Hello, everyone. Welcome to "Strengthening the Team." This is the next topic in the 2024 Deer Oaks Leadership Certificate Webinar series. I'm Greg Brannan from Deer Oaks. Great to be with you today.

To remind you, this is a four-part series that began back in February with our first quarterly session, which was "How to Use Employer Recognition to Increase Productivity." Today, of course, is "Strengthening the Team." The third installment will come-- will take part on August 26. It's called "Moving From Manager to Leader." And we will conclude this series in November, on November 18, "How to Effectively Delegate Tasks and Responsibilities."

Now, to earn the Deer Oaks Leadership certificate this year, you have to attend all four of those sessions-- the one in February, today's, the one in August, and the one in November-- either live or by viewing the recorded webinar on demand. Either way is fine.

And so, again, to let you know how you qualify for that webinar, or for that certificate, the Deer Oaks Leadership Certificate, is you needed to have attended "How to Use Employer Recognition to Increase Productivity" in February. If you missed it, you can still take advantage online and view that on your own time.

If you need the link to the recording for that session, again, "How to Use Employer Recognition to Increase Productivity," it aired on February 26. All you have to do is hit Reply to your GoToWebinar invitation for today and ask our staff to please send you the recording link for February 26 webinar. We'd be happy to send it to you.

And then, of course, you're all here in person today for "Strengthening the Team." And if you want to go on and complete the series, "Moving From Manager to Leader" is scheduled for August 26. And "How to Effectively Delegate Tasks and Responsibilities" is scheduled for November 18.

If you don't have the registration links for those sessions, again, just hit Reply to your GoToWebinar invitation for today and let our staff know that you would like to be sent the link to either the "Moving From Manager to Leader" webinar in August and/or the "How to Effectively Delegate Tasks and Responsibilities" webinar in November. We'd be happy to send you those links. Thank you, folks.

Now, before we get started, I want to make sure our technology is working for us. If you can locate the Raise Hand icon in the GoToWebinar software in the upper right hand corner of your screen-- if you can see the slides clearly and hear my voice clearly, can you please click on the Raise Hand icon now?

Again, folks, if you can hear the slides-- or see the slides clearly and hear my voice clearly, could you please click on the Raise Hand icon now? That lets me know we're good to go technology-wise.

Thank you, folks. That's great. I appreciate that. I also want to make you aware that during these broadcasts that are provided by Dear Oaks, participants are in Listen Only Mode. Which means, of course, you won't be able to audibly ask questions during the formal part of the presentation, which really should last about 30 minutes, give or take, today.

But your questions are important to me. When we get to the end of the formal part of the presentation, I will open it up for questions. At that time, please feel free to type any questions you have into the question box in the GoToWebinar software on your screen. So I'm looking forward to that question and answer session here coming up shortly.

We do have close to 200 people logged on to the webinar today, so we probably will get more questions than we'll have time to cover this afternoon. But I commit to getting to as many questions as we can. All right, folks, let's go ahead and get started.

All right, let me begin with the benefits of team building. I know that team building is something that's important to every manager or supervisor, right? But honestly, I've been in a supervisory role. I'm a supervisor for Deer Oaks for-- and I've been with Deer Oaks for the last 13 years. But all told, I've been in a supervisory role for 30 years in my career.

Honestly, it's been the exception rather than the rule when I've worked on a team where a manager or supervisor had a formal initiative around team building. I think every supervisor or manager certainly values team building, and probably every one of us here on the call today does.

But many of us don't have a formal team building program in place. We might do, you know, some kind of a one-off team building event, like take the team out to lunch, or do a team building event, you know, where we go off site together as a team.

Or we might, you know, do you know, icebreakers and team meetings. But generally speaking, I just have not seen it very frequently where supervisors or managers have a formal initiative around team building.

