Effective leaders must do more than just lead, they inspire the team to want to work together cohesively to solve problems, think outside the box and ultimately achieve (or even exceed) targets. In order to provide the direction, guidance, and motivation needed to excel in their roles, leaders need to have strong communication, time management, delegation and decision-making skills, as well as the ability to be flexible in their Leadership style.

However, these leadership skills do not necessarily come naturally to everyone. Dedication and commitment to personal and professional growth are essential, as well as being provided with the right tools and, most importantly, training.

Why Are Good Leaders Important

Good leaders are essential for the growth and development of your company, they perform a multitude of tasks while also helping regulate the following elements of the day-to-day running of the company.

• Forming an inclusive, welcoming and comfortable workplace culture
• Mentoring and fostering the development of leadership skills in others
• Looking after the well-being of team members
• Improving team spirit and cohesion
• Providing a motivational and inspirational space for team members
• Defining a standard set of goals and values and ensuring adherence
• Ensuring communication channels remain open
• Developing strategies to improve team bonding

Essential Skills Leaders Need To Develop

For clarity, let’s take a look at the types of leadership skills you might want to improve or develop. What are some of the skills that need to be developed in good leaders?

• Leaders must be able to clearly and succinctly explain, actively listen, read body language and produce clear and concise written communications such as emails and reports.
• Leaders need to inspire employees to want to perform to their best in the job. Some key points are increasing self-esteem, recognising effort and achievement and giving new responsibilities.
• Leaders cannot do everything themselves, they must learn to delegate tasks and, more importantly, who to delegate them to.
• A focus on developing a happy, healthy work environment should be a top priority for any good leader, even when the workplace is busy or stressful.
• Building trust is one of the most essential leadership skills. Demonstrating integrity and a sense of fairness are always a good place to start.
• Good leaders are willing and open to trying different ideas, considering alternate solutions and approaching problems from a different angle.
• This encompasses not only identifying opportunities for regular and constructive feedback for team members but also being open to receiving feedback about one’s own performance.
• A good leader understands the importance of accepting mistakes or failures and having the insight and maturity to be able to learn from them.
• A leader needs to follow through and keep promises, there is no faster way to lose confidence than to withdraw previously made statements or offers.
• Leaders need to be able to accept change, actively problem-solve, be open to suggestions and go with the flow where appropriate.

What Are Leadership Training Activities?

Leadership training activities are team-building exercises designed to help develop core leadership skills such as problem-solving, active listening, group management and adaptability, resulting in more effective leaders and better-performing teams.

The best leadership development activities not only give leaders the tools and techniques necessary on the job, they also offer insight into differences in people’s behavioural and psychological traits that may affect their performance on the job.

What Are Leadership Activities Used For?

Leadership activities are used to identify, practice and strengthen leadership and team-building skills. They can also be a lot of fun!

What purpose do leadership activities serve? Trying to learn how to be a good leader while buried in your daily tasks can be challenging, so setting aside time for specifically designed activities and exercises to improve leadership skills is vital to helping leaders become more effective in their roles.

Leadership activities can also be useful to aid in identifying future leaders, understanding problem areas or knowledge gaps and/or as part of a more generalised training program.

Supporting Your Leadership Team Development

Targeted leadership team-building activities are proven to be very effective in building confidence and supporting your leadership team’s growth and development by providing situations where much-needed skills can be developed, practised and enhanced. These activities can be on or offsite, physical or sedentary, but they all must share clearly defined objectives to be most effective.

Activities range from specially organised themed events and scavenger hunts to smaller office-based tasks that can be integrated into a typical work day, like meeting openers or conference break activities.  Whatever the objective, structure is the key; participants need to understand the connection between the activity and the workplace.

Top 10 Fun Leadership Activities For Team Building

However you choose to support your leadership team development, adding the element of fun will increase the effectiveness of the activity, below are some fun leadership training activities to get you started, however, if you are looking for professional guidance, the team at Stepshift are the experts when it comes to team leadership development.

