Blogginlägg -
Boss: "What, paternity leave again? That's the fifth time this year!"
Sweden has very politically correct offices – touching someone is classified as sexual harassment. Squeezing past someone in the corridor can be misinterpreted as penetration. Strangely, however, all this is forgotten during these teambuilding activities where physical closeness, pulling people in and out of things and climbing on top of each other is considered healthy bondage…errr, bonding.
Jan, the new, young dynamic Marketing Director, has arranged for some teambuilding activities. These are basically designed to reduce everybody’s mental age to that of a 14 year-old. Half the group think it is good fun and a quarter think it’s all terribly embarrassing. The other quarter enjoy watching those who think the whole thing is embarrassing.
In Swedish they refer to it more like a dialogue - utvecklingssamtal. Even children as young as 7 years old are assessed and evaluated. Most kids are told they’ll go far – and some teachers of course wish they would.This annual performance is all about feedback. The meeting is usually between someone who doesn’t want to give it, giving it to someone who doesn’t really want it.
Two pieces of advice for dealing with Swedes: Never delay the ending of a meeting, or the beginning of a coffee break.