And folks, as we talk about the benefits of team building, it really-- the more I learned about just how much you can get, how much increased productivity, how much increased employee engagement, how much less turnover that you will see when you have a team that's working well together, when a team is synergistic, when they are well bonded together, when they really care about each other as people, not just as colleagues, the benefits are really great.

And that has really motivated me over the last, I guess, decade or so to really, on a regular basis, have a formal focus on team building. And so I'm always thinking of what I can do with the team that I lead at Deer Oaks to keep the team well bonded together. And generally speaking, we've got a pretty well bonded team. We really care about each other as people, not just as coworkers.

And so now here's some of the research. As most of you recognize, that when a team feels like a work family, when a team is really well bonded together, when the team members really get to know each other, care about each other as people, it absolutely reduces turnover. Turnover is much lower on teams where people feel like they're part of a family.

I'm very blessed to have the work-- you know, the work family I have at Deer Oaks. And that's one of the reasons why I've been here for 13 years. It's the longest I've ever worked anywhere in my entire career. And I've been in the workforce now over 40 years, all told.

And a lot of it's because we have a really close-knit team. We really care about each other as people. You know, we know about-- you know, we know each other's lives. You know, we know each other's families. I mean, we've done a lot together.

And as a result, you know, we really look forward to coming to work together. We have really great morale. And at the end of the day, we're more productive than, I think, most teams I've ever been a part of.

Now, one research study from the Leadership Challenge says that teams where individuals are truly bonded like I mentioned a moment ago, where individuals really care about each other and like each other as people, have remarkably higher productivity. One research study said as much as 70% more productive when people really are cohesive and bonded with each other and really feel like a work family.

So it really behooves us, as leaders, to create a regular intentional focus on creating that bonding within our teams so that people look forward to coming to work every day. They feel they have a sense of belonging. They feel like they have a sense of community.

And it really makes a big difference. And that's why I'm really excited to have this conversation with you today. Because when we focus on it as a supervisor in an intentional way, our teams will become better bonded and establish more of this great, you know, work family environment that causes people to want to do their best work and to really not want to look around for another job because they're really comfortable where they work.

But there are certainly barriers to team synergy that I know you can all recognize. I mean, one of the-- I think one of the primary barriers here in the 21st century to team synergy is technology. And what I mean by that is-- now, certainly technology, I'm a big fan. Technology makes our lives easier and more efficient in many, many ways.

But our reliance on technology does unfortunately get in the way of one on one, you know, face to face bonding at times. You know, we've evolved into a world where a lot is done virtually. And again, there's a lot of advantages to that. But the fact that we're not face to face with each other as much as we used to be, that can get in the way to team bonding.

One of the reasons why our Deer Oaks team is so close together is before the pandemic, we spent a lot of face time together. You know, since the pandemic, we've gone 100% virtual.

And I can see the difference. When we were spending time together, even though we still have a pretty good-- we still have pretty good connections and a pretty bonded as a team, some of that has carried over from the fact that we used to see each other in the office all the time, right? You know, for the last period of time, you know, it's been mostly virtual.

And so it does make a difference. Now, certainly you can still maintain good connections when you're working virtually. A lot of us have been able to do that. And we've been able to maintain those connections. But it really does make a difference when we can spend face time together.

And so, again, if we're not intentional about having-- you know, having that face time together, spending that one on one time together with each other, getting a chance to get to know each other as people and really bond together, technology can-- it just doesn't afford the same use of all your senses when you're, when you're communicating. And again, sometimes it's more difficult to feel close to people that you don't see in a face to face way on a day to day basis. I know we all know that.

There's another thing I need to point out about human nature. And I know I'm preaching to the choir about this. But human nature can get in the way of team synergy. Human nature in all of us-- and, you know, we as human beings, we, of course, we need each other, right? We have social needs. Everyone has social needs. We all know that, right?

But I got to tell you, human beings are also oftentimes very self-focused. It's part of being a human being. Not saying that we're bad people, but oftentimes we have our own agendas.

