If you really want to improve team performance, you can’t just play fun games and expect a huge change. It takes thought, communication and planning to devise a program that will truly move your team forward. Here are some basic steps to get you started:

1. Poll your team members. Give each of them a Team Performance Survey. Corporate Games Team Building offers this survey free. You can request it by emailing us at or download it using the above link.

2. Using the completed survey and the knowledge you have about your team members, make a short list of what the issues/opportunities are. It might be that there are cliques or disconnects within the team. You might have two people that just dislike each other and won’t work together. Maybe everyone works from home and they are all pretty independent. Whatever the issues decide which is the most important to overcome. It will be a list of one to three items. You cannot do everything at once.

3. Meet with your team to reveal and discuss the results of the survey. You also want to tell them what you consider the most important team issues to address. Allow them to agree or make other suggestions. After all, they are part of building their team. Once the issues are agreed upon, ask the team for input on improving those items. You can have them on small discussion groups if your team is larger than 5 people. Small discussion groups of 4-6 people insure that everyone gets a chance to share– and it will also generate more ideas.

4. Share all the ideas and decide what can be implemented. Even if it is only one, good actionable item, that is a step toward real team building.

5. Finally, there must be action and follow-up. Don’t let all the thoughts and sharing go to waste. Additionally, it is great to have fun, get-togethers that allow people to really bond and get positive energy going. A unique team building activity will help keep the momentum going.