Last week’s blog provided alternatives for the traditional celebratory cake in the hopes of creating an environment of inclusion in the office. By being open to small changes, such as doing office celebrations a bit different, managers can encourage a feeling of community and belonging among the staff. Selecting different food items when celebrating can lead to better team dynamics as many employees may have diet restrictions which can dissuade them from participating in team celebrations.

It is important for team leaders to know the dynamic of their team and the effect that dynamic is having on their employees. These dynamics throughout your company will impact not only how your employees speak about you and the company they represent but also how your customers respond to your team.

So What Are Team Dynamics Exactly?

Team dynamics are the “behavioral relationships between members of a group [and these members] are assigned connected tasks within a company.” These behavioral relationships “are affected by roles and responsibilities and have a direct result on productivity.”[1]

How Is Your Company Impacted?

All that being said, it is obvious why team dynamics are important to a company. The attitude, behavior, and overall satisfaction of employees are impacted by the behavior of the group with which they work. How well the team works together will determine how successful the company is.

What Does The Right Dynamic Look Like?

One great example of team dynamics having the desired effect on a company is that of Pixar: “…at some point in the workday, everyone at Pixar would have to pass through the atrium. Brad Bird, then one of Pixar’s top directors, said that Jobs ‘realized that when people run into each other, when they make eye contact, things happen. So he made it impossible for you not to run into the rest of the company.’”[2] Another example of this strategy would be catering to your team specific tastes in the in-office celebrations. Including your team means bringing them together.

As we can observe from this example, and as a recent study noted, “the key to high performance lay not in the content of a team’s discussions but in the manner in which it was communicating.”[3] Communication among your team should be natural in order to be most effective in producing new and creative ideas.

Stay tuned to our blog for more tips and creative ways office managers to create better team dynamics.

[1] http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/team-dynamics.html

[2] https://www.fastcompany.com/1842891/6-group-dynamics-high-performing-teams

[3] https://hbr.org/2012/04/the-new-science-of-building-great-teams