The effectiveness of corporate teambuilding programs
When the acquired company car, or the company moved to a new office - usually known how long it will pay for itself (at least in theory), and how then will bring profit to the exhaustion of the resource. From this one can calculate the cost-effectiveness of design - the ratio of the estimated revenue to the cost, expressed as a percentage. The value is quite specific. On its basis we can conclude - what more profitable to invest money at the moment.
And when will pay (and pay off if at all), for example, a corporate "Health Day"? Thing quite immaterial, and comparable in cost to corporate cars, and even a few. The most interesting, of course, know the answer to this question before deciding on the event. But it is, in fact, the most difficult question, and the answer in most cases - "someday." So, unfortunately, nothing but the general theoretical considerations about the percentage of GDP for investment in staff in the US, Europe or Japan, and left without hope information that the average payback period of investment in staff from 10 to 25 years, modern economic thought does not offer.
But there is less global, but no less important questions to which you can still find a meaningful response:
- What determines the effectiveness? - Knowing the answer to this question, it is possible to make every effort to maximize efficiency.
- Was it worth it? - Determine the effectiveness of "after the fact" of course, is not so interesting - money that will never come back, but there are real methods to evaluate the effectiveness of the completion of the event.
To start conditionally divide all teambuilding program into two classes - Activities and Training (division is rather conditional):
Training (Training)
The goal - to accomplish specific tasks communication, roles, leadership
A small (up to 30) the number of participants
There are objective prerequisites for training: the crisis of the interaction, the influx of new employees , the start of a difficult project
Employee participation necessarily
During the game the participants have the opportunity to discuss their mistakes and offer new options
process supervised coach
Leaders necessarily change - all employees can stay in leadership roles
There is a realization of synergies *
opened and resolve conflict
After the game, the analysis of the successes and failures, give feedback, conclusions, written report
At the end of the training staff immediately go home
Active Life Purpose - a general increase in the corporate spirit, increase employee loyalty
Great (500-600), the number of participants
There is a date by which it is possible to coincide with the corporate field trips and an active program
Participation of voluntary
During the game there is a spontaneous interaction
process supervised instructor or leader
The leaders are determined spontaneously and sometimes seize power for the entire period of the game
There is a synergy * < br> Group avoids conflicts
After the game, formed an information stand-report with photos
At the end of games arranged buffet, fireworks, dancing
* the so-called "synergistic effect" - the most important and fundamental difference, which gives the command form of work of considerable value - is that taken into account and compensated strengths and weaknesses of the team members, so that it can solve the problems of a more complex level than each of its members individually.
ACTIVITIES
The efficiency depends on:
- on the correct format of the event, place and time.
The event format should be chosen taking into account the specifics of the company (or part of the company for which organized the event):
sales managers more suitable format competition and healthy competition, management - tasks for the display of leadership and organizational skills, and here, for example, programmers (IT-department), sometimes it's better not to organize competitions, and joint leisure and opportunity to socialize in a relaxed and informal atmosphere. You should also take into account the specifics of the company's business.
- From the preliminary preparation of competent participants:
Moral - generate interest in the event, bring some intrigue to achieve initially positive attitude of participants, that is, hold the "internal public relations".
Technical - parties must provide, where, and how much they are going to have a matching set of clothes and shoes and so on. & thinsp; d.
- the general situation in the company. There are times when teambuilding at least useless - if employees are experiencing about their future in the company (at the moment of the Reformation of the enterprise, change of ownership or management, and so on. & Thinsp; d.)
- It may seem trite, but the success of the event depends of the total income of employees in the company - participants must not have thoughts such as "would be better if the award was given".
- the professionalism and experience of the organizers. Besides the obvious things, then you can select one aspect - the love for their work. Subjective, but, in my opinion, is quite important.
How to evaluate:
As a basic evaluation of the effectiveness is usually considered the presence of participants' interest and the lack of tension and conflict. That is, the event should appeal to participants, and everyone, even if in the process encountered some difficulties. By the way, regardless of whether the participation of voluntary or mandatory.
Another general criterion - how long and what participants remember the last event. The first feedback makes sense to ask a week later (when the dust settles and the review will be more or less objective), then in a month, six months and a year. If participants still have good memories in a year - the event was successful.
In this light, it is necessary to remember two things that make a subjective assessment of emotional little more objective:
- Any joint empathy to some extent rally team. The effect of the measures aimed at team building, must be clearly above the effect of the collective trip to the restaurant, bowling and so on. & Thinsp; d.