Oftentimes, we are so busy doing what we want to do and what we think is the right thing to do that we're not as mindful and thoughtful about, you know, what do my colleagues think? You know, maybe I should collaborate on something rather than just doing what I think we ought to do.

And so I just-- I want us to recognize that a lot of times, just being a human being, like, one of the things I've noticed over the years is if you try to build a team-- no, let me say it another way. If you put, let's say, five or six people together in an apartment, right?

And these are diverse individuals. Every team nowadays is pretty diverse, right? Demographically, generationally, from a personality standpoint, we're all diverse. The world is a very diverse place.

But if you put five or six people together in an apartment and you don't intentionally create an environment where people can bond together and create synergy, sometimes it doesn't happen. You might have two or three people on the team will find a connection based on commonalities, right? Maybe two of the people on the team both have small children, and they connect on that level.

Or maybe two of the team-- you know, two people on the team went to the same college, and they bond on that commonality. Or they've got a similar personality, or those kinds of things.

So that's certainly-- you're going to have-- those cliques are going to form in any group. You're going to get some people that will just bond based on commonality.

But the greater team is not necessarily going to bond unless there's some intentional work done by the leader to create an environment that, you know, when people are going to want to get to know each other and build those connections, right, to have regular interactions with each other where people can bond together, have those opportunities. And so I do believe that unless there's a formal focus on team building by the leader in charge, oftentimes those bonds don't happen.

And again, then we would miss out. Remember what I mentioned a moment ago Teams that are well bonded, they care about each other, that really look forward to coming together and working with each other every day, not only enjoy coming to work every day because of those relationships-- remember, job satisfaction primarily is derived-- one of the number one reasons people say they love their job is because they like the people they work with-- but also because of, you know, the productivity factor. When we care about each other as human beings and have those bonds, we're going to be remarkably more productive.

So folks, it really behooves us, as supervisors, knowing that there can be barriers to teams naturally bonding together, creating that work family feel that makes work so enjoyable and engages people and leads to higher productivity, that it's really important that we do that intentionally.

All right. Next, I want to talk about establishing team goals. So I think this is an important, important part of bringing teams together. But as a prerequisite to establishing team goals, I really think we need a regular, consistent communication structure.

So let me go over that first. And so best practices nowadays in creating a well bonded team is to have regular team meetings. I mean, most leadership gurus nowadays really recommend that teams meet together on a regular basis.

It doesn't necessarily have to be every week. Sometimes it's every other week, maybe once a month. But it really is a best practice to have teams come together on a regular basis.

And certainly, there's a business reason to do that, right? You can get on the same page together. You can work on projects together. Everyone can be updated by the leadership at the same time. And so everyone has-- you know, has the benefit of the same information, the same communication.

But folks, I think more than anything else, weekly or bi-weekly or monthly team buildings-- excuse me, team meetings, create an opportunity for team building.

I do my Tuesday afternoon team meetings with my team at Deer Oaks. I've got four people on my team, four direct reports. And in those Tuesday meetings, we do a couple of things. One is we do icebreakers.

And so we'll start a lot of our meetings, we'll go around the virtual room together and talk a little bit about, you know, what's going on in our world. Or we'll do icebreakers on, you know, fun things to get to know each other better, like talk about the best concert you ever went to and why. You know, that was a fun one to do.

Or we've done other teams-- you know, we've done other icebreakers on things like if you were giving advice to your 18-year-old self now that you're an adult and you know what you know now from experience, what advice would that be? What would you give to the younger version of you?

So we create opportunities to do those team building events. And that starts with our weekly meetings. Again, you don't have to do them every week. If you did meetings every other week or once a month, that would pretty much still give you the value of keeping people bonded together and having those opportunities.

But make sure you don't just-- when you bring those team meetings together, don't just get right down to business. Start those meetings with some bonding time, where people can get to know each other. Go around the room and have people have an opportunity to talk about what's going on in their world.

