Telephones ring. Rushing to meet deadlines. Ceaseless interruptions and profusion of meetings make coordinating schedules difficult. And we always seem to be playing catchup. It's no wonder that enthusiasm wanes for one more meeting. Constant demands on our time can easily fragment a team. These demands can diffuse team members' energies. When this happens, meeting everyday demands and the inevitable daily crises consume all of our time. In this environment, crises management becomes the key to survival within the system. Unfortunately, this situation occurs far more often than we would like to admit to ourselves. And when it does, our priorities limit us to what's before us each day. In the crises mode of operation, we don't have time and energy left for team building. This results in expensive and unnecessary casualties: planning, the generation of new ideas, and thinking about how our team can do far more to survive. And, most of all we lose valuable team members who become frustrated. Instead of this energy consuming process, we need to thrive and to be leaders in our field. We need to set the standards of excellence, rather than become reactors who look for others to decide our future and the direction of our endeavors. We know that we need to take time to be together. We see the indicators. Our ideas are getting stale. Brainstorming and long range planning are limited because we don't think we have the time. Perhaps we need time for a reality check. Perhaps we need some rewards for work well done. Or, perhaps we simply need some new stimulation to think and feel differently about ourselves and our projects. < previos - next >