Leader shouldn’t just be a title held by a single person on the team—the best leaders know that leadership team building activities are your secret weapons for building extraordinary teams and harnessing every member’s superpowers.
Too many of today’s leaders get caught up in their titles and status, completely missing the point of authentic leadership. They forget how essential leadership development activities and training exercises are for themselves and their team members.
Successful leadership is a daily practice that relies on people-focused skills—these have nothing to do with how you look on an org chart. As Mahatma Gandhi famously said, “Be the change you wish to see in the world.”
Let’s explore how leadership can serve as an ongoing journey of growth and how leadership training can help. We’ll touch on leadership skills, games, activities, and more. Are you ready to lead differently?
Note: this guide is for employees in general leadership positions. If you’re looking to boost your executive team’s skills, check out our executive team building blog.
How Does Leadership Affect Teams?
Leadership is all about influencing the behaviors, attitudes, and thoughts of others. As a leader, your actions are held to an unspoken standard of what’s appropriate and what’s not.
Team members learn about acceptable behaviors by observing the actions of their leaders. Office dress code is a good example of this—by wearing clothes that meet the dress code, a leader indirectly demonstrates which attire is acceptable.
In short, while employees should have access to a clearly defined dress code, they’ll likely also take cues from how their leader dresses. This is called leading by example.
Likewise, when you get your employees involved in leadership team building activities, you’re strengthening their bonds and skills. You’re also showing them what’s expected of leaders in your organization, so they know what to aim for to advance their careers.
The Link Between Leadership and Team Building
Leadership and team building are closely related. Effective leaders help drive teams forward, push them to innovate, and create a workplace that fosters the attitudes necessary for achieving goals.
By extension, team building is one of the most effective ways that leaders can develop these skills in their team members, creating an environment that encourages strong leadership.
As a bonus, team leadership building activities allow you, the leader, to keep your own skills sharp. It’s a win-win!
4 Tips for Strong Leadership
Before we dive into our favorite leadership teamwork activities, let’s review some of the essentials of strong leadership.
From productivity to consistency, each of these tips will help strengthen your foundation so that you can be the leader your team members need.
1. Do the Work That Others Expect You To Do
Actions speak louder than words. What you do, the steps you take, and the decisions you make have an overall impact on how others perceive you.
If you’re hard-working, meticulous, and dependable, you can subtly set expectations and encourage your team members to strive to meet similar standards.
Likewise, if you emphasize courageous leadership, you can encourage your team members to tap into their inner wells of confidence when they’re navigating professional challenges.
No matter what they are, your actions as a leader will have a significant impact on your company culture, and it’s up to you to show your employees what your workplace is all about.
Bottom Line: Great leaders hold themselves up to the same standards as their team.
2. Be Positive
Effective leaders don’t just hear problems—they find positive solutions. You should be able to help solve the problems your team members are facing on a day-to-day basis.
When your team comes to you with problems, they expect you to help solve them. Being positive while you do so helps encourage them to continue turning to you for help and shows them how to behave when they’re solving problems, too.
- Be a compassionate listener
- Provide helpful advice
- Follow your words with concrete actions
- When you don’t have a solution for a problem, own it and be positive about it
- Work alongside your team to solve issues
Essentially, it’s all about helping your team find solutions and working with them when you have to find alternative methods of addressing situations.
Bottom Line: A good leader can use positivity to turn obstacles into learning opportunities.
3. Be Approachable for Your Team Members
As the team leader, you’re one of the most important resources for your team. It’s important to make sure that this resource (that’s you!) is accessible to them at all times.
If you exude positive energy and a judgment-free attitude, your team will be more likely to approach and trust you with their concerns, questions, and suggestions.
One of the best ways to ensure open communication is to create an open-door policy—this allows all employees to chat with upper management whenever they have concerns. It’s a great way to build trust and transparency.
Bottom Line: Approachable leaders foster trust and open communication, which helps teams strengthen trust and collaboration.
4. Always Be Consistent
While anyone can be placed in a position of authority, it’s the leaders who can gain the respect and trust of their team members. Your employees need to see you consistently setting a good example.
An inconsistent leader sets the standard for an inconsistent corporate culture. It actively works against the goal of creating a consistently productive and healthy workplace.
Make sure you’re always doing what’s right for the team, and take ownership of situations when you don’t. Support them in developing their skills, and be there to defend them in the good times and the bad.
Bottom Line: Trust and respect are built on consistently supportive and positive behavior.
Assembling a High-Performing Leadership Team
The first step in building a high-performing leadership team is assembling the right people. Not everyone is a natural leader—and that’s okay! However, for leadership teams, there are certain things you need to look for.
Choosing the Right People
When it comes to identifying people with leadership potential, there are certain qualities to look for:
- Communication skills: Leaders need to communicate effectively with team members and others within the organization.
