Relationship Building Activities For The Workplace Anyone Can Start

Relationship building activities for the workplace can boost cross-team communication. And improved team communication leads to improved output. But it’s not a get-connected-quick scheme; it takes time. Hence why it’s critical to lay the foundations for the long term with relationship building activities as a regular part of your team’s activities.

What’s in this article? Glad you asked, we’ll dive into...

• What causes a lack of communication in the workplace?
• Why are Relationship Building Activities important?
• What are the effects of poor communication?
  

Put simply, stronger relationships across your workforce increase output and productivity. Divided workforces with team culture issues lead to fractured workforces.

The biggest problems occur when differences in opinion aren’t addressed due to lack of  communication in the workplace environment. Employees are at their best in the workplace when they feel free to express their ideas and bring their unique perspectives to the table. They need to have the confidence to speak up and offer value.

Relationship building activities make team members more likely to feel confident around colleagues. It’s all about creating an environment where every member of your team can thrive and bring something to the table, not just the outspoken few. Sometimes, the most talented members of your team are those that have to work harder at interpersonal skills.

If you can set up relationship building activities, you will be able to create a welcoming environment. This should be the primary goal for all team leaders, regardless of industry: build a strong team culture and results will follow.

What causes a lack of communication in the workplace?

Several underlying issues could cause a lack of communication across your team, but ultimately, it all stems back to team culture. As a team leader, you need to establish strategies to boost cross-team communication by improving the workplace culture.

A persistent lack of communication in the workplace will limit team effectiveness. This means less decisive action on key issues which often can adversely impact company-wide objectives.

There are many ways in which a lack of communication in the workplace can present itself. Most of the time, it’s first evident in oversights and easily preventable errors. While there may not be an obvious lack of communication, it’s important to dig a bit deeper at team members’ communication patterns.

Why are Relationship Building Activities important?

A friendly piece of advice: do not underestimate the value of relationship building activities for the workplace. The idea of setting up activities to bring your workforce closer together may seem trivial at first, but the potential value of these activities quickly becomes clear.

Here be some key statistics on the value of relationship building activities:

• 75% of employers rate teamwork and collaboration as very important, yet only 18% of employees get communication evaluations at their performance reviews.
  

• Up to 80% of businesses use social collaboration tools for enhancing business processes.
  

• 39% of surveyed employees believe that people in their organization do not collaborate enough.
  

• 86% of employees and executives cite lack of collaboration or ineffective communication for workplace failures.
  

If the groundwork isn’t in place, how can you expect the team to communicate effectively? Some of the most talented workers on the planet are introverts. This means they may find it more challenging to build rapport with other members of the team. With this in mind, it’s critical to actively create situations through relationship building activities to get them talking to the rest of the team.

Relationship building activities do not have to take hours to set up. With tools like Water Cooler Trivia, the process can be super straightforward for launching trivia quizzes to your team in just a few minutes. Even for team leaders who are short on time, there are plenty of plug-and-play tools on the market for relationship building activities.

No matter how busy your team is, you need to set aside time for relationship building activities. Some team leaders like to set up relationship building activities on lunch breaks, but we’d caution against that. Lunch breaks are a time for team members to take a breath and relax. Relationship building activities shouldn’t cut into this time.

What are the effects of poor communication?

The effects of poor communication in the workplace can be widespread, hence the responsibility of leaders to ensure there is a consistent stream of communication between team members.

Otherwise your team could get into a funk. Not just any old funk, but a muddled and rhythmless one. Unlike this very rhythmful funk. So hey, maybe today’s the day to start investing a small amount of time into setting up relationship building activities for the workplace. With Water Cooler Trivia, you can send fun trivia quizzes to team members in just a few minutes.

These trivia quizzes can be tailored to the interests of your workforce to spark conversations and competition. Ultimately, effective relationship building activities will get team members communicating with each other and this will help to foster relationships in the workplace.