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Why Most Team Building Exercises Backfire (And What Actually Works)
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"We're doing a team building exercise today."
Watch what happens in people's minds when they hear those words. Half the room mentally checks out. A few start planning their excuses. And the enthusiastic "yes people" who seem excited? They're actually making everyone else more annoyed.
You've lost them before you even start.
After more than 40 years working in schools and organizations, I can tell you: most team building exercises do more harm than good. They breed cynicism. They waste time. And they rarely connect to the actual work people need to accomplish together.
The Language Trap
Here's the problem: When you say "team building," people automatically hear its opposite.
In Acceptance and Commitment Training (ACT), we pay close attention to how words are related in the human mind. Words carry what we ACT folks call "mutual entailment" - they're always connected to their opposites. When you hear "good," your brain simultaneously accesses "bad." Love brings up hate. Success i...