Team building without the ick

[Smangus]

A long time ago we went to Horley skittles , like a beer festival where we entered a team and got completely shitfaced trying to knock over bits of wood with bowling balls in a rough wooden alley. We all had a whale of a time and nothing since has ever come close.

 

[Smangus]

Still going apparently

We Need an Urban team

Skittles Week

 

[krtek a houby]

After years of horrific team building days, involving tasks, flip charts, projects, running around and getting the "best" out of your skillz, management finally saw sense and sent us off to an amusement park somewhere. Great fun, even if balked at some (most) of the scary rides.

 

[smmudge]

Once we tried to break a Guinness world record by making the longest paperchain in 2 minutes, and the quickest putting on and taking off jumpers in a group. But turns out other people can make longer paperchains in 2 minutes and put on and take off jumpers quicker.

but did learn that guineas world record adjudicators take their jobs very seriously.

It was only OK because I worked with my wife at the time

 

[RubyToogood]

Not really an event but we use something called Donuts which is a Slack extension. This pairs you randomly with another team member and you go out for coffee or in our case have a virtual coffee over Slack, usually half an hour.

I like it because you get to have a proper chat with someone you might not otherwise talk to and you get/give some useful insights.

It can be prone to people not making /being able to find the time though.

 

[The39thStep]

Not really an event but we use something called Donuts which is a Slack extension. This pairs you randomly with another team member and you go out for coffee or in our case have a virtual coffee over Slack, usually half an hour.

I like it because you get to have a proper chat with someone you might not otherwise talk to and you get/give some useful insights.

It can be prone to people not making /being able to find the time though.

I did this when working for the Council in Chief Execs 'talent spotting' . Meeting other managers whose business areas I knew very little about and had never really worked or collaborated with. It was very useful, sometimes I found really interesting and talented people who for whatever reason had ended up in , for example, Libraries or Accounting or Licensing who people just assumed were just knowledgable in those areas but whose skills could easily transfer to other areas and were just overlooked and under used.

 

[DaveCinzano]

perhaps politicians should do away-years in which they have to survive on £70 a week in a single damp vermin-infested room

Many of them already work in Parliament

 

[bmd]

GUYS! OK GUYS! GUYS! TIME FOR AN ICEBREAKER YEAH?

 

[equationgirl]

I'm not at all sure how many of these examples of 'team building actually build teams tbh . Presumably, these activities should be able to show some impact or outcome ie higher staff satisfaction, staff identifying strengths/weaknesses PDPs , better relationships at work ,better communication, higher productivity/improved /outcomes?

Honestly I don't think they do. The only thing I've ever seen built is a shared loathing for senior management.

As I said, it's an artificial environment. It doesn't address any underlying issues within a business especially if there's any around budgets - there's enough for a company away day but not to hire an extra pair of hands to help someone's workload?

Sure, it can be helpful to help people network but nothing better than a night in the pub in my experience.

They're just a way for management to claim they're doing something to improve communication and build morale without actually looking at the issues of why those things are bad in the first place.

Companies need to pay people better to improve morale - all people.

 

[equationgirl]

GUYS! OK GUYS! GUYS! TIME FOR AN ICEBREAKER YEAH?

Shoot me now. Please. I beg you.

 

[8ball]

An escape room can be fun, depending on the size and configuration of the team.

You start finding out about skills that people have that weren’t brought out by their job role, too.

 

[The39thStep]

Honestly I don't think they do. The only thing I've ever seen built is a shared loathing for senior management.

As I said, it's an artificial environment. It doesn't address any underlying issues within a business especially if there's any around budgets - there's enough for a company away day but not to hire an extra pair of hands to help someone's workload?

Sure, it can be helpful to help people network but nothing better than a night in the pub in my experience.

They're just a way for management to claim they're doing something to improve communication and build morale without actually looking at the issues of why those things are bad in the first place.

Companies need to pay people better to improve morale - all people.

Yes improved pay and conditions, career paths or opportunities to upskill etc make a huge amount of difference to morale as does not wondering if you are going to be made redundant. I also think there are ways to involve staff more in the running and design of the business or public sector , for managers to trust staff more and not micro manage etc.

I remember that in the Council I worked at there was a series of inspirational speakers for what was called the leadership group ie managers above a certain grade ( most of whom would be lucky to find their way to the room and back never mind lead) . Lawrence Oliviers son who taking famous people in history demonstrated their leadership skills including Hitlers apparently good communication despite his tendency to micro manage , some Scouser fella who made out he was a one time addict now advising people on effective use of time and a truly self possessed narcissist business woman who had climbed Everest and gone to the South Pole who allowed and encouraged us to celebrate her. Some loved it , queued to buy books, and CDs but the wise guys just sat furtively looking at their phones glancing up to check that the assistant chief execs weren't looking at them.

 

[WouldBe]

If you want a team building exercise without the ick then probably best to avoid piss up type events.

 

[Sasaferrato]

Also, with task and finish, you have to be the best one on the team for that particular job, otherwise everyone is going home later. I worked on the bins before wheelie bins and my job was pulling out the bins to the end of the street. You had to be fast and focused. 20 miles a day, ten on friday and home by 11 ready to start the weekend. I fucking loved that job.

When my father was Depute Borough Surveyor of Kilmarnock, he reduced the bin men's effort, and increased their productivity.

