I have been told I must attend a two-day off site team building session next month with the members of my company's sales management group. What should I be aware of and prepared for?

Answer: Team building involves a group of people working together to achieve a common goal. One of the first steps in a team building exercise such as this is to clarify the team's goal[s]. Once that is done, the next logical step in this process is to identify the conditions that prevent the team from reaching its goal[s].

For you as [presumably] the only representative of the credit department is to make certain that the first step [clarifying the goal] is done properly. The goal agreed upon needs to be carefully worded. For example, if the goal identified was "To maximize sales and increase market share" the implication of this goal is that the company would accept any amount of credit risk as long as sales increased. Similarly, if the goal was "To maximize both sales and profits" the goal statement is flawed. Why? Because sometimes maximizing sales will result in bad debt losses rather than profits. In other situations, the only way to increase sales is to "buy" market share by reducing your profit margins. We suggest you offer this goal for consideration: To increase sales while maintaining sound and collectable accounts receivable.