What is VR team building?
Team building is a widely researched topic within organisational psychology; however, it is often poorly defined. It is important to understand the topic clearly, starting with the definition of team building itself.
Woodcock and Francis
Woodcock and Francis (1981) defined team building as “the process of planned and deliberate encouragement of effective working practices whilst diminishing difficulties or ‘blockages’ which interfere with the team’s competence and resourcefulness”
Hanson and Lubin
Team building for Hanson and Lubin (1988) is about viewing the process of how a team is working from the outside and then creating a situation where team members can problem-solve to resolve issues.
Whilst there are plenty of definitions of team building, the commonality between them all, is that team building is about problem-solving and improving team function. It is a task with a clearly defined reason for doing it. Team building done well creates better functioning teams.
Why VR Team Building?
VR team building offers all that traditional face to face team building can offer but also:
- Quick change of activities at the press of a button
- Functionality and experiences not available in the real world (it would be too dangerous in the real world)
- Convenience, no need to travel, at the end of your team build you can take your headset off and make a cup of tea!
- Bring together colleagues in a way that would normally be geographically impractical to do so
- We have assessment tools in our platform that give us extra information about your team
Why is VR team building important?
With a clear understanding of what team building is, the question is, why is it important? Why is it used as an organisational development tool? Why do fortune 500 companies and medium to small businesses invest in team building so heavily?
The reason is within the definition of team building, problem-solving and better functioning teams. Every organisation needs their teams to function at the highest level possible to meet the organisation’s outcomes. Team building is an activity that helps organisations achieve this. It is that simple.
What are the common types of VR team building activities?
Communication VR team building activities
Team building activities centered around communication are designed to get individuals interacting with one another. Activities could be icebreakers or fun games which develop interpersonal relationships.
They could also be activities that are centered around specific communication issues the team is having. Perhaps the team has underlying issues that are being brushed over because team members want to avoid conflict.
Communication-based team building activities can be designed to get team members to open up and discuss issues and face what is going wrong so it can be dealt with and the team can move forward.
Problem-solving and decision-making VR team building activities
It is well known that problems arise within organisations. That is just a guarantee; how the team reacts to problems is what leads to success or failure. Problem-solving and decision-making team building activities can allow team members to improve on how they approach issues.
By giving employees the chance to deal with issues in a safe environment, they are more able to deal with issues when they arise in daily work life.
Trust-building activities
Trust is fundamental to a high functioning team. Employees need to feel like they can be themselves within a team. It is essential that individuals feel seen and heard and feel safe to make mistakes, take risks and grow. Team building activities centered around trust-building can help individuals develop trust with one another.
Remote Team Building
At Virtual Reality Experiences, we specialise in remote or at home work environments. While that is not all we do, our experiences enable remote teams to develop strong bonds despite their distance.
This is becoming more important in a world that is getting smaller, where cross country teams are becoming more popular and where more people are working from home.
We can run activities based on improving communication, problem-solving or building trust. We can run team building activities even if your employees are located worldwide or all over a single country.
VR opens up the possibility for remote teams to work better together to achieve excellent outcomes for the organisation whilst allowing individuals to maintain the work from home flexibility they enjoy.
How does our service work?
- We have an initial call, determine what you want to achieve from your team build
- We plan your session and ship our Pico headsets from one of our hubs direct to you
- We run an orientation for each of your team 1:1 to get them event ready
- We run your amazing VR Team Build event
- We arrange collection of the Pico headsets using prepaid labels in each box
What do I need if I want to book a team build event?
- You just need a wifi signal
- That and an willingness to throw yourself into some extremely engaging experiences
- A team of similarly minded individuals
My team are not geeky at all and a varied demographic, will they like it?
- Yes they will, we know this because we have a huge amount of experience working with all demographics with varied levels of interest in technology
- From this very large pool of clients, we know that people of all ages and interests and backgrounds love VR!
- Oh and we are a team of psychologists, so we are particularly good at getting people comfortable with technology and selecting the right activities for each group
- The technology is very good now, our Pico headsets are easy to use and very intuitive, we can get even the greatest technophobe moving around our virtual platform within minutes and surprising themselves with how much they enjoy meeting others
Where can we run this?
- You can run this literally anywhere, any room in your house, any room at your office
- You just need wifi
- You also need some light for the sensors to work (so a completly dark space is probably not recommend)
- Not outside, the sun can stop the tracking working, plus rain……..
Is it expensive?
No, we believe when you factor in traditional team building costs, it actually represents significant cost savings
- Cost of travel of all delegates to venue
- Time for teams to travel there
- Hire of venue
- Food and drinks at venue
- Cost of travel back from venue
- Time for teams to travel back
VR eliminates or reduces significantly all of these, a brilliantly fun and engaging team event for 2-3 hours and then your teams can go straight back to whatever they want to do.
There is also the huge reduction in environmental impact too, no travel.