I try to start our meetings with the bonding, the rapport building. And whether we do that through, you know, some sort of a team building initiative like an icebreaker like I mentioned a moment ago, or we do a game-- sometimes we do some games.

You know, we've done some really fun things. Like in December, we always do a gift exchange. And we'll use one of our team meetings for a gift exchange, which is always a lot of fun.

You know, we played an online game together as a team a couple of years ago, and that was a lot of fun. Of course, when we are together in person, we'll go out to a restaurant together and do a team lunch. We've gone and played top golf. We've gone to bowling alleys.

And so I just focus on making sure that our team has a regular rhythm of being together so that those bonds can form between people. And not just-- and not just do a business agenda, but give people an opportunity to visit together and catch up with each other informally, get to know each other better, let their hair down and connect with each other as human beings.

And I don't want to just let that-- because there's so much benefit to having well bonded teams, I don't want to just leave that to chance. I make sure that I have a formal team building structure throughout the year, and I'm going to give some suggestions about that here in a little bit.

But I start the beginning-- and the core of my team building approach, my intentional team building approach with my team, is my regular weekly team meetings. We'll talk more about that here in a minute.

So once you have a regular rhythm where you're meeting together, some of those meetings ought to be focused on connecting people together better, helping them function better together as a team. So bonding is a piece of it.

And bonding includes how people treat each other. I will do a, you know, once a year or so, what I call a rules of engagement conversation, which basically is, how are we going to treat each other?

And we'll start that conversation and just remind each other that we spend more time together as teammates Monday through Friday on the job than we do with our own families. At least more of our waking hours we spend together when you're working full time than we do with our families.

And just remind people that since we got to be together so much, how do we want to experience our workplace environment together? What kind of culture do we want? And usually, what comes up from the team is, we want to be treated with respect, or I want to make sure that we communicate each other-- communicate with each other in ways that are comfortable for each other, and that we don't leave people out.

We include everybody. We're inclusive. We include everybody and everything. So no one feels left out. Everyone feels a part of things, an equal member of the team, regardless of our position or our responsibility. And so I find that doing that has the team thinking about how they treat each other interpersonally.

Folks, way too often in today's busy world, when teams come together, they get right down to business. They get right to their agenda. And while the agenda does need to be attended to and the business does need to be done, the tasks need to be completed, I think it's really important also to begin-- you know, to begin every meeting thinking about, you know, bonding together and being mindful day in and day out about how we treat each other as members of this team.

It's almost like family rules, right? It's our work family rules, is we're going to remember that we're going to say good morning to each other. We're not just going to walk in and ignore each other and go right to our computer. We're going to treat each other respectfully at all times. Even if we disagree, we're going to disagree, you know, respectfully.

We're going to make sure that we're inclusive. We include everybody in all of our conversations. I find having that conversation-- and I call it a rules of engagement conversation, or you just call it, how we're going to treat each other interpersonally-- I think is a really good, good sort of a backdrop to get people-- when they're working on issues and they're dealing with tasks, you want people to remember it's not just what they do, it's how they do it, to remember to treat each other-- more than anything-- more than anything else, treat each other respectfully, with kindness, and include everybody. So that's another piece that I think is really important to bonding a team together and having that team function well together.

I also like to make sure that we communicate with each other in a way that's comfortable for everybody. Another way of having a meeting-- and I think this is something you ought to do a couple times a year with your team-- is go around the virtual room, or go around the room together if you're meeting face to face, and have everyone talk about how they like to be communicated with.

I like to say, you know, go to person number one. How can I best communicate with you? And that person maybe says, you know, pick up the phone and call me if you have-- don't send me a three-paragraph email. Just pick up the phone and call me if you've got something that's really detailed to talk to me about. I don't have the patience to read long emails.

Or someone else says, you know, I don't like to talk on the telephone. Just please send it-- send me a-- you know, send me a virtual message. Someone else will say, if it's important, text me. You know, someone else will say, you know, if you're going to send me an email, just send me the bullets, the highlights. Don't write me a novel. I don't have patience for a long email.

