The importance of teamwork in the workplace: a little guide
December 11, 2023
September 26, 2024
Top-performing employees spend 45% of their time working collaboratively. But we still wonder about the importance of teamwork in the workplace. Now that most of us work remotely, at least a few days a week, collaboration takes a new turn. So, today, we’ve decided to dig into this crucial aspect of a successful business.
What are the benefits of teamwork in the workplace? How can you promote and enhance collaboration in your work environment? Diversity, office design, technology, culture… Many aspects play a part in enabling teamwork and making people thrive as a collective.
But, as you’re about to see, teamwork does not only positively impact performance and development. It is also essential to boost morale, improve employee experience, and create a healthy work culture. In this article, we explain why encouraging your staff to work together is fundamental. Moreover, we give you relevant statistics about the consequences of teamwork in the workplace and valuable tips so you can also create a thriving work environment.
The top benefits of teamwork
Greater outcomes
Teamwork starts with knowing your colleagues’ values and being willing to combine your skills to reach your goals and grow together. We are not only talking about hard skills here but also about soft skills.
If you know your colleague Sarah is great at public speaking, maybe she’s the best person to pitch your new project idea to investors. But if Gina is the best at analyzing data, they must work together to prepare a great speech based on relevant data. They combine their strongest asset to create the best outcome possible.
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Contagious creativity and innovation
Another reason teamwork is important in the workplace is its opportunity to combine different experiences, points of view, and ideas. Encouraging employees from diverse backgrounds to work together can lead to a great sense of creativity and innovation among the team.
This is great for problem-solving, but not only. This also means your coworkers are more eager to develop new processes and ideas that help your business grow and thrive!
Stronger workplace connection
Workplace connection is when employees are connected to the company they work for, their job, and their colleagues. This feeling is essential to create a sense of belonging and foster a positive work environment and employee happiness, productivity, engagement, and retention.
Without a culture of teamwork and the opportunity to experience a feeling of belonging, it is difficult for workers to develop this connection. However, when people can work on a collective project, share ideas, and exchange their knowledge, this takes a totally new turn. They are part of a system where their work, skills, and input are requested and valued.
👉Read our full article about workplace connection.
Healthier work environment
Promoting a teamwork culture has a positive snowball effect on your workforce and business. Companies that highlight the importance of teamwork in the workplace tend to see employees who are happier and more satisfied with their jobs. Fostering collaboration and emphasizing each other’s strengths also reinforce trust at every level of the organization. It also improves employee recognition, a crucial aspect of a positive and healthy work environment. Last but not least, it boosts diversity and inclusion, another strong expectation from today’s workforce.
Key statistics about the importance of teamwork in the workplace
The importance of teamwork in the workplace from an HR point of view
You now understand better why fostering collaboration is fundamental. However, statistics always help us comprehend how essential teamwork is in the workplace. Here are a few numbers that highlight the benefits of teamwork from an HR perspective.
- Diverse teams perform 35% better than homogeneous teams.
- Employee turnover is 50% lower in organizations that promote collaboration and communication at work.
- The best size for a team is between 4 and 6 people.
- 33% of businesses undervalue the benefit of using social networks as a collaboration tool.
Interesting numbers about the importance of teamwork for managers
Leaders have a significant role to play in enabling collaboration and teamwork. Here are a few statistics emphasizing the importance of teamwork in the workplace from a manager's point of view.
- Teams are 30% more productive when having access to online collaboration tools.
- 39% of employees need more collaboration.
- 75% of employees rate teamwork and collaboration as being very important.
- Top-performing employees spend 45% of their time on individual tasks, 45% working collaboratively, and 10% learning and socializing.
- Only 9% of team members report that their workplace has effective collaboration tools and systems.
💡 Learn more about collaborating in a hybrid work environment!
Key statistics about the role of teamwork from a financial perspective
Promoting teamwork in the workplace does not only improve employee morale, experience, and productivity. It also has financial benefits. The following numbers give you a better understanding of this aspect.
- Profits increase by 29% when executives recognize qualitative work from a collective perspective as much as individual input.
