Consulting · Team, Leadership & Motivation
Team Development Berlin: effective team workshops and seminars
Successful Team Development in Berlin is always a challenge. The pace of the city puts companies, associations, non-profit organisations and the public sector under considerable pressure to change. When the environment changes, organisations usually have to adjust their "inner workings" as well. For many years we have been supporting Berlin companies and organisations from the profit and non-profit sector with tailor-made Team Development processes, and with great success. Here you can read what makes our Team Development workshops so effective for Berlin companies.
Occasions for team development in Berlin
We support Berlin-based companies and organisations with tailor-made Team Development workshops. Here are some typical cases:
- new teams are forming and need support in the "founding phase"
- a team develops goals together (agreeing "annual objectives" at the start of the year) and defines the steps it can take to position itself even better for reaching them
- new challenges are coming up and the team wants to improve its collaboration further, so that it can meet the changes and any additional workload efficiently
- established teams need a "team check" to remove "frictions" in their collaboration and work together even more efficiently in future
- there are conflicts in the team that we address successfully as part of a Team Development process or resolve through conflict mediation
- restructuring has torn old teams apart and thrown new ones together – the first step of team building is now to clarify roles, responsibilities, processes and rules of collaboration, and to agree on shared "rules of collaboration"
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This is what Berlin teams need for efficient collaboration:
The basic conditions for functioning teams are always the same:
Clear task definition
("I know what to do!")
Defined goals
("We know our joint goals!")
Clear allocation of roles
and responsibilities ("I know my own role and know who is responsible for what!")
Defined processes
("We all know how we work together internally")
Defined interfaces
("We have virtually no frictional losses in cooperation".)
Well-functioning communication
("I am informed about relevant matters promptly, clearly and in good time – irrelevant emails do not reach me")
If some of these factors are not sufficiently present, teams become inefficient and conflicts often arise because there is a lack of "clear direction" and orientation.
How we help Berlin teams with Team Development
In our team development workshops in Berlin and the surrounding areas, we ensure that
- the team goals are clearly defined and transparent
- roles and areas of responsibility are distributed appropriately and sensibly according to skills, inclinations and volume of work
- processes are optimised and interfaces are clearly defined
- efficient communication tools are used and the team has a sufficient number of "communication arenas" to coordinate regularly
- team meetings are used efficiently and only relevant topics are dealt with there
- conflicts are dealt with promptly and purposefully (because they always offer real development opportunities for the entire team!)
- there is a clear team code of conduct for efficient and meaningful cooperation and a commitment within the team
- your team develops an action plan to achieve the set goals within the given timeframe
- overall, there is a good team culture and a good atmosphere in the team, and the team members and managers enjoy coming to work.
We use effective methodologies, e.g. from systemic Team Development or helpful approaches from Gestalt therapy.
Models such as the "Team Development Clock" are also often helpful when teams and their leaders reflect together. It gives answers to questions such as
- which phase of Team Development is your team in at the moment,
- what are the acute and latent challenges in collaboration
- what kind of leadership is needed now,
- what are the next sensible steps in the Team Development process
Team development Berlin - exemplary tools
The typical four phases of Team Development according to Tuckman
You have probably seen this model of the "classic" 4 phases of Team Development ("Tuckman's Team Development Clock") somewhere before. It provides guidance on typical Team Development processes and indicates what teams need in which development phases in order to develop into the efficient "4th phase" of the "Performing Team".
The core statements of this model are:
- Every team goes through the 4 phases of Team Development.
- The 4 phases can only be accomplished one after the other.
- Only in the fourth phase does the team become a high-performance team.
- When new team members join or the task or context changes, teams often have to go through these four phases again. This can be quicker than the previous time – but it doesn't have to be.
- Some team members go through the four phases faster than others. This is where the manager's ability to provide situational and individual leadership is required in order to compensate for any "asynchronies" that may occur.
The task of leaders in Team Development
As a manager, how should you lead your team in the different phases of Team Development?
Here is an overview of the 4 phases with the appropriate leadership behaviour for each:
Forming
Features: The orientation phase, in which the group members get to know each other. Much is still unclear, performance is limited, and attention is fixed on the leader. Questions such as "What am I supposed to do?" or "Where do I stand?" are asked.
Task of the leader: In this phase leaders should give security and orientation, point out tasks, give clear instructions and check the work results regularly.
Storming
Features: The conflict phase, in which the goals become increasingly clear. There are differing views, a distribution of roles emerges, and the first power struggles arise.