And I love that. I love when people take the time to really get to know how to communicate with each other. Folks, think about that. These are practical things that can help people get along better within a team and help a team function better that we might not just think about.

Sometimes I think it's almost assumed in organizational life that if we're adults, we'll have great communication skills. We'll know how to bond with each other. But know most of you would agree that that's not necessarily the case.

Not everyone bonds easily. Not everyone communicates patiently with other people. Some people, you know, will talk at each other, even electronically. And you know what I mean if you've ever gotten an email that was in all caps. It's almost like you're being yelled at electronically.

So I do think it's really important to talk about how, you know, what's-- what's the best way to communicate with each other, even what time of day is the best time to contact each other.

I was talking to-- you know, to a couple of my colleagues at a team meeting a couple of years ago. And I happened to bring up that I'm a morning person. But I wondered, you know, what's the best time of day to reach a couple of you?

And two of my colleagues said-- and I never thought to ask that before-- I'm not a morning person. I don't like to respond to emails before 10:00 AM. I have to have that second cup of coffee.

And I thought to myself, because I'm usually online at 10-- excuse me, I'm usually online at 7:30 AM, because I get up at 5:00. And that answered the question for me why sometimes I'll email early in the morning, I don't hear back until midday. But that was good for me to know, that that's OK.

And so then I became more thoughtful about sending out these emails so early when some of my colleagues are not really hitting their full stride of the workday until, you know, 10:00 or 11 o'clock in the morning. So that's important to-- you know, to keep in touch with. So just be thoughtful about getting to know your teammates' communication preferences.

Because think about that, our relationships are-- I like to use the-- I like to think about the bonding process of relationships. That relationships-- that once there's a bond established between people, how those relationships are nurtured longer term really is through day to day communication, right? If day to day communication is respectful, it's patient, it's kind, it's helpful, then those relationships will grow, right? Those bonds will get stronger.

But even if you know someone on your team and you've gotten to know each other, you've visited together a few times, but if that person, that other colleague doesn't treat you very respectfully in day to day communication, that can deteriorate the relationship and not allow it to grow closer. And so I truly believe the value of having well bonded teams that communicate effectively together is really worth taking the time to do some of what I'm talking about here today.

All right, the last thing I want to talk about is creating a team building plan. And I spoke about that earlier. But I think this is really important. Again, there's too much upside potential in terms of creating a great workplace culture that's comfortable for everybody, getting a team to bond together and enjoy coming to work every day because they look forward to being together, and then having people be in an environment where they're motivated to do their best work. There's so much upside potential, that I really believe that we should be much more-- much more intentional about team building.

And so I basically build a team building plan every year. I've been doing it now for several years. And it's really made a difference in bringing our team more close together.

And again, I start my team building plan-- and so what I'm talking about here is I create a team building plan. And I start with my regular team meetings. So I do a combination of formal and informal team get-togethers. From a formal standpoint, I do my weekly team meetings. So my weekly team meetings is really the foundation of my team building plan. That's why I make sure that I have regular structured meetings.

And they don't necessarily last that long. They can be-- you know, they average probably about 45 minutes, give or take. And we don't do it every single week that we schedule them weekly. But if someone's on a deadline, or if someone's on vacation, we'll often cancel a meeting, you know, just because we want to have everyone there for the team meetings, you know, just because we get so much benefit out of it.

But be thinking about that. Be thinking about making sure you've got some sort of a regular team meeting rhythm that's dependable, and that within those team meetings, you don't just get right down to business-- again, that you use every team meeting for two reasons.

Reason number one is to keep the team bonded together. So that's why it's good to go around the room and have everybody take a minute to update everybody else on what's going-- what's going on in their life and in their world. I think that's a very healthy thing to do.

Or doing an icebreaker and coming up with a topic like, let's talk about the best concert we've ever gone to and why we loved it so much, and give people an opportunity to get to know each other, you know, outside of work, what their personal preferences are. That's another way to bond the team together.

