Destination Team Building for Virtual Coworkers
One of the key pieces of any successful business is a team that works well together. While most of us don’t get to pick our coworkers any more than we get to pick our family, traditional work environments provide plenty of opportunities to build relationships. From simple daily interactions to organized office parties, it’s natural for your office to grow together.
But “traditional” offices are becoming less common. As more and more workplaces allow employees to work from home, telecommute, or build their business on a distributed team model, it’s harder for employees to build connections. When your interaction with a coworker is limited to Slack, email and Google Hangouts, building strong relationships isn’t exactly built into the job.
That’s where destination team building comes in.
How Destination Team Building Taps Into Employee Potential
Carrousel Travel recently organized a destination team-building trip to Cancun, Mexico, for a group with over 150 employees split between Minneapolis, Minnesota and Omaha, Nebraska. Many had never met each other. And that’s exactly why it’s such an important investment for a company to make.
Creating a cooperative workplace is essential to the success of any organization. Employees who can work together efficiently boost productivity. Being able to work together well requires knowing one another—strengths, weaknesses, how to encourage each other, and more—and nothing brings out these qualities more than a destination team-building program.
On their own, these kinds of exercises provide plenty of benefits. Boosting motivation, morale, trust and confidence in each other as well as the company. Employees participating feel the pressure to perform, and by bonding over a problem or activity, it allows them to make a deeper connection.
Now, take your employees out of their element and into a new location. Destination team building is one of the most efficient formats. When people are removed from their comfort zones, it exposes vulnerabilities and helps coworkers get to know each other in new ways (even if they’ve sat next to each other for years). Putting them into situations where they not only have to problem solve together, but also live and socialize, allows employees the opportunity to get to know them in a new light.
Destination team building also allows for minimal distractions. One of the first rules of team-building activities is to leave work out of it, meaning that the activities shouldn’t be rooted in work processes. Employees should be allowed to bond and have fun over the activities without thinking about their email inbox. And when team-building is done at the office, it’s impossible to disconnect 100%.
Not to mention studies show that organizations who create destination team-building opportunities, whether as part of an employee incentive program or otherwise, see higher retention among their staff. Employees feel more confident when they see their workplace invested in their success and well-being.
Design Your Destination Today
Even if your workplace isn’t using a distributed model, a destination team-building trip could be the perfect thing to boost productivity. Contact Carrousel Travel today to learn more!