Team Development

Team building and development

Its important that teams in universities  have the ability to collaborate, to make quick effective decisions and to be supportive and work as a true team.We use thought provoking activities and tools to get to the nub of issues and help you understand each other better, get a better understanding of how your teams work and draw out how to improve and sustain what you do and the way you do it.

We work with teams from professional services, project teams and whole school teams.   Let us know if there is something you want to achieve as a team and we bespoke design sessions to deliver exactly that. We have years of experience and know what exercises and activities will and won’t work for different groups and we know how to achieve outcomes that last.

With team development sessions you will:

  • Enable teams to discover strengths and effective ways of working
  • Have perspectives to enable understanding and consideration of others.
  • Uncover the key elements of a strong team identity and belonging
  • Have agreement on priorities and conflict resolution
  • Have an enjoyable and engaging time 

Team development approach

 Our facilitation is based on recent research from Sussex University that showed team identity is the key driver of performance. We use a wide variety of approaches to facilitate the day and make sure we use activities to suit the group and which allow you to talk in a refreshingly open way. We create a safe but challenging space so people feel they can put more ‘on the table’. Issues that are often swept under the table or fears or hopes that people keep back are able to be discussed.

Case Study

university of sussex logo

Team building at Sussex University

We were invited to work with the management team of the School of Business, Management and Economics as they had been experiencing rapid growth in student numbers, a fast changing landscape in terms of expectations of students and also a change in focus of the University. The management team at the school was also growing fast and so not yet a cohesive unit.

We ran a series of experiential workshops with the management team on the following themes:

 Finding balance: Helping the team to find ways of getting things done and enjoy the journey We developed techniques to help them avoid being overstretched, fire fighting and feeling burnt out and to develop real resilience.

Acting flexibly: focused on how to build key relationships and develop collective agile intelligence. The team discover ways of flocking around projects and to work with others more effectively.

Navigating uncertainty: focused on how to deal with a fast changing landscape, and a difficulty to plan ahead. We helped the team develop ways to pick up on weak signals to respond quicker, and have agility to be more flexible in approach and collaboration to achieve changing goals.

What they said:

 “The level of engagement was shockingly high! The trust and confidence the team felt in Toby and Alistair was clear from the start, and everyone was really engaged all the way through, in a way we haven’t seen with previous training programmes. It’s developed the group from a newly-formed and not yet cohesive unit, to a team with shared experience that they refer back to and use to give mutual support outside the session. “

Sarah Hardman – School Manager, School of Business, Management and Economics

Get in touch

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