Non-profit organisations don’t have a typical worker profile. This means that team building exercises are more important than ever. While some office environments will attract workers of a similar age with similar ambitions and often a similar personality type, non-profit organisations are often more diverse.
Having a more diverse team makeup means that team building is more important than ever before. Planning effective team building exercises can help to improve communication, build trust and allow managers to spot those with leadership potential.
The trick is to find team building exercises that will unite workers with diverse interests and abilities. The best way to overcome these challenges is to stop thinking about team building as a single event and start making it a regular event. By choosing to run monthly team building events, you can vary the activities to help ensure everyone gets a chance to shine and do something that they really love.
Why is team building important?
Team building helps to break down barriers and will encourage team members to get to know one another on a more personal level. Some people struggle to get to know their colleagues and this can put up barriers that prevent them from achieving true collaboration.
Team building is effective for building trust, transparency, collaboration and compassion between team members. It helps to improve problem solving and will encourage everyone to recognize the unique skills that their coworkers possess. Managers can also use this opportunity to spot leadership potential in their workers.
And finally, if there are issues within your teams, workers are more likely to find a solution if they are often engaged in activities outside of their usual work requirements.
Team building ideas for nonprofits
Non-profit organisations tend to attract a diverse group of employees which can include workers of all ages. With this in mind, you need to find a way to bridge the gap. Remember that your workers are also likely to be environmentally conscious, charity-minded and actively looking for ways to help their community. You can use these principles as the starting point for your team building activities.
Charity bike ride
Raising money for charity and getting active at the same time will always be a popular activity for nonprofit teams. The goal here is not to win, but to complete the challenge together. It can take months to train for a long distance bike ride, so your teams will have something to talk about on the run up to the challenge. This type of challenge will not only tst their fundraising abilities but it will also encourage them to support one another towards a shared goal.
Community volunteering
There are often plenty of opportunities within your local community to get involved with projects that make a real difference. Examples include things like gardening projects, helping at a food bank, or getting involved with a charity fundraiser. Teams will get to work together towards a common goal and will enjoy the team building aspect as a bonus.
Escape room
Everyone loves the challenge of an escape room. Mix up your teams so you have a diverse range of ages and personality types. This will ensure that everyone has something to contribute. Escape rooms are fast-paced and incredibly fun so they will quickly break down barriers and encourage everyone to work together more effectively.
Book club
Not everyone enjoys fast-paced or energetic team building activities. But you could start a company-wide book club to encourage those who are more introverted to get to know their colleagues. Reading the same book and then getting together to discuss it might not sound like the most engaging team building activity, but you have to remember that team building is often just about getting to know your colleagues.
When you read a book, you approach it through the lens of your own experience. And when you share this experience, you reveal a lot about yourself in the process. This is one reason that a book club can be a highly effective way to get to know the people you work with.
Building challenge
Bring out the competitive side of your employees with a building challenge. You can take everyday items like paper straws and balloons and challenge your workers to construct something with specific properties. Popular choices include the tallest freestanding structure, or the strongest bridge.
This type of challenge will test their problems solving skills and also their ability to accept leadership. While everyone might have their own idea of how to win, they can only move forward with one of their ideas. How they decide which one to champion will be very revealing about their ability to work together. If teams cannot work together effectively, they will get caught up in arguing about which method is the best.
