Team Building – Or a bus breakdown

Everyone company (at least its management) wants their team members to work together well. By getting to know each other, learning about strengths, weaknesses, interests and other personal properties, future cooperation will ideally be more productive and have less friction.

In one evening, hanging around with friends at our favourite Turkish restaurant, I started to toy with ideas of an activity that we could initiate for above purpose. And everyone’s entertainment. Going back into my past I recalled an experience from my military times in 1991: one night, our training unit of rookie soldiers was woken up by our seargants who pretended that we were supposed to go out into a forest helping to arrest some poachers. None of us bought that story but their wishes were our command.

Our unit got dropped off by a truck in the middle of nowhere and had a really long march ahead of us. Stuffed with annoyingly heavy equipment. A heavy backpack, a bag with our NBC mask hanging over one shoulder and a machine gun over the other. Inevitably, when our march continued until the morning hours, feet and shoulders started to ache. More for some than others. In fact, some comrades declared to be unable to walk any further. While the whole activity was just an excercise, the team did not want to let down any of their members. So without thinking much, those still in good shape offered to carry a backpack of those struggling. Everyone did in fact go way beyond their usual physical limites. In hindsight, it was amazing to see how much energy and comradeship can be set free in an extreme condition. That is how we reached our goal. Just to take a shower, sleep for 30 minutes before being woken up for breakfast.

Now I wondered: would it be possible to replicate such an experience?