- Collaboration abilities: Good leaders must be capable of working together with those around them and setting an example of how to collaborate.
- Strategic thinking: Leaders need to think strategically while having a visionary mindset. They drive innovation and have a vision of the future.
Assessments and evaluations can help identify which candidates have leadership styles that will be a good fit for your team.
Diversity and Inclusion
A diverse leadership team brings in a broader range of perspectives that can improve decision-making. Everyone sees things differently, and that’s a strength you should leverage.
Do your best to foster an inclusive environment that encourages diversity. Ensure people have their voices heard and that different perspectives are valued, not tossed aside.
12 Impactful Leadership Team Building Activities
There are many ways to improve leadership skills within your organization, and the connection between good team building and leadership skills is strong.
It’s vital to make leadership team building activities and training available to all team members, not just the current leaders.
These types of activities are designed to highlight people with natural leadership abilities. Who knows, you might find that you have one or more team members who should move into leading roles in your organization!
Fun leadership activities, workshops, exercises, and training programs help employees build a wide range of skills.
Here are our picks for the top 12 leadership team building ideas—they can help team members learn to manage stress, connect with others, identify their strengths and weaknesses, and so much more.
1. Cultivate Team Improv Skills
There’s a strong link between improv and business. Improv is a unique tool to get your team to tackle challenging subjects in a fun and non-confrontational way.
At TeamBonding, we’ve designed group improv programs that train employees to perform at their best, even when faced with uncertain and volatile conditions.
This is a necessary skill set leaders must have, and it’s a great way to bond with your team!
There’s something special about the relaxed environment these programs create. After all, it’s hard to argue with having a safe place to build trust through shared laughter and fun.
2. Corporate Survivor
Corporate Survivor is a leadership teamwork activity that lets everyone’s skills shine. Your teams will work together to “save” their teammates through a variety of challenges, just like in the TV show.
Each challenge requires a different skill, giving everyone a chance to showcase their strengths.
During this fun leadership exercise, you’ll watch as new leaders emerge with increased confidence in their abilities. You’ll also help create lasting memories and new friendships within your team, which can significantly boost morale.
3. Team DNA
In our leadership development activity, Team and Leadership DNA, team members will complete their Belbin® profile and invite feedback from their colleagues.
Each employee’s profile is analyzed to identify any balances and imbalances present in the current team roles. From there, a TeamBonding expert introduces the best programs for your team members to apply the insights from their Belbin® Team Roles.
This leadership development activity helps teams maximize their work relationships and boost performance. It’s also available for virtual, hybrid, or in-person teams, which means you can benefit from it regardless of how your office is structured!
4. Leadership Stories
Investing in your company’s key players can benefit everyone in the organization. The Leadership Stories program uses the proven powers of gamification to keep even your busiest, most distracted leaders engaged.
Your employees will join small teams to compete against each other. They’ll consider a series of scenarios that require crisp, smart leadership decisions as they choose the best courses of action for each part of the game.
5. Beat the Box
Beat the Box will have your team working together for a series of mind-bending escape room challenges, putting their collaboration to the test. It also helps identify individual strengths, which is a big part of working together as a team.
This activity emphasizes teamwork and communication, which are essential leadership skills that you’ll want to foster.
6. Bridging the Divide
Bridging the Divide is a great event that will get your team members working together. They’ll have to rely on each other as they tap into their creativity to build a physical bridge for an RC car to drive over.
Your team will have to communicate and innovate to accomplish their goal, practicing key leadership skills while growing closer.
7. Team PechaKucha
Team PechaKucha (TPK) is all about building trust in 6 minutes and 40 seconds! It’s a fantastic way for teams to exchange broad and diverse ideas in a short amount of time.
TPK uses an internationally renowned storytelling format to foster trust through business storytelling. Teams get to pick their topics, plan their presentations, and share their values to strengthen a foundation of trust along the way.
8. ibuild
ibuild is one of our most fun, unifying leadership team building activities. It offers strong outcomes by focusing on language, feedback, and the importance of creating a step-by-step project strategy.
This activity emphasizes the idea that every member is vital to the team’s overall success. Participants will split into small groups, assign specific roles, and then work to replicate a model in a set amount of time while using simple components.
9. Chain Reaction
The Chain Reaction Challenge involves teams designing fun and complex Rube Goldberg devices. This activity is designed to encourage innovation, creativity, and problem-solving, all essential skills for effective leadership and teamwork.
Looking for even more fun? Try following up on this one with Corporate Crime Scene Investigation. This event involves working together to solve a mock crime, promoting collaboration and problem-solving, and it’s always a wild ride.
10. Professional Development Programs
High-performing leadership teams are constantly growing, so professional development is essential for creating and adding new members to your leadership team.
Your team should always be learning, developing, and growing, and our professional development programs are designed to make it happen.
Try introducing professional development workshops, networking events, mentorship programs, and industry conferences to engage the whole team and help their leadership skills shine.