Task of the leader: Here leaders should keep an eye on discipline, encourage conflict but stop personal attacks. Certain communication techniques are useful at this point. They can also maintain motivation with the first successes the team achieves.
Norming
Features: The organisation phase, in which clear structures and arrangements are agreed. Important questions are "How can we reach the goal?" or "How do we want to treat each other?".
Task of the leader: Leaders help their employees best by, for example, delegating tasks, involving the more vocal members more closely, scheduling team meetings and making successes visible.
Performing
Features: The integration phase, in which self-organisation comes to the fore. Teams become more creative and more flexible in how they deal with each other. Questions are "Who has to do what?" or "How can we reach the goal most effectively?".
Task of the leader: Leaders are now well advised to delegate further tasks, to step back and to stay open to new ideas.
Further selected Team Development tools
To give you a first impression of what to expect in our workshops, here is a brief look at a few of the many Team Development methods in our "toolbox":
01
Team compass
The following topics are examined with the help of a "compass-like" visualisation:
- Current state
- Desired state
- Areas for improvement and actions
02
Input/output analysis
Particularly suited to analysing communication and interfaces.
- Dividing the team into functional groups
- Each group states what it needs from the other groups in order to work successfully
- The groups addressed respond to the requests with "Yes, we will"/"Only if…"/"For that we also need…" etc.
- Requests and responses are visualised in a large matrix on a high wall
- Review, discussion, action plan
03
Sociometric constellations
Team members position themselves in the room in response to prompting questions
- To gather and differentiate opinions
- To make opinions, attitudes, differences and common ground within groups visible
- To "warm up" at the start of a workshop
- To gather opinions and attitudes, e.g.: "On a scale of 1-10, how far do you agree with the following statement: "…"
- To warm up at the start of a workshop: length of time with the organisation, place of birth,
If you would like more examples: here you will find a selection of some of the other workshop methods we use.
Team building or Team Development?
In everyday language the two terms are often used as "synonyms". Strictly speaking, though, team building and Team Development are different things:
Team building mainly serves to build affective trust ("I like you!"), which is certainly a basic requirement for successful collaboration. Affective trust can be particularly helpful for young teams that have only just come together. Processes of this kind can be supported by outdoor activities.
Team Development mainly promotes the building of interpersonal trust. At least as important, however, is cognitive trust ("I know that we can work together well"). For the quality of the work results this is the more important factor . Cognitive trust develops above all when people can keep having good experiences during collaboration in real working situations.
Among other things, this requires the framework conditions already mentioned above. Providing them is a key and continuing task for the team leadership, and our workshops support that effectively: we clarify or resolve the questions raised above and, together with the manager, anchor the results in the team so that they last.
Effects of our team workshops and Team Development training courses
Our Team Development workshops have the following effects:
- The team identifies with its own goals and those of the organisation
- The team has a higher performance capacity
- The team takes joint responsibility for implementing the results
- Working relationships in the team have become closer, and people communicate with each other more.
- Trust and the "sense of togetherness" in the team have grown.
→ Team development in Berlin-Brandenburg
We run our Team Development workshops and seminars in Berlin, Brandenburg and throughout Germany. In short: we come to where you need us! Arrange a free initial consultation:
What our clients say
What clients say about our team workshops
A big thank you for facilitating the workshop. We came out of the day as a team, with a good sense of togetherness and a clearer picture of the way ahead. The workshop was well worth it.
Everyone was very happy with your facilitation. The agreements we reached together are working wonders. The team workshop did us a great deal of good.
You were a real asset to our team development. Many thanks.
Your attentive, well-grounded facilitation and the inspiration you brought helped us a great deal. The team was delighted too.
Thank you for this team development process. I am glad we booked you.
The team development was genuinely excellent preparation for our strategy retreat.
A very helpful, well-run workshop. The results served us well through the restructuring phase too.
Many thanks again for the excellent collaboration, the organisation and the very good workshop results.
You prepared our workshop thoroughly and precisely. Both the method and the facilitation fitted our objectives very well. We were able to carry on working very successfully with the results. Many thanks.
Four days of workshop and still playful, creative, inspiring and well structured, with good methodology. Thoroughly recommended.
Thanks again for the excellent workshop — we have already started putting the first ideas into practice, and enjoying it.
I thoroughly enjoyed working with you, personally and professionally, and it was a great pleasure to run this workshop with you.
Team Development Berlin by initio - you can find us here:
initio Organisationsberatung Berlin
Reinhardtstrasse 52
10117 Berlin
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