And so I do that. I try to make sure that the beginning of every team meeting is more bonding and more connecting people together, again, to strengthen those relationships before we get down to business. And then we do the business agenda. And so we do that. So that's the core, right, is my regular team meetings.

But in addition, several times a year, I do other team get-togethers that are very focused on team building, like in the picture in the lower right-hand corner here. And so we will go off site and have a meal together. We will do some sort of a bonding event, like we do for our annual holiday-- holiday gift exchange.

You know, we went online and did a game. We found a company that did a murder mystery a few years ago that was-- and we did it online together. And it was really fun just to, you know, play a game together virtually.

We dedicated an hour of one of our team meetings to playing a game. It was so much fun. People were talking about it weeks afterwards. It was really-- it was really fun.

And so just be very thoughtful and creative about, you know, spending-- getting the team bonded together. Again, the goal at the end of the day is you want a team where the team members care about each other as people. They look forward to seeing each other. They come to work, feel very comfortable. They feel they feel a sense of belonging.

Because at the end of the day, when that's true, people are going to be more comfortable at work. They're going to be more motivated and more engaged and much, much, much, much, much less likely to look for a job somewhere else because they're really comfortable with the people that they work with. Remember, again, folks, the number one driver of job satisfaction is, I like the people I work with. And so really important to do this in a very intentional way.

All right, folks, now I know I covered a lot in a very short, short period of time today. But again, remember, at the end of the day, you want to have-- you want to make team building intentional. Have a plan. Have regular team meetings.

And then schedule throughout the year several other team building events. One a quarter is a nice way to do it. I try to think about something along those lines. Where, in addition to our regular meetings, maybe we go out to lunch one quarter. The next quarter we go bowling, and so on and so forth.

But just to make sure you've got a really nice rhythm of team meetings where people are bonding before they get down to business, and then-- you know, and then events where the team's getting off site and connecting together, or doing something that's a really fun team building event online-- whatever works for you and your team and your environment.

Because at the end of the year, think about this, if you've got team meetings-- because we probably do, I'd say probably 40 to 45 team meetings a day, all told-- team meetings a year, I'm sorry. And then we do another at least two or three in additional, you know, team bonding events or team building events like I mentioned.

So altogether, I've got the team together, you know, it could be 45, 48 times a year, where we're really bonding together. And over the last couple of years, I can really feel the difference. When we're together, we really care about each other. It feels good to be together. I look forward to being with the team.

We've really built really strong relationships. We have very low turnover, and some of it's because we've really taken the time to bond together and we enjoy working together. And so I truly believe that we are experiencing that higher productivity that comes from-- and lack of turnover and higher level of motivation that comes from proactively team building and building that team-- you know, that work team environment that I'm talking about here.

All right, folks, let me open it up for questions. We have plenty of time today for questions. So if you have any questions, please type your questions into the question box in the GoToWebinar software. You'll find that on your screen.

All right, here's one question. I've inherited a team with long standing mistrust of management and almost an inherent trauma through previous mismanagement. All right, this is a good question. How can I break through to them and get buy-in towards driving the organizational culture forward? That's such a good question.

Now, a couple folks said that they had some audio issues for-- let me do a sound check before I answer these questions, folks. Let me do a quick sound check. If you could again use the Raise Hand icon in the GoToWebinar software-- if you can hear me clearly right now, could you please click on the Raise Hand icon and just double-- so I can double check that we've still got good audio. A couple of folks had said that there was an audio issue there for a bit.

OK, it looks like we are back online with audio. That's great, folks. And I'm sorry for any technical difficulties. But it does look like we are good to go technology-wise.

All right, so let me get back to that first question. Again, folks, if you have any questions, we've got plenty of time. Please type your questions into the question box in the GoToWebinar software on your screen.

So the first question again is, I've inherited a team with long standing mistrust of management and almost an inherent trauma through previous mismanagement. How can I break through to them and get buy-in towards driving the organizational culture forward? That's such a good question.