You might also encourage regular job shadowing to help team members learn about other roles within the organization.
11. DISC Assessment Training
DISC Assessment Training is all about helping your team improve communication and cooperation by learning more about each other. It helps build the connections and trust that are necessary for effective teamwork and leadership development.
12. StrengthsFinder 2.0
StrengthsFinder 2.0 is based on Clifton StrengthsFinder Training. This simple online assessment comes with accompanying resource materials to serve as guides for discovering the true strengths of your team members.
It’s designed to put success, both in life and leadership, within the grasp of every participant from your team.
How To Nurture a High-Performing Leadership Team
Once you’ve found the right team members and the best leadership team building activities to help them build skills, you’ll still have work to do.
It’s all about nurturing your group into a high-performing leadership team, and that requires ongoing attention to several key areas. From professional development and soft skills to goals and communication, there’s a lot to consider.
Goal Setting and Alignment
As with anything in business, goals are crucial in nurturing a leadership team. You want clear, shared goals to unite them around a common cause.
Leadership and team building activities can bring your team together, help them understand the importance of goals, and see the bigger picture.
It’s also important to make sure that team and organizational goals align with individual goals. That way, team members can feel more connected to the organization, which helps motivate them to work towards those goals together.
Effective Communication and Collaboration
Effective communication and collaboration are key for nurturing a high-performing leadership team. Regular team meetings and convenient channels of communication help ensure everyone’s talking openly and often.
You’ll also want to encourage healthy debate and a respectful exchange of ideas. When everyone can voice their opinions with confidence, you’ll foster deeper trust and connection between team members, bringing in more varied perspectives and ideas.
Don’t forget to tap into emotional intelligence here as well. Understanding your emotions and the emotions of those around you can improve communication and collaboration skills.
Building Trust and Psychological Safety
Last but not least, you need to build trust and psychological safety in the workplace. Employees only reach their full potential when they feel safe sharing their ideas and taking risks, even if their plans don’t pan out.
People-oriented leadership can help you create a safe work environment that encourages free thinking and calculated risk-taking.
You also should reward success and help employees view failures as learning opportunities. This shows them that taking risks is a good thing—you reinforce that risks may lead to success, and if they don’t, they’re opportunities to learn and grow.
Extra Credit: 4 More Tips for Leadership Team Building Activities
Strong leadership teams are essential for any business, and team building is one of the best ways to foster the skills and environment necessary for them to thrive.
At TeamBonding, we live and breathe this stuff, and we just couldn’t end the article without sharing a few more tips. Here are four more of our top tips for effective leadership team building.
1. Implement Employee Engagement Tools (and Actually Use Them!)
Don’t guess how your team feels—ask them! Conducting regular surveys and pulse checks represents one of the best leadership activities for adults to improve employee engagement and satisfaction.
Many companies send employee feedback surveys and don’t do anything with them. Instead of wasting this potential, seize it! Use these surveys to make your team stronger.
This feedback can also help the team leaders adapt to best fit the needs of their team. They act as employee engagement tools to help guide your employee experience strategy, which can increase retention and improve productivity.
2. Schedule Regular Emotional Intelligence Training
It’s not enough for today’s leaders to say they have a high IQ or an impressive college degree.
Team leaders in today’s workplaces also need high emotional intelligence and empathy to connect with their team. It’s a must for facilitating healthy communication!
Emotional intelligence training courses can serve as practical leadership development activities to teach essential intrapersonal and interpersonal skills.
3. Try the Digital Innovation Game
Want to spark your team’s creativity? You’re in luck! The Digital Innovation Game is a fun leadership activity that’ll get everyone brainstorming and creating before they decide on their strongest innovation and give a Shark Tank-style pitch.
This exciting exercise helps bond teams and empower hidden team leaders to show (and improve) their skills.
4. Shark Teams
Speaking of Shark Tank, Shark Teams is another fun team leadership development activity that lets your entire group try their hand at product development, process improvement, or marketing.
True to the TeamBonding style, it’s a friendly but spirited competition that leaves everyone feeling confident and happy.
Maximize Team Potential with Leadership Team Building Activities
Investing in leadership team building activities will always pay off if your goal is to work toward a motivated and productive team. It’ll show your team that you’re not placing yourself on a pedestal as “The Leader,” but looking to do your best and bring out the best in every employee.
By creating a supportive and healthy environment, you can foster a positive company culture that will benefit your organization and employees. Remember, a title does not define your leadership qualities, but your abilities and behaviors do.
Ready to take your leadership to the next level? Want to foster high-performing leadership teams? Consider partnering with TeamBonding.
In our 25+ years of experience, we’ve gained the knowledge, experience, and tools necessary to help your leadership teams achieve their full potential.
Take a look at our events and get in touch with us today to get the ball rolling and create a team of leaders who will drive your organization forward!
