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When you are working for a big organization training is something quite unavoidable, whether you like it or not. There are some of those trainings where activities consist in ice breakers and team building exercises. Now honestly, tell me how many times have you thought “please don’t” when the trainer introduced the activity?
Think about the last team building training or meeting where an ice breaker was used. Usually the memories shouldn’t take long to come by. Those trainings, done by -insert irony- “those guys at HR that have lots of free time”, tend to linger in your memory for two reasons:
- At least once, you felt uncomfortable during the training
- “They made you play” childish games
- The third one led me to write this post, even days after one of those trainings: they leave you thinking
Whoever says that hasn’t gone through this please throw the first stone -you wouldn’t do that to your screen, would you?-. With tons of paperwork piling on your desk, requests from clients and deadlines to meet, you think to yourself “why am I wasting my time here?”.
The funny part is that 90% of the time you end up having fun. Even on those occasions when you did but wouldn’t admit it.
These trainings are successful at getting the message across because they feed on your discomfort and reluctance to take part in them.
Usually, the second reason -childish games- is perceived as the most evident source of uneasiness and that’s what people cling to when judging these type of training. People in suits playing Twister? Doctors getting wrapped in paper towel? How do you expect me to feel after those tortures? Being mummified in the workplace is certainly one way you don’t want to see yourself portrayed on Larry King Live.
In a way, that shield that took you years to build around your adult persona sometimes limits access to feelings deep within you, feelings so primal that you can’t even put into words. When you are alone or in a “controlled” environment it’s easy to keep those emotions at bay but when faced against peer pressure you have no other choice but to go with the flow. This may be the most spontaneous reaction to games during training at work: “the CFO, CEO, Paul from Finance and Jenny from Marketing -along with other 14 souls- are doing it… what the heck… can’t dodge it… here I go…”.
In a crowd, individual traits are suppressed, hence each crowd member’s personality blurs, the heterogeneous merges into homogeneous and suggestibility turns people into blind followers. Yup, good old peer pressure pushed you into this game.
An hour later, you are out of the training with the feeling that you didn’t waste your time, even after you felt embarrassed because once the “crowd dissolved” you are back to normal but it’s too late, you got impregnated with teamwork and the feeling that you can’t tell what it is but you have learnt something.
I bet that most companies don’t think about this when they develop their trainings, but in these activities, there are elements extensively studied by a school of psychology, a form of psychotherapy known as Psycho-drama. Take a look at this Wikipedia entry and tell me if it doesn’t ring any bells.
In a different channel, those trainings switch on one of the most (currently) regarded and lest used types of intelligence in the work environment: your Emotional Intelligence -well, women use it more than us. Point for them-.
Now, compare those trainings where you sit and listen, interact every now and then and maybe do some scenario based brain-storm to these type of trainings where you experienced something with your bare self and body. Which one “marked” you the most? Yup, they may seem cheesy, corny or childish when looked from our “grown up” point of view, but think again.
Image credit, Online Educa Berlin