So, folks, let me remind us all that even if previous management-- the previous management was in place, and there's some morale issues in a team because that previous management wasn't doing a good job of leading or wasn't really creating an environment where people were really bonded together, a new supervisor coming in has an opportunity to create a new environment just by doing some of what we've done today.

So the first thing I would do, if I was coming into a team-- and I have inherited teams in the past where there wasn't great morale, where there was some baggage from the past.

And one of the things I did was I really first started meeting one on one with everybody on the team and really getting to know them, and letting them know that I was really interested in doing everything I can to make-- you know, make their job as-- make them feel as supported and cared about as possible and to help create an environment where they could really thrive, and asked them what I could do to help make that happen for them. So I would start with one on one meetings with people.

And then I'd start meeting-- when I start with the team meetings, I would be talking about a lot of what we're talking about today, is, hey, you know, we got a new fiscal year-- for those of you on a 7/1 fiscal year, for example, July, 1 fiscal year, I'd start meeting with people and say, hey, you know, we got a new fiscal year coming up.

And especially if wanted to do a reboot of the team that I knew that I had taken over that used to have some morale issues and be able to say, hey, we've got a new year-- new fiscal year starting. Let's talk about creating the best environment. I know there's been some challenging times in the past, from what people have told me. I respect that.

But I want to tell you that I'm committed to creating an environment here in partnership with you all that will enable us to thrive. So what can we do together to create the best environment for all of us here so we truly enjoy being together day in and day out here on the job?

So I would try to do a reboot and really work with the team and come-- you know, come up with a plan. What could we do in terms of how we communicate together, the kind of environment that we should establish?

Because think about it, creating a team environment, yes, the manager does set the tone, but everyone on the team is part of that environment. So we can all partner together. That's how I would go about it. I'd go about-- I'd do-- you know, I'd do one on one meetings with everybody and try to get some input from everyone and let them know my commitment to creating an even better workplace environment, the most comfortable one possible, where they could thrive.

And then I would partner together with the team to come up with, how are we going to treat each other? You know, what kind of environment do we want to have here? How are we going to communicate with each other? And just start to create that new positive vibe and energy that, hopefully, people over time will start to trust and start to enjoy.

Thank you. That was a great question. Got lots of other questions coming in.

All right, here's another good question. How do you get someone on your team to partake in outside bonding sessions? We've had several, and they just don't want to join. We're all basically new in our roles.

That's a great question. So every team is going to be a little different. And so some teams, you may not want to get-- they may not want to go out after hours. Or they may not even want to get away from the office for lunch. Everyone's going to be a little bit different.

So I think that the idea is to work with the team and say-- and I really do think, you know, having a little bit of a retreat-- and you can call it a-- it doesn't have to be an offsite retreat. It can be an internal retreat, where, OK, guys, you know, we got a new fiscal year coming up. Or, you know, for next year or moving forward, I really want to create a, you know, a more positive energy here for all of us.

And I know I've tried to do some team building events, and I know that folks weren't very enthusiastic about joining those. We're all busy. And folks didn't want to do-- you know, do stuff on their own personal time, which I respect.

But what I would like to do is I would like to schedule a couple hours next week. And let's pick a day that is most convenient for all of us. And let's spend some time together.

And let's figure out what kind of environment we want here together and how we're going to nurture that. Are we going to do just regular team meetings and use our team meetings to bond together and be on the same page together with the work? Or do we want to go to lunch once a month?

But let's work together and come up with a plan for how we can spend time together, communicate effectively together, and build a good environment for all of us in a way that's comfortable for everyone. And you may find that your team just, it would be fine doing that, by doing bi-weekly team meetings, right?

I don't even force the frequency of meetings on people. If people are saying weekly is too much, I'll back off to once every other week. I think it's more important that the team has a voice-- to a degree, right? I mean, as the supervisor, you know, you do need to lead and make decisions when you need to make decisions.