- 86% of employees at a management level blame lack of collaboration as the top reason for workplace failures.
- Collaborating on tasks and sharing ideas is valued at $1,660 per employee each year.
Teamwork statistics regarding the impact of business growth
To finish with the numbers, here are two last pieces of information that highlight the importance of teamwork to ensure the company’s growth and success. But, of course, all the previous statistics also play a key role in this regard.
- Organizations that encourage teamwork are five times more performant than those that do not.
- Businesses are 30% more innovative when a successful collaboration strategy is implemented.
Tips to promote teamwork in a flexible work environment
Focus on improving soft skills regarding teamwork
Diversity is the golden ticket to make people thrive as a team and reach their goals successfully. This aspect is also essential when it comes to skill sets. People excel as a group by sharing their experiences and knowledge. This includes using their hard skills as much as their soft skills. Here are a few core abilities that every worker should have to make the whole team succeed:
- active listening;
- time management;
- conflict resolution;
- reliability;
- interpersonal communication;
- knowledge sharing.
Encourage knowledge exchange
Constant learning and growth are two fundamental aspects of today’s workplace. Offering training opportunities to your employees is, therefore, essential. However, another way to promote this aspect is to encourage sharing or exchanging knowledge.
For example, Chloe, from the marketing department, wants to learn more about sales. Adriana, who is working in the sales team and loves her job, could meet her for one hour every week for a month to talk about this topic! It doesn’t need to be in a formal meeting room. They can enjoy the chilling zones of your office and discuss sales while having a cup of tea!
Organize team-building activities regularly
Teamwork doesn’t happen magically. Several factors are essential to promote this aspect, such as:
- feeling part of the team and connected to the other coworkers;
- getting to know each other better;
- breaking the ice when a new team member joins;
- knowing each other’s strengths and weaknesses;
- feeling valued;
- etc.
Although all this doesn’t appear from one day to another, team-building activities can boost these aspects. This is especially important for hybrid workforces who don’t see each other daily. Regularly planning in-person or online team-bonding games and events is crucial to maintaining an employee connection. To help you do so, we’ve created the office event feature on the deskbird app.
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Redesign your office to promote teamwork in a hybrid work environment
If you aspire to boost teamwork and collaboration among your workforce, laying single desks and cubicles one after another is not the best idea. Your office layout has to reflect what you want to promote and answer your staff’s needs. The good news is that more teamwork is something that both employers and employees want. Here are a few suggestions to consider in designing a workspace that enhances teamwork:
- provide enough meeting rooms;
- plan informal collective areas;
- create single desks in open spaces;
- favor an activity-based workspace design.
Invest in tools that make collaborative work easier
To enhance teamwork in the workplace, although employees enjoy flexible work arrangements, you need to invest in the latest virtual collaboration tools, which is crucial. Here are the resources you should add to your team’s toolkit:
- Desk and room booking software enables employees to plan their hybrid week according to their colleagues' schedules and book the workspace they need.
- Scheduling app to keep track of who is working where and when.
- Videoconferencing tool to conduct effective virtual meetings with on-site and remote team members.
- Instant messaging platform to communicate easily about daily topics;
- Cloud-based document and file sharing system to have everything centralized in one place and accessible to all workers;
- Virtual whiteboards to brainstorm ideas without location constraints.
- Project management software to guarantee smooth and efficient teamwork.
The collective strength and cohesion achieved through effective teamwork are the bedrock of business success. Aside from being just a corporate buzzword, collaboration is essential to an organization's infrastructure. The benefits of teamwork in the workplace include fostering innovation, facilitating problem-solving, and accelerating productivity.
By leveraging a wide range of skills, perspectives, and strengths, a diverse team can navigate complexities and surmount challenges in ways that individuals working in silos cannot. Investing in promoting the importance of teamwork in the workplace creates an environment for sustainable growth.
Do you feel your current collaboration tools don’t do the job? Or do you need to upgrade to digital solutions that facilitate and encourage your employees to work together and bond? deskbird is a must-have to foster teamwork among your hybrid team. It provides user-friendly desk and room booking software and is also equipped with week planning and team event features.
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