To foster better teamwork and communication, try implementing ice-breaker questions, company social events, and coffee chats:<ul><li>What are your hobbies outside of work?</li><li>What does your perfect day off look like?</li><li>Who is your favourite artist?</li><li>What is your favourite genre of music?</li><li>Do you like to travel?</li><li>Where have you travelled to?</li><li>If you could meet any historical figure, who would you meet?</li><li>If you could live in another generation, which one would you choose?</li><li>What is your favourite restaurant?</li><li>What is your least favourite restaurant?</li><li>Would you rather be able to fly or be invisible?</li></ul>

Foster better teamwork

While doing lots of work shows your commitment to the company, taking on more than you can handle can affect your mental health and quality of work. How to say “no” when our bandwidth is stretched to its max:<ul><li>Assess the request</li><li>Know your priorities</li><li>Be straightforward and authentic</li><li>Bring up an alternative solution</li><li>Build trust with your bosses and colleagues</li><li>Practice before the conversation.</li></ul>

Know when to say no

<ul><li>Create (and celebrate) milestones</li><li>Make your resolutions public</li><li>Make it official</li><li>Set (realistic) expectations and don’t overcommit</li><li>Use the right tools to keep track of progress</li><li>Keep asking why you want to achieve your resolutions</li><li>Don’t prioritize work over your well-being</li><li>Don’t be afraid of change.</li></ul>

How to avoid failure with your New Year’s resolutions

When a company begins, there are ways of doing things that are established. And as your company grows, these processes improve. But it is important to recognize when a process is no longer benefiting the company.

Discuss issues that hinder performance

“When you say no, you are only saying no to one option. When you say yes, you are saying no to every other option. No is a decision. Yes is a responsibility.”

It is important to both ask and give feedback if you want to grow. Oftentimes, we get into a routine doing the same thing daily. To avoid repeating mistakes and learning to grow it is important to ask your coworkers and managers for constructive feedback.It is also important to give feedback when something doesn’t work. Again, if you want your team and company to grow, voicing your opinions will go a long way. It can be scary and uncomfortable voicing an opinion when it goes against everyone else’s, but sometimes that opposing view opens everyone’s minds up to what was missed.

Ask and give feedback

One of the best qualities in a team member is reliability. If your team can rely on you to get things done, they will trust you more. Being a reliable employee will benefit you because when big projects emerge that you want to work on, your manager is more likely to assign it to someone they can rely on and trust.

 Be reliable and foster trust

A psychologically safe environment is an environment where everyone feels safe to share their ideas.According to Dr. Soracha Cashman, a Cognitive Neuropsychologist and coach, “psychological safety is a capacity to feel safe to express your boundaries, trust others to recognize your legitimate concerns, speak up about your fears, issues and what needs to change – all without the risk of being shamed, undermined, or penalized.”

Create a more psychologically safe environment

The biggest distinction between goals and resolutions is that goals and typically quantitative metrics, for example creating X amount of content for the month, while resolutions are typically more qualitative, for example increasing the monthly content created. So, while goals have a concrete date or number that is meant to be hit, resolutions are more of a concept that your team wants to work towards.

How are New Year’s resolutions different from goals?

While it is easy to blame yourself or somebody else for mistakes, this is not something that is good to do. Blaming yourself only puts more pressure on yourself and deters you. Rather, learn how to recognize your mistakes and learn from them.It is also important not to blame others. If something doesn’t get done, rather than blaming them, consider offering a helping hand. You never know what other people are dealing with outside work so when you see a co-worker struggling, don’t blame, help.

Forget the blame game

Learning good communication skills is very important. There are 8 essential communication skills for leaders:<ul><li>Be willing to adapt your style of communication</li><li>Become an active listener</li><li>Be transparent </li><li>Be clear</li><li>Ask open-ended questions</li><li>Communicate with empathy</li><li>Use open body language</li><li>Give and receive feedback.</li></ul>

Improve communication

How to overcome the 88% fail rate of achieving your New Year’s resolutions for your team to have an even better year and conquer more, together.

Setting new year resolutions for your team and sticking to them will help you scale the team and foster a productive year.