But I do feel like if you can, work with the team and help the team. Get the team to help you decide, what's the communications rhythm? How often do we meet? Where should we meet?

You know, so that they buy in and take ownership of it. So it'll just-- you'll establish that rhythm moving forward that'll create that better environment for everybody. Thank you. Great question.

All right, let's continue. We got a lot of questions coming in. Thank you, folks.

All right, I have a great-- here's another one, very similar. Let's see. I'm trying to find questions that are-- oh, here's a good question. Do you make team building mandatory and you require people to attend, or do you leave it optional?

I make it a part of our meetings. I do. I just feel like that people need to make-- you know, they need to make a commitment. If they're a team member, they need to make a commitment.

Now, again, I don't ask people to spend time after hours. I don't. I mean, that's their personal time.

But I do give people input into how we're going to do our team building-- you know, when it's going to be, how often, where the event going to take place or whatever. So I give them input. But I do require that everyone take part. And that's worked out.

And I've had my share of dissenters, of people over time that said, I don't want to-- I don't want to-- I just want to do my job and go home. I recognize that. But I'll pull that person aside one on one and say, hey, you know, I appreciate that this is not your thing.

But if you can please humor me here, I really feel like the energy we have together as a team is really important to everyone's-- to the culture here and everyone's comfort level and our personal-- you know, and our personal and team productivity. So I'm going to ask you to please participate.

You know, you have an input as to where the participation event occurs. And so we'll make it work. We'll make it a win-win for you. But I do need you to participate, is kind of how I've approached that in the past. And people generally come around, especially if you give them a voice and make them a part of it.

OK, here's another one. I have a very quiet team. It's really hard to get anyone to volunteer for anything or even show up for fun events. In meetings, even if my energy is high, some of my team members are just kind of there.

Folks, I can relate to that. I'm a high energy guy. You can tell just from being with me on this call today. But sometimes I'll be-- I'll say, hey, what do you guys think? And I'll hear crickets, right?

But what I've come to recognize is as long as I'm giving-- as long as I'm giving the team a voice-- so you do have to adjust your style to the style of the people that you're working with, right? I mean, I can't change who I am. I'm an extrovert, and I'm going to I'm going to bring enthusiasm. But I can tone it down a little bit.

And I do have a couple of more introverted people on my team at Deer Oaks. And so I do-- I do tone it down a little bit and I rein it in a little bit. And I talk a little bit less in those meetings and give people more of an opportunity to give input-- just because I don't want to dominate the conversation because I tend to be, you know, too verbose, as you can all tell.

So I do think it's wise to-- you know, to adjust your approach. Communications 101 says, good communication is when the center of an interaction or the initiator of an interaction is willing to adjust their style to what's comfortable for the audience or the other person. And so we do need to be willing to adjust our style.

But find a-- find a rhythm. Work with the team to find a rhythm. Maybe it's meeting less frequently, you know, maybe once a month. You know, people will back off of their complaints a little bit and be OK doing it once a month instead of every other week.

But find a frequency, find a style. Find an approach, you know, a way to structure those meetings that people can-- that will at least work for people. And again, give them some input, because people typically will be more amenable to contribute if they feel like they've had some say. Thank you. These are really good questions.

Here's another good one. Is it OK to ask your staff what they think you could do better? Absolutely. I think it's a great question. And I would do it one on one. I wouldn't set yourself up to be grilled in a team meeting.

But one on one, I think, it's perfectly appropriate to ask someone, you know, I know I'm your supervisor, and I just want to make sure that I'm doing everything-- that I'm providing the kind of support you need. Or what could I be doing to provide better support for you or more support for you? I think it's absolutely appropriate to give people some input into that.

I did that with one of my direct reports a while ago, and she had some really good input. And I was able to make some adjustments for her. And so I do think it's a good idea from time to time.

All right, we got time for maybe one more question. I'll tell you what? I got two more questions, so time for two more.