Ineffective team building

Team building activities give the opportunity to collegues to get to know one another better. In this way, cooperation becomes easier and employees feel more comfortable. The main difficulty in such activities is to persuade people to participate. For this reason, many companies choose something easy to realize such as dinner at a restaurant. It is considered that as long as they participate, the results are positive and the company is benefited. However, is this always true?

In my opinion, most of the times team building activities have something positive to offer. But there is a possibility that a deeper knowledge of a colleague's personality harms communication. Indeed, while communication in work lies within a context familiar to anyone, communication in a restaurant is almost free. As a result, some of the participants  may not be able to get along with. For example, introverts may feel outshined by extroverts who rule the discussion. Or some others may find that they just don't fit in this environment, while they don't face any problem at work.

Recently I had a discussion with a friend who found a new job and he was sharing his experience with me. He told me that he cooperates really nice at work with his colleagues, but, listening to some of them talking outside of the workplace, he felt "disgusted" (that's the word he used) by their way of thinking.

I am sure that such an experience cannot be a serious obstacle in the way they work. On the other hand, it creates a sense of distrust which can be harmful in the long run.

Since trust is essential in leadership development, team leaders should take actions in advance, and protect the framework of communication in team building activities, as long as it is possible. And it is very crucial that they don't make their colleagues feel uncomfortable with their behaviour.Even outside of the workplace, they should stick to the rules of communication. Besides, a leader communicates constantly!

What is communication?

Communication distance

I think that people usually prefer to keep a middle distance on their daily interactions with others. They feel unconfortable being strangers, so introducing to people that surround them makes them feel better. However, coming very close to each other also makes them feel uncomfortable for various reasons.
But this may be a little offensive. Imagine that you 're in a bus or a train and the next seated person introduces herself to you. You get to know each other and then you lose contact. What happened there? Have you been used to help an unknown pass the boring time of commuting? During this time you could have done something more productive for you.
That is the case of people doing networking. They create contacts, sharing every now and then pretty much useless information to keep the contact alive. Sadly, it is usual that when a contact needs them, they can't be available. They can't afford so many contacts and they are not really interested in all of them.
So if we define as micro-distance how easily you make connections and macro-distance how easily you get close with a connection, then, speaking of myself, I would have a very short micro and a very long macro. This means, it's very easy for me to get introduced to people, but it is hard for me to have a stronger relationship with this contact. It seems that it is a quantity-quality issue and though I prefer quality, I give priority to quantity.

Building Relationships

Communication is a tool for building a relationship. Some people consider that building a relationship is just to get introduced to someone. I know several people who use their communication skills to meet new people. However, this is just the surface. This relationship is doomed to failure on the first disagreement. My work experience as a teller taught me that every relationship is getting stronger with hard effort. In every contact with someone you have to set boundaries and context. You have to train the other to cope with your requirements and you have to get trained to cope with his/hers. This is not an option. This is obligatory if you want to make this relationship work efficiently. The only tool you 've got in this exchange is communication.

The worst part is that you have to work on building a relationship with EVERYONE. There is no choice. You can't choose which relationships you want to invest in, because inevitably in every day life and work you are related not only to people of your choice. So, since you have a contact, why not build this relationship to work properly, no matter if your are "compatible" with the other or not? It's just simple rules of communication. The only input, though expensive, is positive energy and good will.