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Okay, you got me!  As managers, we can’t really “motivate” anyone to do anything – at least, not in the long term.   Oh sure, we can briefly dangle a carrot (or wield a stick), but take away the external factors and poof –there goes the motivation. Rather than focusing on penalties and incentives, it’s far […]

1) Teambuilding “scavenger hunts” and “treasure hunts” are two different animals. A scavenger hunt involves the execution of a simple list. For example, in a scavenger hunt, you receive a list of objects to find, or pictures to take — all very straightforward. By contrast, a treasure hunt involves the solving of tricky clues that […]

Recently I came across this very interesting and challenging article in the Harvard Business Review, titled: Stop Wasting Money on Team Building by Carlos Valdes-Dapena In a nutshell, the author argues that most corporate teambuiilding is a waste of time.  He refers to bowling, ropes courses, and the like, and references one company which took […]

Did you know there is a difference between “teamwork” and “teaming”?    I didn’t either until I watched a great TED talk by Amy Edmondson, which you can watch here.   It’s called “How to Turn A Group of Strangers into a team”.   Edmondson suggests that teamwork is what sports teams do.  Teamwork is: –stable –a […]