The Blind Leading the Blind

As part of a team-building exercise at a corporate training retreat, staff were paired up, with one of each pair asked to wear a blindfold. The blindfolded team member would then be led around by their partner, with the intent of building trust and showing how staff can and must rely on each other to be successful. The retreat facility was at a lakeside resort, and the blindfolded team members were led around outside in the fresh air, across a small lawn, and onto the boat dock, trusting in their sighted partner to lead them safely.

As a final trust example, the blindfolded team members were led to the edge of the dock, toes just over the edge, and told to lean forward. Their partners were to support them, and prevent them from falling. Now one participant, who normally wore eyeglasses, had removed them and slid them into his shirt pocket before accepting the blindfold. As he leaned forward over the water, the glasses slid out of his pocket and plunged to the bottom of the murky lake. No amount of searching could locate them, and this unfortunate man was out a pair of glasses.

And now to put the Motivational Icing on this delicious Team-Building Cake...

His boss, who was also participating in the team building retreat, accused him of losing his glasses on purpose so that he could get new ones through the company's benefits plan. In front of all the staff, he ranted about abuse of the benefits package and reminded everyone it was only to be used in case of real need because benefits cost the company a lot of money.

Needless to say, nobody really came out of this with a warm, fuzzy feeling of trust and teamwork. And, even without this extra unfortunate event, such teambuilding exercises rarely produce any lasting improvement. If you really want to build teamwork, improve the work itself; reduce the daily frustrations and stresses.

When you help your people succeed as a team, and they will likely start behaving like a team.