How? Very simply, a bin waggon had two binmen and a driver, he bought dustbins, so every waggon went out with two on board.

The binmen went from collecting the bin, emptying it and returning it, to taking and leaving an empty bin (they were standard), taking the full one, which became the empty one for the next house.

 

[WouldBe]

When my father was Depute Borough Surveyor of Kilmarnock, he reduced the bin men's effort, and increased their productivity.

How? Very simply, a bin waggon had two binmen and a driver, he bought dustbins, so every waggon went out with two on board.

The binmen went from collecting the bin, emptying it and returning it, to taking and leaving an empty bin (they were standard), taking the full one, which became the empty one for the next house.

Probably worked ok until people started painting house numbers on their bins.

 

[Throbbing Angel]

Probably worked ok until people started painting house numbers on their bins.

'My' bin is often the hill most residents will choose to die on.
Not your bin, Council's bin.

Was this with wheelie bins Sasaferrato ?

 

[WouldBe]

'My' bin is often the hill most residents will choose to die on.
Not your bin, Council's bin.

Was this with wheelie bins Sasaferrato ?

Not sure how you swap middens.

 

[Puddy_Tat]

The binmen went from collecting the bin, emptying it and returning it, to taking and leaving an empty bin (they were standard), taking the full one, which became the empty one for the next house.

'My' bin is often the hill most residents will choose to die on.
Not your bin, Council's bin.

yes, i can see dustbin socialism not going down well.

i vaguely remember when i was little that the lewisham bin-men each had their own bin, so they emptied each dustbin in to theirs, so they didn't have to bring each house's bin back. that was before wheely bins (except the bloody big metal ones) were thought of.

 

[Elpenor]

Bromley council notably did not provide bins - purchasing them was the responsibility of the residents I think

 

[Sasaferrato]

Bromley council notably did not provide bins - purchasing them was the responsibility of the residents I think

Not sure what the situation was, but whoever bought them, they were standard bins. We're talking 60+ years ago.

 

[Funky_monks]

That was why I loved working on the bins. Task and finish. Most motivated I've ever been in a job for money rather than passion.

Thats how I worked when I was managing on farms.

"We've got these things to do today - faster we do them, faster you can all go home (within reason, please don't back the loader into the RSJs in the barn roof, ta)"

 

[Teaboy]

Team building?

Introduce a total cunt of a manager. Sit back and watch people bond like you never seemed possible.

 

[farmerbarleymow]

Went on a great course years ago - was in a country house with lovely grounds and we did outdoorsy stuff. Much better than theory bollocks.

Got some nice pictures somewhere including a damselfly by the pond.

Must have cost the employer loads for the week.

 

[muscovyduck]

Done an opt in one once which was great, got to meet loads of people I wouldn't have met otherwise, they were clear where the funding came from (it was external) so that dealt with the whole "why do you have money for this and not that" problem. Was the typical weekend away thing.

On the flip side, seen someone at a different workplace have to deal with management trying to discipline them because they are physically disabled and couldn't take part in some sort of raft building / life saving thing in the severn river which had nothing to do with their actual job or training.

 

[ouirdeaux]

Shuffleboard. Fucking shuffleboard.

I had thought it was something old people did on cruises -- another example of how I fail to understand the world, because as if trapping yourself in an enclosed environment with other people whose company you haven't chosen weren't bad enough, you can while away the dismal hours by playing a very very dull...well, 'sport' is pushing it. But there's apparently a version played on tables. I don't know if that's better or worse. It hardly matters.

I had initially said -- when it was being touted as a great opportunity for bonding in the wonderful happy family way that we all were -- that I should prefer to perform oral sex on a a diseased warthog. (This may have been a mistake, as I suspect most didn't recognise the quotation.)

Now that we've found out that it will count towards compulsory training, it's a lot more attractive. Or at least marginally more attractive than the warthog, which admittedly isn't a high bar. But can I manage the about-face?

Also, why? Just why?

 

[equationgirl]

Team building?

Introduce a total cunt of a manager. Sit back and watch people bond like you never seemed possible.

Nothing unites a disparate team like an absolute cunt of a manager attempting to run that team, I have found.

 

[Orang Utan]

Not sure what the situation was, but whoever bought them, they were standard bins. We're talking 60+ years ago.

Didn’t they just chuck it out of the window when you were a lad?

 

[seeformiles]

All the ones I’ve been on have been death by flip chart and some waffle about communication. Only good one was when I was part of a team of 4. We went bowling then on a pub crawl, winding up back at my place smoking dope and watching Prince videos until 3am. Everybody kipped over and we didn’t go in the next day until midday - all paid for by the company with my boss fabricating a more sober scenario to the higher ups.

 

[nogojones]

An escape room can be fun, depending on the size and configuration of the team.

You start finding out about skills that people have that weren’t brought out by their job role, too.

Locking everyone from work in a room until they find a way to escape seems just like a normal workday for most.

Getting the team to find a way of locking up your manager and fucking off might improve team building skills.

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

Had an email this morning about a planned (and compulsory) management away day, that will involve a series of “fun” activities and workshops, that will all feed into us each getting a “Strength Deployment Inventory 2.0” report.

Which a) Sounds like a pile of absolute fucking horseshit and b) sounds like something where I’d rather eat glass than take part

I’ve already emailed back saying I won’t be going