AIBU or are team building events really f*cking awful...

[rOsie80]

Especially the variety that ask you for an "interesting" fact about yourself so you all sit around and reel them off in an awkward, stilted fashion for an hour.... does anybody really enjoy this stuff ?!!

We need a petition!

A day doing drama at RADA

I would have loved that. I see why it's not everyone's cup of tea though

I suppose RADA could teach you how to act as if you enjoyed team building events. Could be useful.

qwertyuiopy

You seem to think you know a lot about me.

Did I fire you last week for a generally bad attitude and inability to produce respectable work?

H/she called me a wanker too (as they were escorted out of the building).

Some companies do it because they have genuinely fallen for the scam perpetrated by companies that sell these shitty events (ie that it will make your staff happier and more productive). But I think some do it because they believe that it's an effective form of brainwashing, and that it is necessary to frighten, humiliate and annoy staff in order to convince them that their loyalty is to their employer; that all employees are naughty kids who need to have the individuality crushed out of them and accept that they are the property of their employer, which is why so many of these fucking things are scheduled for what should be your free time; you are not paid for the time you waste spend going to them, and you are either regarded with suspicion or actively pestered and bullied about it if you refuse to go.

Sparklingbrook - that surprises me. Try searching on FB. It is legit!

brokeforyou Shush now, you are making a fool of yourself.

If we are efficient we can get this 5pm finish down to 3:30, is that ok with you?' No, actually. because those of us who have been dragged from across the country to this event in Birmingham have had to reserve seats on the overcrowded train home, so we've still got to kick our heels till the 5.30 train, or stand all the way to Newcastle. Now if you'd originally said the event would end at 3.30, we could have booked a seat on the 3.45.

I would browse in John Lewis til the 5.30 train Mere. Bit of a bonus.

No, actually. because those of us who have been dragged from across the country to this event in Birmingham have had to reserve seats on the overcrowded train home, so we've still got to kick our heels till the 5.30 train, or stand all the way to Newcastle. Now if you'd originally said the event would end at 3.30, we could have booked a seat on the 3.45.

I agree with this. If you cannot make your sessions interesting enough to warrant leaving at the correct time, then either change the timings of your sessions or give up teaching.

I would be furious at this.

I once turned up having driven 50 miles to a session, getting up at 6am; and there were 3 local people late so they held the session up - including the other 30 odd who had turned up - until the 3 latecomers appeared. And yet, I got there ahead of schedule. From 50 miles away. So disrespectful of the people who made it on time.

I was going to say the same sparkling. I'd treat the hour and a half as shopping time and be delighted.

Many years ago there was a team building event on a TV documentary. Team's coach stopped at a scenic point in the mountains and team were told to get out and stretch their legs. As the were admiring the view, the coach drove off. To catch up with it, they had to climb a mountain and down the other side. One senior manager proved particularly inept and required immense team work to get him safely down. My manager at the time would have simply been abandoned - that would have done more than anything to improve team productivity.

I’ve been on some fantastic team building days but they are mostly activity based with options for fitness level/interest/ability. Escape rooms, spy days, driving experiences, sailing, hiking, museum tours etc. I think the difference is we all genuinely like our colleagues and are happy to spend time out of work with them anyway so this is just considered a company paid for day out together.

If they tried an icebreaker on us it wouldn’t go down well and our boss knows it!

I was going to say the same sparkling. I'd treat the hour and a half as shopping time and be delighted. OK if there are some shops you actually want to go to in the area of the station. And it still doesn't trump the feeling that you could have been home for 7.30 instead of 9pm.

I think these are genuinely awful, aside from meaning having to make up the lost time of meeting real work deadlines. I'm self employed now but where I previously worked they were big on this. From experience it did more harm than good and was actually more divisive than team building. One particular time I remember literally ended up like some horrible playground bullying. I can not see the point in it if it just turns into an ugly scene from The Apprentice.

• I'm the wanker with incredibly low staff-turnover for the industry.

Are you David Brent?!

brilliant. I genuinely do enjoy these days sheerly for the Brent factor that inevitably comes out in one or two people.

The 'interesting fact' thing really pisses me off though. I strongly dislike the insinuation that being interesting and finding other people interesting is something we should do by exception and to a schedule. Also the facts are inevitably less interesting than normal conversation. It's not going to help my working relationship with someone to know that they swam with dolphins eight years ago, but it might help to know, when I'm phoning them up about something, that they've been buying their daughter a prom dress or are at the same point as me in a Netflix series. i.e. things that come up in natural (pub) conversation.

They can also really reinforce division and even bullying - if there is one person on the team who eg doesn't drink (and part of the event involves booze) or one with a mobility issue or a much lower level of fitness than everyone else (when the event involves a lot of strenuous physical activity) - or things like one person being a lot older/younger than the rest or the only one who is single, or gay... or the only one with a partner and family that s/he would rather be at home with than fucking about in some grim Travelodge pretending to enjoy an 80s disco or whatever.

Is it bad that I now want to go on one, just so I can marvel at the awfulness?!

My current work place is great, we actually go somewhere where we do physical activities as a group rather than just mindless ice breakers.

Oh they are fucking awful.

The lazy/evil/sexist/ bastards that you have worked hard to manage at work over the years think it's open season to inflict their superior logic and problem solving skills on sane normal people who just want to go to the pub and have a chat and a laugh.

So you spend a day of dealing with the bastards trying to take over the world in unknown territory while pretending to the HR Gestapo that you are 'having a sooper time'

And while I'm on that, I hate HR people with a vengence. Evil cunts the lot of them.

Thankfully I'm self employed now and I don't have to do any of that bollocks or best of all, deal with HR .

What's interesting reading this thread is that team building days seem to work well enough for teams that get along together to begin with, but disastrously for teams that aren't functioning well.

So achieving the exact opposite of their aim them

H/she called me a wanker too (as they were escorted out of the building).

More like Denholm Reynholm I think...

We generally don't do team building as such as we are mainly assertive introverts who would tell anyone who suggested it where to go. However, I have done them in a previous life where we went to an outdoor activity place. Last time I went, I put my back out and was crippled for a month. I did actually enjoy it up until then but I was only participating in the activities that I liked the look of so nothing involving dirt or water.

We do have strategising and planning sessions though. They're fine up to a point. Main problem is the usual candidates take over and won't shut up. They're usually only one day and local.

However, for some reason, we are having a two day one a few hours away soon. My manager had enough sense to know that a weekend wouldn't wash so it's mid-week. However, they are looking at booking twin/triple rooms. There are a very small number of people with whom I'm willing to share a room. I don't work with any of them so unless I get my own room, I'm not going.

I particulary remember being on one 'treasure hunt' where people men drove around the city like fecking loonies at high speed causing traffic chaos and nearly killing random pedestrians.

You were 'teamed up' with halfwits, funnily enough none of the women 'got' to drive but were instead delegated to assistant at the back of the cars with males screaming directions and instructions at each other. Oh the team building.

Afterwards, all the women grouped together in the corner of the pub, knashing about the fecking eejits they had been teamed with and calling them all cunts while the men stood at the bar regaling each other with stories their near misses mowing down old men and their genuis in problem solving.

Noooo to room sharing. I just couldn't do it.