Teamwork Skills

Sharing Best Practices

Individually, in small project teams, or departmentally we work to accomplish goals which ultimately achieve the greater goal or mission of the organization. Or do we? Is our desire to be successful as individuals getting in the way of the greater goal – a successful organization?

Transferring knowledge or sharing "best practices" between project teams, departments as well as individuals in the organization is an invaluable way of saving time and resources while increasing production and profits. It's also a great way to pass on teamwork skills.

Unfortunately, in many organizations, sharing best practices does not happen as readily or as frequently as it could. Duplicating efforts, repeating avoidable mistakes, not building on previous successes can be greatly minimized if not eliminated altogether by sharing best practices.

In our popular multitasking program, Pursuit small teams compete against the clock and each other for points toward a collective company score. Though one goal is to come out on top as a team, we don't want to lose sight of helping the other teams and ultimately the organization to also come out on top! Though there are many opportunities for inter-team collaboration throughout Pursuit, having a tool to facilitate the sharing of useful information works as a catalyst.

The "Knowledge Transfer" instrument is available at each activity station throughout Pursuit for teams to share best practices. Once a team has completed a challenge, they then reflect on what helped them to be successful. Leaving this information on the knowledge transfer sheet allows each team to build on the successes and learn from the mistakes of the other teams.

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