- There will always be "the cost of missed opportunities." Simply put, the difference between what "would be in the ideal case" and it really is - there is a direct loss. With a really good result, a rough estimate should not reveal major differences.
TRAINING (TRAINING)
Everything related to leisure, applicable to training in full.
Also:
The efficiency depends on:
- from the respective goals of the training real-world problems that require solutions.
Since unlike active recreation training decides not common, "prevention", and quite specific tasks causes the need for training should be identified, and the tasks are defined and clearly stated.
For a simple illustration we present the basic components of effective teamwork:
1. The presence of sense (business necessity) the existence of the team. Clear overall goals and strategy. The answer to the question "why the team?"
2. The right people in the right roles.
3. All team members have the necessary skills to achieve the objectives.
4. Decision-making processes and to build an effective communication.
5. Motivation and attitude to work together to achieve common goals.
Accordingly, any activities designed to help the team, should be based on a clear understanding of which of the components of the effectiveness (or some combination thereof) needs to be improved. Before you try to improve something, you need to understand exactly what needs to be improved.
For example, what is the point to increase the cohesion of the team, if the problems are related to the fact that the key positions "wrong people"? Probably the first to assess the costs and form the "right of the team", and only then proceed to the "cohesion". By analogy, it can be assumed that an attempt to motivate people to work together to fail when there is no clear purpose (business necessity) the existence of the team.
How to evaluate:
Again, all that is true for active recreation can also be used to evaluate the training. But there are methods to evaluate the effectiveness of a more objective and, if necessary, quantitatively:
Kirkpatrick Levels The first addressed the issue Donald Kirkpatrick at the end of the 1950s, he formulated the now famous 4 levels.
Level 1 - Reaction - what is the reaction to the student's learning itself?
Level 2 - Education - what the student has learned during the training?
Level 3 - Behavior - how much has changed the behavior of the student after completing the course? - it is the application of acquired skills and knowledge in the workplace.
Level 4 - Results - how to increase the efficiency of the company as a result of completing the course?
Note that the effectiveness of active rest, we evaluated solely in terms of 1.
In his book, "Evaluating training programs: The four levels" (Evaluating Training Programs: the Four Levels), published in 1994, Kirkpatrick thought that the evaluation of the results at a higher level on a scale of success, requires considerably more effort and resources, than at a lower level, ie. & thinsp; e. Level 1 estimate is easier and cheaper than at level 4. This is the main argument (made Kirkpatrick personally) in favor to evaluate training at level 1 in 95% of cases, and only 5-10% estimate it at 4.
Level 5 - return on investment (ROI)
4 level Kirkpatrick does not answer the question of whether the cost of the training. In 1991, Jack Phillips (Jack Phillips) added to the system level 5 called return on investment (ROI, Return of investment - financial measure commonly used to assess the effectiveness of investment in virtually all areas of economic activity). In general, the ROI is the ratio of profit to investment (cost). The question, which is set at this level: Did the training funds invested in it?
ROI, in fact, and is cost-effective training in its purest form. But calculate it into practice is not so easy if objectively calculate the cost is still possible, how to calculate exactly the profits that resulted from the training?
The most obvious way - to compare sales before and after. The data can be extrapolated to the year, calculate the difference and get the desired return on training.
But in reality, the learning outcomes do not always manifest themselves immediately, eventually overlapping results from other influences.
In order to minimize the distortion in the calculation, it is possible taken as a unit of measurement parameters, to a lesser extent dependent on external factors and more - on the professionalism of the employee. Calculate the difference in the average results before and after training and transferring them in any way in terms of money, we obtain data that can be extrapolated for the whole year and substituted into the formula for calculating ROI.
Such factors may include, for example, the number of appeals in service, first time you perform a certain operation and the number of mistakes and so on. & thinsp; d.
If the calculations are always worth remembering that all the results will have to somehow interpret, make assumptions, and so rounding. & Thinsp; d., Ie the final
performance evaluation will always be based not only on mathematics, but and intuitive management and execution of the main requirements of the project "results = tasks".
The article used materials:
Anastasia Ivanova: "Field Training: Training or leisure?"
Paul Bezruchko "How to improve the efficiency of the team?"
Martin Shmalenbah "Evaluating the effectiveness of training"
Director of "Team Building Club"
Nicholas Zagrebel'nyi
For the magazine "Corporate leisure and training"