If your company has grown rapidly in a short space of time, the chances are you have an office filled with people who barely know each other. This can make day-to-day communication and organisation within the business a little difficult, but what can you do to improve the situation? Your team will work much more productively and effectively if they gel well, so you need to take some steps to ensure your workforce arent strangers.
Putting a Face to a Name
An easy way to ensure people get to know who’s who is to use photographs in your email system. If you use Microsoft Outlook, you might be aware of the integrated option to add a photo to each contact. Have some professional photos taken of all of your staff one morning and have your HR team add them to the email system. That way, when an employee is emailing someone at the other side of the office, theyll be able to recognise the person they’ve been dealing with.
Social Occasions
Holding social occasions every now and again is a good way to get employees talking outside of the work place. You could hold quarterly social events where everybody goes out for a drink, or you could make it more of an anticipated occasion by putting on a big event. Either way, getting employees socialising outside of work is a good way to encourage a friendly, familiar environment in the office, which should increase productivity.
Team Building and Development
Whilst the fun stuff is good, it’s important you dont lose sight of your main priority to build an effective workforce that will benefit your company. Thats why arranging team building and development sessions is crucial as a business owner or manager. It helps to re-establish your main goal and unite everybody in the same cause, consequently encouraging productivity. Most packages, including the ones from Developing People, offer team building and development schemes that mix the serious stuff with fun activities aimed towards forming bonds within your teams, so you can rest assured that you aren’t missing anything out.
Communal Areas
Incorporating a communal area, like a kitchen or games room, into your office will allow more opportunity for staff to bump into each other and strike up a conversation during their lunch hour, or whilst making coffee. If your workforce has grown significantly, it’s probably something you should think about doing anyway if you want to keep your employees happy.
Anything you can do that gels your workforce in a positive way will no doubt contribute to the overall success of your business. So, dont overlook the importance of team bonding and building a positive working environment in your company, or you could live to regret it.
Putting a Face to a Name
An easy way to ensure people get to know who’s who is to use photographs in your email system. If you use Microsoft Outlook, you might be aware of the integrated option to add a photo to each contact. Have some professional photos taken of all of your staff one morning and have your HR team add them to the email system. That way, when an employee is emailing someone at the other side of the office, theyll be able to recognise the person they’ve been dealing with.
Social Occasions
Holding social occasions every now and again is a good way to get employees talking outside of the work place. You could hold quarterly social events where everybody goes out for a drink, or you could make it more of an anticipated occasion by putting on a big event. Either way, getting employees socialising outside of work is a good way to encourage a friendly, familiar environment in the office, which should increase productivity.
Team Building and Development
Whilst the fun stuff is good, it’s important you dont lose sight of your main priority to build an effective workforce that will benefit your company. Thats why arranging team building and development sessions is crucial as a business owner or manager. It helps to re-establish your main goal and unite everybody in the same cause, consequently encouraging productivity. Most packages, including the ones from Developing People, offer team building and development schemes that mix the serious stuff with fun activities aimed towards forming bonds within your teams, so you can rest assured that you aren’t missing anything out.
Communal Areas
Incorporating a communal area, like a kitchen or games room, into your office will allow more opportunity for staff to bump into each other and strike up a conversation during their lunch hour, or whilst making coffee. If your workforce has grown significantly, it’s probably something you should think about doing anyway if you want to keep your employees happy.
Anything you can do that gels your workforce in a positive way will no doubt contribute to the overall success of your business. So, dont overlook the importance of team bonding and building a positive working environment in your company, or you could live to regret it.