Is it just me or does any one else absolutely hate team building/ice breaker type things?

[crosser62]

Been on a study day today and there was a load of shite ice breaker activities, get into two groups/if you were an animal what would you be and why type carry on.

The day was full of highly qualified, highly trained professionals who all seemed to embrace and enjoy... indeed relish this stuff.

Over the years I’ve been sent on many of these type things and I always feel excruciatingly uncomfortable and like they are a huge waste of my time as I always have to go on my day off and have to tick a box to say I’ve attended.

They are usually corporate in nature.

Is it just me?

No YABU I absolutely loathe this type of thing.

Oops - should have said YANBU!

Oh i hate these. I actually cringe and sink into my seat.

Everyone I know hates them, the bosses are just better at pretending they like them as they're supposed to tow the company line.

Yanbu, I hate them with a passion and think they are bollox!

Only one thing worse than ice breakers, that is role play. 2 things guaranteed to ruin my day .
Chalk it up OP, a few hours of your life you won't ever get back but life goes on.
Get a glass of something delicious to cheers yourself up

God yes. Nothing makes me feel more demotivated at work.

I bloody hate these.

I can get on with people just fine without having walking around a room having to say and do embarrassing things 🙈🙈

Loathe with every fibre of my being. I get the point, but please just make it 'say hello to the person next to you' not 'draw a house, and in every room, depict an element of your personality'. Shite.

Does any one LIKE them? They're utterly dreadful

I hate that sort of wankery. Nobody’s life is improved by knowing that Karen sees herself as a panda.

Also, trainers who make you introduce yourselves to each other. We all work in the same office.

Ahh my people

I agree, everyone hates them. The people who sign others up to them rarely have to participate themselves.

God I’d rather have a smear test. Hi my name is Jebus I’m a Libra and My hobbies include clipping my toenails in the staff coffee dock and burning naked effigies of my colleagues by the light of the full moon.

Oh god I hate them so much. I think they're invented by people who have no social skills of their own. I'm perfectly capable of breaking the ice myself by, you know, starting a fucking conversation with the people around me

God I’d rather have a smear test.

Haha, yes, absolutely!

OK, I have to make a confession - in my time, I have used team exercises (disclaimer: carefully tailored, lasting no more than 5 minutes, to revive a low-energy group AND actually linked to the focus of the workshop...I know you're eye-rolling and that's fine) but I don't use ice breakers - in an ideal world I'd like a group that turns up fairly motivated and engaged. If they're not, I'll work hard to turn that around through a session that surprises them by being genuinely useful

Everybody does hate them but...I think they are kind of necessary? Esp if they don't really know each other- you have to get a way for them to learn each other's names, grind out a bit of cringey small talk, just to get them warmed up and into gear for the day.

I suspect we are all supposed to cringe together.

There was another thread on MN about this a few months ago. Just after reading it, I went to an event - and there were ice-breakers. I asked why they felt the need to have them when everyone on MN hates them and MN is reasonably representative of the population. Just going round the room, saying your name and what you do is enough in my opinion. At most, give an interesting fact about yourself (which can be made up if you don't have an interesting life!) But that is enough for me!

Ha just read the previous post. I think next time I have to do one, I will make the fact about myself that I would rather go for a smear test than partake in pointless icebreakers. Might make me unpopular with the trainer, I suppose.

Once I was at an event where we had to draw an elephant as the ice-breaker. I cannot draw. My "drawing" did not resemble an elephant in any way and the trainer was unprofessional enough to laugh! Humpf.

I think everyone hates them and indeed this is an open secret - everyone feeling uncomfortable is part of the logic behind designing the activities. Afterwards you have the instant (shallow, short-lived) bond of people who've survived something mildly traumatic, and listening to bad jokes, jargon and other nonsense and making small talk over coffee with these people you don't know is easier because it's not as bad as what came before...

Everyone hates that shit.

Omg Yadnbu. They're absolutely horrible. Cringe worthy and pointless apart from making everyone feel vulnerable and embarrassed.

Delivering them is even worse. I inwardly cringe when I have a new Y7 tutor group and have to do these things for a whole morning.