Time required: About 15 minutes, depending on group size.
Materials required: One blank piece of paper for each person.
Instructions:
Notify team members in advance that you’ll be doing a team-building activity where each team member will share in one sentence or less what they value in their co-workers. (This activity isn’t recommended for a dysfunctional team. It’s intended for an average or good team that may want to improve cohesion.)
- At the meeting, provide blank pieces of paper to all team members.
- Ask each team member to write their name at the top of the sheet.
- Then ask them to circulate their paper to the person to their left.
- Ask team members to write about a work-related strength or characteristic they value in the team member whose name is on the sheet. Length is no more than one sentence and as little as one word.
No one’ is to sign their name to what they write.
- Circulate the sheets of paper around until each person receives the one with their own name on it.
- Ask each person to add one thing they value about themselves as a team member.
- Once everyone’s done, ask each participant to share any one item from their sheet. It’s okay if someone wants to pass.
The objective is to improve each team member’s ability to acknowledge the strengths of others, and to become aware of the characteristics others value in them. The effect of seeing the strengths others attribute to you can be quite motivating.
To wrap up, you can instruct people to take their sheet with them and be aware of how they might continue to look for characteristics they value in others. Let them know you may do this activity again in a few months.