Budget for Team Development

It’s late summer, only four months until Christmas and a New Year, and most of you may have already begun (or even completed) your budgeting for 2015. If you haven’t or even if you have, I’m curious what you budgeted for the development of organizational health for the coming year?

The best time to talk about this subject is when we are in big picture mode, like we are when we are constructing annual budgets. I recently conducted a webinar on the subject of team health. What I found, as I surveyed the attendees, was that most in attendance had some degree of current team dysfunction (ranging from minor to major). I also inquired as to what level of costs their organizations spent on pursuing health for their mildly to majorly dysfunctional teams.

The late John Butler from Odyssey Transformational Strategies suggested that world-class organizations spend between five and ten percent of payroll on employee development. Those in attendance at my webinar responded overwhelmingly that most of them spent between zero and two and a half percent on this area. There seems to be an obvious connection between the underfunding of team health and the lack of development of the same.Problems are likely to occur in the coming year 2015. If we haven’t budgeted for team development or even for crisis interventions, we will be caught off-guard and unprepared to spend what might need to be spent to restore the team to health and vitality.

I too often encounter clients that have urgent needs and a lack of corresponding budget. This makes the conversation about providing solutions to their needs more difficult than it might have been had budgeting anticipated these needs. Pieces of needful and helpful consulting work, in this too frequent paradigm, are viewed one at a time and often seen as unwanted and unwelcome expenses. If organizations can become more proactive in budgeting for this area, the funds needed for this critical area are available for use.As you think about the budget you are working on or just finished for 2015, what amount did you budget for team health? If it was less than five to ten percent of payroll, how will this impact your ability to make wise choices when your team encounters difficulty in the coming year.

As we head into the holidays that culminate in the celebration of the new year, do yourself and your organization a favor and resolve this new year to invest in team health.