Building the team

Day 2 - on which we build the team

She is emerging like a ghost from the darkness at the end of the
corridor. Nervously, I pull my door to. A clunk breaks the morning
silence and echoes towards her. I notice through the gloom that a smile
is taped to her face, stretched across it with an indelible tautness.
Nothing will remove it, I can tell. With each confident thump of her
heavy heels on the soft carpet tiles, she bounces effervescently
towards me. Her hair bounces, her eyes bounce, her tits bounce. Her
entire personality bounces.

I acknowledge her unwelcome presence with a transparently unwelcoming
smile.

'Morning!!!!!!!!' She discharges an enthusiastic squeal, assaulting the
silence like cannon fire across a still morning field. Oh God.

I grunt, then fall in alongside her in the forced march to the
restaurant. I struggle to keep up.

It is still dark outside. Even the animals are not awake. But we are
not animals. We are humans. We separate ourselves from our young at
birth.

We get up at seven in the morning to do team-building exercises.

. . . .

I have my hand on Annette's buttock, which is soft without being
flabby. The flesh gives way easily under the pressure of my fingers.
Then she slides over my face and now both my hands are running along
the rough denim which coats her skinny thighs like Artex. I gasp for
breath in my struggle to handle her. Her breathing too is sharp and
heavy. I sense in the irregularity of her breaths the inimitable
combination of uncertainty and excitement, as my trembling paws work
their way down to her feet. Then with a squeal of delight, she slips
from my clutches. It is over.

I fill my lungs with the clean, cold air of autumn. My nostrils are
awakened by the sweet scent of pine needles. The dampness of the fallen
leaves, glistening a treacly caramel, starts to work its way through
the soles of my trainers.

Al fresco bottom groping. I just love it.

This first team-building exercise is known as the spider's web. The
team's mission is for all its members to pass through the web (a
lattice-effect rope system strung between the trunks of two evergreens)
without touching it. This, we have been told by Lucinda (our leader and
coach), is a hierarchical model involving the identification of goals,
allocation of work, assessment of team processes and management of
interpersonal relationships. Hmm.

'Ohhh-kay! Are YOU ready, guys?!' she gushed, as we exchanged nervy
looks. 'You are SO going to love this, guys. Let's GO for it!'

And we shuffled reluctantly into our team-build huddle, tentatively
draping our arms round each other's shoulders, like a pack of reluctant
rugger buggers in the centre circle. As Lucinda's motivational jargon
pumped and high-fived the air around us, the clock ticked. I
concentrated on trying to listen and to hear, to influence but not to
control, to follow and to lead also, to respect the relative value sets
of my fellow team-members.

But I couldn't make myself heard. So I started shouting. My colleagues
started shouting too. Chaos reigned.

The pack eventually broke up. We had a plan. We decided the only way
forward was to embrace one another's body parts in a way that would be
indecent in normal society, then haul each other through the web.

As I exchange a half-hearted post-coital smile with Annette, I have to
remind myself that I left normal society almost 24 hours ago.

I was the first to make it through, travelling wheel-barrow style.
Tariq followed. As soon as they lifted up his feet, he started
trembling violently, touching the rope and setting off the virtual
alarm. Eventually, we succeeded in delivering him Superman fashion,
fists first, on his stomach.

We are all agreed that the passage of Annette - she came on her back
with her hands between her thighs - has been the most uplifting.

But we won't say so for fear of acting contrary to the founding ground
rule of respect for diversity and acceptance of the value sets and
visions of all workshop participants.

The story continues in my ABC Set 'Corporate Cuddling'