Team building company picnics can be a great way to improve levels of cooperation and communication, develop productive relationship and increase your employees’ camaraderie. However, to ensure that your team building company picnic is effective, it is important to plan it right.
In this post, we’ll discuss the importance of team building company picnics and show you how you can plan a successful team building company picnic.
Importance of Team Building Company Picnic
Employees are the backbone of any successful company. It is essential that your employees communicate and work together effectively. A team building company picnic can bring your employees together, increase teamwork and collaboration and provide several other benefits. Those benefits include:
Job Satisfaction and Motivation
Research shows that about 64 percent of employees are of the view that establishing trust between senior management and staff members improves motivation and increases job satisfaction. A company picnic provides an opportunity to develop a bond between colleagues. In a team building company picnic, senior management and staff members can communicate and collaborate with one another without any hesitation.
Brings the Remote Team Together
When your team members have not met each other before, it can be hard for them to communicate. A team building company picnic brings all your employees together. This is a perfect opportunity for a team that works remotely to interact with other employees.
Improve the Weaknesses and Build On Strength
You may think that your team is strong, but there are always some elements that require improvement. Most organizations don’t invest in their team to address the need of those elements. A team building company picnic allows you to target specific areas for improvement. You can choose team building exercises and activities that will help improve the weaknesses of your team.
Planning a Successful Team Building Company Picnic
Careful planning is required for planning a successful team building company picnic. Let’s take a look at how you can plan a team building company picnic that will appeal to your employees.
1. Assign the Planning Job to a Committee
The first thing you need to do is assign the job of planning the company picnic to a committee. The planning committee should consist of members who can handle the planning task. Select the members yourself and tell them the date of the company picnic to ensure that they can make all the arrangements in time.
2. Goal of the Picnic
Most team building company picnics aren’t effective because there is no clear goal regarding their outcome. Think about what you want to achieve through the team building company picnic. Why are you organizing a picnic and bringing the employees together? Once you know the goal of the picnic, you can choose team building activities that will help you accomplish it.
3. Choose a Venue
There are several options available to you when it comes to selecting a value for your team building company picnic. There are several important things that you should consider when choosing a venue. Few of them include:
- Can the Venue Cater to Team Building Activities?
The venue you choose for your company picnic should support the team building activities planned for the picnic. Check the space available and ask the venue manager if they offer team building activities.
- Facilities Offered
Determine the facilities offered by the venue. Check the place for food and drinks.
- Food and Drinks
Check the food menu and ask the venue for sample food. Check the quality of the food and see if there is enough variety to satisfy the taste buds of your employees.
- The Budget
Some venues are more expensive than others. Therefore, you must consider your budget when selecting a venue for a team building company picnic. Check out different venue options to find a place that meets your budget.
4. Team Building Activities
The next important step is to choose team-building activities for your company picnic. From scavenger hunts to cook-offs, there are many great team-building activities you can select for your company picnic. You should choose the team-building activities that align with your goal. A few team building activities that you can include in your company picnic are highlighted below:
- Cook-Off
Cook-off is a great team-building activity to bring your employees together. Creating unique dishes together requires focus and creativity and everyone will have to interact to make something special. Divide your members into small teams and challenge them to make something special. Ask the executives to do the honor of tasting the dishes. The team that whips up the most delicious dish should be given a good prize.
- Scavenger Hunt
Scavenger hunt can be easily incorporated into a company picnic. Your team members will have to work together to find items in time and win the game. They’ll be rejuvenated after fun challenges.
- Foil-Fun
In this game, teams are given two sheets of foil and they are required to sculpt the foil into an object specified by you. This creative task requires teamwork and will help break down barriers between your team.
- Bridge Build
If you wish to develop communication, creative thinking and problem solving skills of your team members, bridge build is the ideal option. In this game, your team members are split into two groups and they must work together to build half a bridge on their respective sides without seeing each other’s bridge. Both teams must build the bridge of an identical design. Communication is crucial to this game.
Avoid Mistakes When Planning
When planning a team building company picnic, many organizations make mistakes that affect the outcome of their picnic. A few mistakes that you should avoid when planning a company picnic for team building include:
1. Not Planning Early
You can’t organize a successful team building company picnic if you start planning just a week before the picnic. You won’t be able to make all the arrangements if you start planning late. Therefore, start planning for your team building picnic early and give yourself at least two months to make the arrangements.
2. Not Inviting Everyone
When you are organizing a team building company picnic, invite everyone. If you fail to invite all the people in the company, it will have a major affect on the morale of your workers. Ensure that no one is left out when you are sending invitations for a company picnic.
3. Not Setting Goals
If you fail to set goals for your team building company picnic, you won’t be able to determine whether the picnic was successful. When you are investing financial resources into the company picnic, you should be able to prove that the return on investment was worth it. Goals are essential for a team building company picnic as they help you determine the activities that are right for you event.
4. Not Selecting Engaging Activities
Your employees will get bored if the activities included in team-building company picnic aren’t engaging enough. Make sure that the activities you include are fun, challenging and engaging. Offer a variety of team-building activities so that your team members can participate in the ones they like the most.
5. Not Setting a Budget
This is one of the worst mistakes you can make when organizing a team-building event. If you fail to set the budget at the beginning, your team building company picnic won’t be successful. That’s because you’ll be forced to remove some of the activities from the agenda when you find that you are exceeding the budget. Therefore, set the budget early to ensure that all the activities are planned well within its limits.
Final Thoughts
Team building company picnics can be a lot of fun for employees and are great for breaking down barriers and increasing collaboration and teamwork. However, organizing successful team building company picnic isn’t easy. As you can see there are many arrangements that need to be made to pull off a successful team building company picnic. By following the advice mentioned in the post and avoiding the mistakes that can have a negative impact on a picnic, you can improve your chances of organizing a successful company picnic. If you’re still struggling to organize a company picnic, then we recommend you hire a professional picnic planner.
When it comes to professionals, there is no one else to trust but Bay Area Picnic Planners. At Bay Area Picnic Planners, our professional picnic planners can make all the arrangements for your team building company picnic. We offer several team building activities and games that can improve teamwork among your employees and increase your teams’ camaraderie.
