’t have time to plan for team building exercises that improve performance.
Too many things keep falling the cracks.
One department head won’t cooperate with another. Managers find themselves spending huge amount of time mediating subordinate disputes. Such symptoms often lead prudent managers to realize that it’s time to hold another team-building exercise.
Unfortunately, one-size fits-all team building packages can’t help you. Contrary to popular but wrong belief, team building isn’t an event or a series of activities.
It is the responsibility of team leaders to build teams everyday.
A team building event cannot make organizational problems disappear.
In fact, most team building programs that many of us have experienced can only provide away-from-work intramural experiences.
However, well-planned and excellently-executed team building experiences can provide your team many benefits.
Can team building help us grow our business?
Yes and no.
Let me first explain why many team building programs do not lead to the improvement of your business. It begins with some wrong beliefs.
There are those who believe that by having your teams compete in outdoor team building, they will make them more competitive — and this will result to improved performance.
This is not true. Many organizations have very competitive employees who refuse to collaborate. In organizations where silos is a big issue, workplace competition can only be made worst by competition-based activities that produce few winners and many losers.
Playing games, without thinking, cannot make you get more business.
Many managers hope that team building can change the attitude and behavior of their employees. But they don’t know how – and they don’t know when. They don’t have anything that will measure success. Hope isn’t a strategy.
Our organization is here for you to be able to innovate and make more business. Business Innovation, our companies name, is also our promise.
It is no secret that engaged and empowered team members reflect positively on your business. They stay with the organization. They delight customers. People want to do business with them.
Our secrets is in our process. We begin with your business objectives, not in selling your games or team building facilities.
We help you frame your challenges (including business challenges!). We design solutions. We help you execute your solutions.
What makes Jef Menguin the wise manager’s choice for team building facilitation?
Jef Menguin is known for training professional team building facilitators in the Philippines. What makes his system of designing and facilitating team building different?
Jef Menguin certifies team building facilitators in the Philippines. He believes that genuine team building is not about playing games. The purpose of team building is to help team members to think different and play bigger. Team building is improving team performance. Without improvement, team building efforts are wasted opportunities.
ABS-CBN
ACS Global Logistics Solutions
Ajinomoto
AlveoLand
Analog Devices
Asian Development Bank
Asian Technicon
Bank of Philippine Islands
Baxter Healthcare
BFAR
Brent International School
Canon (Philippines)
Chevrolet Philippines
Chevron
City Goverment of Makati
City Government of Sagay
City Government of San Jose Del Monte
City Government of Taguig
Dell (Indonesia)
Dell (Malaysia)
Dell (Thailand)
Deparment of Energy
Department of Agriculture
Department of Education
Department of Social Works and Development
Development Academy of the Philippines
DOST-NCR
Federaland
GMA Kapuso Foundation
Healthcode International
Hyundai (Philippines)
Ilocos Feedmill Corporation
Integrated Microelectronics, Inc
Isuzu (PHilippines)
Jotun
KMBI
Local Government Academy
Maynilad
Meco (Taiwan)
Nexperia
Office of the President (Philippines)
Omron
OSM Maritime Group
Panasonic
Petron Marketing Corporation
Philippine Business Bank
Philippine Councilors League
Philippine Long Distance Company
Philippine National Bank
Philippine-Australia HR Development Facility
Provincial Government of Agusan del Sur
Puregold
San Jose del Monte Water District
San Miguel Corporation
Shopwise
SMDC
Social Security System
SolanaLand
Subic Enerzone
Sunpower
TESDA
The Farm at San Benito
Thomville (Malaysia)
Tiens (Thailand)
Toshiba (Philippines)
Toyutetsu
TV5
United States Embassy
University of the Philippines (Diliman)
World Bank
World Vision
Yakult Marketing