Although we prefer to highlight the employee engagement best practices of small and midsize organizations over large ones – since they create three out of every five net new jobs and are 14 times more innovative per employee than large firms – once in a while we do deviate from our normal emphasis to report on the good work that the big boys do.

When it comes to team building, Toyota appears to be leading the way, much as the company has done in pioneering just in time production – a management philosophy the "Big Three" are still taking notes on.

This article from this weekend's Evansville Courier and Press underscores how Toyota is re-emphasizing workplace team building in tough economic times like these, which are hitting all automakers equally hard.  Yet, rather than simply lay off workers and close plants, at least at the Indiana-based plant highlighted in Dan Shaw's piece, Toyota is using this time of decreased production of pickups and SUVs to help their 2,000 employees here double down on "corporate ideals and building techniques."

The result, as Shaw writes, is that even in an industry giant like Toyota, which employs over 300,000 people in many countries, employees in a single location can be empowered to improve processes, giving them a sense of ownership over their work.

Here are the core team building principles at work right now at this plant, according to the paper:

• Skills and responsibilities testing. Net results after the last few months: knowledge of both has increased at least 30% on average.
• Exercise regimen. Net results: employees limber enough to return to assembly line at a moment's notice.
• Reinforcement of value of mutual respect: no layoffs. Net results: too many to count, but high on the list is continued income for the 2,000 employees and their families, enabling them to help the local, and national, economy with their purchases – and taxpayers by not joining the ranks seeking unemployment benefits.

This article supports an underlying notion about workplace team building that is not yet universally accepted, whether among large or small firms: team collaboration and unity are even more vital in uncertain economic times.

Frank Whyte, a facilitator for nationwide employee training and development contractor Training Services On Demand, drives this point home in this press release from last week, which itself makes the case for an increased emphasis on organization team building efforts:

An organization may go through dramatic and traumatic changes, but when the dust clears, the team that emerges from the other side must be a high-performing team.  That's why savvy leaders are protecting team development budget dollars the way hurricane survivors conserve drinking water.

If you own or run a business, I encourage you to think about how the above story of the Indiana Toyota plant, and its efforts to use former production time for employee training and retraining, can apply to your workforce.  And if you need a helping hand once you've moved beyond ideation, we're here.