The more the business develops, the bigger and wider the team will be. One of the challenges faced by all companies is how to make the team solid and have a good positive culture. Thinking about culture building for employees is necessary for business development in a positive direction and has a significant impact on employee sentiment and foster brand loyalty. Thinking about the company's progress not only from a financial perspective, but also from a work environment perspective. Today, SMEbrother will discuss culture building activities that are suitable for employees and create a positive work environment.
What is culture building?
Company culture is about creating a work environment that reflects your company's values and empowers the best team performance. You can build a company culture from scratch or develop an existing company culture and ensure your efforts are in the right place. Building a culture is not easy, because every employee has different characteristics and attitudes. But as long as you can understand each team member and provide opportunities for each employee to improve, then slowly a positive culture will be built.
What is the importance of building workplace culture?
Every employee needs to feel connected to the company's mission, colleagues, and core values. Simply, employees need a positive culture in the workplace. There are two important side effects from building a workplace culture.
First, a positive culture attracts and retains employees. A positive workplace culture is employees doing things like open communication, having meaningful work, and understanding core values. As long as employees are embraced with a strong workplace culture, they have no reason to leave their company.
12 Unique Culture Building Activities for Employees
Second, a true positive workplace culture will increase employee engagement. If companies and leaders can evolve based on different needs and get employees' attitudes, then companies can solve problems without having to face a toxic culture. Every problem can be solved with the team, without having to feel hurt personally.
12 ways of culture building in the workplace
Corporate culture shapes how employees socialize inside and outside the office, how leaders treat team members, how employees communicate with coworkers, clients, or higher ups. All activities are needed for long-term success, encouraging employees to actively participate, think strategically, and collaborate.
- Professional development opportunities
Seminars, classes, webinars, lunch and learns, are some forms of training to maintain employee engagement and boost employees' morale by continuing to upgrade the knowledge of employees in soft or hard skills. Choose potential training sessions according to the expertise of each employee, and choose the right time to discuss them together so they can share knowledge with one another. Not all professional development has to be paid for, because you can start by looking for certain material in books from the library or from YouTube for knowledge about leadership, productivity, creativity, budgeting, or teamwork.
- Employees recognition
The most important thing about the comfort of employees in a company is employee recognition. Give awards or praise to workers who work hard or complete tasks well, achieve company goals or any accomplishments. Recognizing what workers do and celebrating their success will bring a deeper sense of loyalty, make employees trust their company, and stay for a long time. For example, you can do announcing at a meeting or hold a special event for employee recognition and awards, along with distributing gifts as a form of gratitude from the company for hard workers.
- A vision board party
Organize special events to give employees time to make and visualize their goals. For example, you can hold a vision board party at New Years Eve to hold a party and combine fun with strategy. Give workers time to create their ideal work environment and convey their ideas if they need something and write it down on poster boards, craft decorations or whiteboards.
This activity is a chance to understand what employees want and preferences at the office. Leaders can direct their employees to unite common desires, or provide specific suggestions so they can meet their expectations. After the team has completed their vision boards, you can discuss them together.
- Workplace trivia
Trivia night is a great way to find out whether employees have a strong enough bond with their coworkers as well as being a fun competition. Divide employees into groups, and host the trivia with typical questions related to the workplace, such as "what is the company's vision and mission?" "who is the longest serving employee in this office?" "Since when was this company founded?"
Make a trivia night by answering quickly or hand out sheets to each group. Make things even more lively by giving prizes to the group with the most correct answers. This activity requires each group to communicate with coworkers and triggers employees to know the history of the office where they work.
- Community volunteering
Creating a positive culture doesn't have to only be done in the office. You can look for community volunteering as a way to improve employees' mental and emotional health. Doing community activities will strengthen the bonding between employees to do something good and work together.
Corporate volunteer opportunities can be carried out by preparing meals for the homeless, helping to renovate community facilities, cleaning nearby roads, or trash picking in parks. Employees can also choose what community activities they want to do, such as volunteering with a charity organization.
- Giving gifts to employees
For special occasions, you can give corporation gifts to employees as a sign that you care about each team member and want to give them the best. You can give gifts in the form of hampers, gifts of experience, or money as a bonus. For a gift of experience, you can invite employees to take a vacation together to enjoy nature by rafting or doing outbound activities.
If you choose to give corporation gifts, choose useful items such as portable chargers, bluetooth speakers, notebooks or stationery.
- Wellbeing meetings
Provide a team meeting where each employee can share their experiences when they face problems at work. Coworkers can offer suggestions to help with problems, and teach each other how to deal with specific situations by talking about experiences and listening to how coworkers are dealing with the same issues.
Employees will feel calmer and have more confidence to face problems, because they have the opportunity to share their difficulties with the team, and increase the sense of unity to this network of support.
- Blind drawing
To train communication, concentration, and trust between employees, you can do blind drawing games. Each group has 2 people, the first person teaches how to draw a simple picture, and the other participant draws. This activity can be a fun icebreaker and a perfect culture team building.
Prepare paper, pencils and pictures for easy drawings such as houses, cats or stationery. The positions of each group are back-to-back seats. Start the game with one partner set a sketch and another person draw the objects. Let participants find a way to complete the drawing with continuous communication between the two until the drawing is finished.
- Two triths, one lie
This game is a conversation starter and can be a company culture activity. Each team member prepares three things to say about themselves, 2 things are true, and one should be a lie. The participants will take turns telling the group about the truth and lies. The more complex the lie, the more coworkers will use their critical thinking to choose which two things are the truth. The game is a fun approach to learn more about coworkers, and can create a team for debates and votes which part was the lie.
- Jigsaw chaos
Prepare a jigsaw puzzle with lots of pieces. Separate the teams into equal groups. Instruct the teams to solve the puzzle in limited time. The plot twist is, in each group not all the puzzle pieces are in their places. Each group must take a puzzle piece from another group.
Each group will have its own strategy, for example they will not distribute puzzle pieces without bartering, or they must first look at other groups whether the puzzle pieces for their group exist or not.
- Company-paid lunch
Invite your employees to have lunch at the employee's place of choice. Company-paid lunch provides time for relaxation among employees and discussing other things besides work. You can do this event regularly, for example once a month or celebrate each milestone with the team.
- Karaoke night party
Releasing fatigue after work is the need of every employee. You can look for specific dates to do karaoke night parties. You can do it in the office or karaoke places around the office. Give each employee time to sing their favorite song. Karaoke also provides an opportunity for employees who are often shy to show their talents, such as singing or performing in front of coworkers.
Company culture building activities are needed to create positive habits for employees to make it easier for them to collaborate, communicate, and achieve company goals. THEse activities may improve productivity and morale around the office. Most importantly, these activities are fun to do, bring joy to every employee, and create a better work atmosphere.
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