Happy teams and official getaways

Corporations taking their employees on a trip is no new news. Pleasure trip for execs and their families has also become quite common among the big businesses. These, of course, are to keep the individuals happy and hopefully, with the company. However, with global companies and teams spread across geographies, it takes happy teams to get the job done - not just happy individuals. So, whats the difference? After all, teams are comprised of individuals, aren't they? Yes, of course, but happier teams can accomplish much more than just happier execs. What exactly are these happy teams?

Happy teams have

• members who know each other by name and face
• members are ready to get started on any new task together without too much of 'scope' or boundary issues on the sub-tasks
• there is a camaraderie amongst all the competition
• ...

and possibly more. Remember, we are not talking about an ideal team or a winning team. However, a team that is happy is more likely to be so.

Now, how can we make a team happy or happier? Going by the bullets mentioned above, firstly, the team should know each other well enough. This is far more important than what team managers normally realize and predictably, it is more important in the tech, sports and service industries (Specifically, for knowledge based industries) and many other places. So, how to go about all this?Here are some pointers...

1. Create a team profile page/ document with photos where that is accessible for all
2. Always make sure a meeting/ telecon happens whenever a new member joins the team
3. As a manager, you might prefer lunching with managers or above. But, do not hesitate to join your team once in a while
4. Try profiling team members with traits. There are many tools available to help.
5. Organize team lunches, dinners once in few months. Get the remote teams join via telecon, if possible.
6. Organize off-site meetings once in a year or two including not just the team but, important points of contact from other teams that they frequently interact with. Find a good location and reveal enough details to encourage attendance

Of all these, official getaways are most important for remote teams who work together everyday. I had recently been to one such trip to Hyderabad organized by my company and I was really impressed by the location: ICRISAT, Patencheru. I never knew abc of agriculture, leave alone agri research. But, it was heartening to see some part of the world being preserved as it was without too much of human intervention. I came to understand that there are 16 such organizations in the world that research on various crops and help them thrive under increasingly difficult conditions, thanks to global warming. More on ICRISAT here. (embedded are pictures of ICRISAT campus)