Team Building Tips

Our team meets once a week to discuss team health issues. But we have two members who are consistently late. That means we have to spend time updating them when they get there which wastes everyone elses time. How do we get them to arrive on time?

I put a policy in place just for this, because I had more than my share of stragglers too.

In my office, if an employee misses all or part of a meeting, he/she is still responsible for knowing/using the information that was given at the meeting. The employee is free to confer with a coworker or ask a supervisor or the manager for an update, but they can't use the excuse "I didn't know" if something goes haywire.

I have a fool proof method for making even the biggest deadbeat arrive on time. I have a rule that "the last person to arrive at the meeting is responsible for taking the meeting minutes". So when the meeting starts the last one in the room starts taking the minutes - if someone arrives after them they are responsible for the next meeting. People almost push each other down to get into the room on time.

To keep meetings short (besides having an agenda) I schedule them at 11 - cause everyone wants to be done by lunch.

In our office, whoever arrives late has to put a dollar in the meeting kitty. It really helped when we started this. They don't like giving up their money even if it's just a dollar. It's rare for someone to be late these days.

I disagree with the point to give last member punishment because some times it may turn in to negative reinforcement and discourage team member and they may work against each other which is not good for team

The issue of FREE RIDERS is always big issue in team so if the team size is small then chances are good to resolve that problem

I also use the $1 late fee and it has worked very well.

We make it into a game and the rules are listed below:

If you are late, you can either pat the $1 fee or offer an excuse. The team gets to vote on the acceptability of your excuse. If okay, no payment is necessary. If the team votes that your excuse is not okay, then you have to pay $2 (that was there is a risk to offering the excuse).

All of the money goes into a kitty and is used to buy food and drinks at one of the meetings.

Lastly, the fee is waived if the individual informs me prior to the meeting that they will be late or they will not be able to attend (I also have a $2 fee if they do not attend the meeting without letting me know first).