1. The Human Knot. This brain teaser depends heavily on how well everyone works together. Participants need to stand in a circle, shoulder to shoulder, then place their right hand in the hand of someone standing across the circle from them. Then place their left hand in the hand of a different person (not standing directly next to them). The participants must then try to untangle themselves without breaking the chain, if broken, they must start again. This is a great problem-solving and communication activity.
2. Leaders You Admire. Essentially this activity involves participants divided into groups and discussing leaders they know or know of and why they admire them. Groups come back together for a larger discussion and communication session at the end. This is an activity that helps define desirable leadership characteristics and improves team bonding.
3. Zoom. This activity requires participants to create a unified story from a set of randomly provided sequential pictures. The participants must find a way to recreate the story’s sequence in the correct order while being unable to see the pictures the other participants have. This is an excellent activity to encourage communication, tolerance and patience.
4. Minefield. In this activity, participants are asked to blindfold one team member and then create a ‘minefield’ of obstacles to negotiate around or over. Using only specified communication techniques, for example, only being able to use the words left, right, forward, and backwards, the other participants must guide the blindfolded person through the ‘minefield’. This activity can be set in an elaborate outdoor environment or simplified in a regular office space; it enhances communication skills and builds trust.
5. All-Aboard. Participants are required to build a “boat” using pieces of wood, mats, or any other materials available, and then all must stand on the “boat” at once. As pieces of the “boat” are removed, the team must endeavour to occupy the ever-diminishing space as best they can. This activity helps to encourage communication, problem-solving and critical thinking.
6. Icebreaker. This simple activity is great for breaking the tension in a room and helps encourage discussion and contribution, creating a sense of connectivity. Participants come up with a series of questions relating to people in a general way, for instance, “Who is left-handed?” and then have to find team members who meet the criteria of the question. The participant with the most answers after 10 minutes wins. This is an excellent activity for developing interpersonal skills and communication.
7. Round Table. This activity requires four tables, each set up with a different task. Each of the table’s tasks must have separate steps that can be easily delegated among participants. A team leader is selected to communicate and delegate tasks. Each table is timed to see how long it takes to complete the task. This is an activity that helps develop leadership and delegation skills.
8. Skyscraper. For this activity, you will need a variety of items to build with, these can be anything readily available, for instance, toothpicks, newspapers, uncooked pasta, wooden blocks, marshmallows etc. Participants are required to build the tallest freestanding structure from the provided items. This is an ideal activity for analytical problem-solving and improving collaboration skills.
9. Observation. Participants in this activity need to form two equal lines facing each other; one line turns around, giving the second line a few minutes to change several things about themselves. This can include anything from swapping clothing items with other people to altering your hair do, but it must be something the other group can easily see. The first line must then identify all of the other group’s changes. This activity stimulates memory retention and is great for team bonding.
10. Survival. This one requires a bit of imagination, participants must pretend they are on a plane that has crashed on a desert island and choose a set amount of items from around the workplace that they think would be most useful to aid in their survival. Each item is individually ranked in its importance, and the entire group has to come to a consensus. An excellent creative problem-solving and collaboration activity.

Benefits Of Leadership Activities

Some of the more common workplace objectives when looking to enhance leadership roles are improving communications, coaching, planning and decision-making skills, building trust, decreasing resistance and improving active listening and problem-solving skills. Whatever the reason behind your leadership development goals, the investment will be a worthwhile one! Still not convinced? Take a look at our 5 best benefits for developing critical leadership skills that will benefit your entire company in the long run. 

• Promotes Engagement. Leadership training helps promote and increase employee engagement in the company’s mission and longer-term goals. 
• Enhances Learning Culture. Activities for leadership build on creating a workplace culture of aspiring to learn and problem-solve proactively. 
• Identifies Potential Leaders. Leadership training activities are a great way to identify future leadership potential in current team members, promoting internal advancement.
• Cements Internal Collaboration. By giving team members the chance to get to know each other better, they learn to collaborate and coordinate more amicably with one another.
• Improves Productivity. Leadership training activities aid in improving overall productivity by instilling a sense of purpose and direction in team members.

When executed correctly, team leadership activities can have a very beneficial impact on businesses, with measurable increases in both productivity and performance, as well as the security of knowing the company is in good hands.  For professional advice on your next leadership training activities, contact the friendly team at Stepshift today.

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