On the heels of the oh-so-successful Fitness at Work Day, the HR World website reports that Americans are both fat and tired.
A survey by 1800mattress.com of 5,000 people who called for their services found that 38 percent had fallen asleep on the job.
The free-market solution to exhausted employees? Don’t give them a day off, fools. The better idea is to host a team building event and call it RECESS AT WORK DAY.
Just when your CEO has pushed his employees to the edge, he’s gonna cut you some slack on June 19th and let your departments stop working so they can have some fun.
- Go ahead, IT Department, and play some cornhole in the parking lot.
- Grab a handful of microwave popcorn, Sales, and don’t forget to take one of the complimentary diet Cokes that we’re giving away in the cafeteria.
- Did you hear that the CEO is allowing the admins to wear jeans to the office?
It’s so crazy around here, but it’s RECESS AT WORK DAY! ANYTHING GOES!
Don’t forget the most important part of this awesome morale-improving event: the RECESS AT WORK certificate. Create one for each employee to prove that your HR department sanctioned this visionary and highly strategic event.
Recess at work… that would be a great perk. Install monkey bars and a swing set, maybe a couple of those big slides, and a heavy layer of mulch underneath the equipment to provide some semblance of padding. Let the employees loose! The newer hires will scurry around the swings, and the veterans will sit in small groups and talk about “secret stuff”.
Okay, so this would last about 18 minutes before the lawsuits started to pour in, but those 18 minutes would rock!
Urgh. I feel I could write at length about the wrongness of this, but Laurie’s sarcastic tone does the job well enough!
Low morale, satisfaction & productivity? No problem! Treat your employees like children for a day & instruct them to participate in *your idea of fun* in a prescribed, controlled and supervised manner.
Give them a certificate at the end so that they remember *who’s in charge*.
Call it Team Building. Call it Employee Morale. Just make sure you make a note of anyone who calls it an unproductive waste of time - Annual reviews are due soon.
Our recess at work day is when we shotgun beers on the loading dock.
Anything less just doesn’t cut it.
@Perrik It’s all fun & games until someone pokes their eye out and sues the company.
@Neil If I treated my employees to a day of fun, it would include kittens on the couch and a prolonged discussion about abortion rights and politics. Fun, right?
@Lexy Oh I miss loading docks!!
Now I have more time - I think… Team Building is one of those things like pyramid schemes or playing the lotto. The reasons why you should join in are easy to explain and appeal to our human desire for a quick win. Plus, everybody else is doing it, so why shouldn’t you?
The reasons why you shouldn’t are complicated, require thought and make you sound miserable when you try to explain them. In my eyes, all three activities basically create more losers than winners & amount to Get Rich Quick schemes.
Yes, morale, satisfaction & productivity are important in business
Yes, you should reward what you want repeated.
Yes, people who work together will find it easier if they like each other & have fun together.
Yes, it’s a good plan to give a new team an opportunity to get to know each other quickly.
Yes, you should find situations where people have the chance to operate outside of their everyday roles sometimes, to avoid pigeonholing.
But, No, you don’t need Recess Day to achieve any of the above, just competent management. Recess Day is just an acknowledgement that you’re failing in all of those areas & want a quick fix.
Interesting idea…but here is what can happen if Sales people are let loose on a recess day:
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OTgb3KO7QM&hl=en]
Oops…the video wouldn’t embed.
Here a link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OTgb3KO7QM
“Wear jeans to work” days are my undoing. Because if jeans are good, then I want my flip flops to go with them, and no one EVER embraces the office flip flopper. EVER.
Flip
Flop
Flip
Flop
And that’s just the sound when you’re walking around. We haven’t even gotten to the sight of un-manicured toe nails or the hair that grows on the knuckle of the toe yet. OR the smell.
If you want to improve employee morale, how about just saying “thank you” or recognizing when someone goes a little above and beyond instead of playing it off like they should have done it anyway. Of course they should have! But recognizing it means it’s more likely to happen in the future.
Also, If you’re going to give out certificates… Make them with cake or chocolate. A chocolate certificate of merit. It’s not going on my wall anyway, so at least then I can eat it.
And as a final note, my hubby-to-be works in IT and he would tell the CEO exactly what he/she could do with that cornhole
Cornhole….giggle giggle….
@Heather Mmmm, chocolate certificates. Best idea I’ve read all week.
I finally read the website that Laurie linked. “Your boss won’t let you participate in Recess At Work Day? Or maybe you are the shy, bashful type and do not know how to suggest participation in this great event? Let us know. We’ll call him/her and be annoying.”
Um… no. Bleep no.
Cornholes and chocolate certificates. Exactly why I write this blog.
Glad I could be of service, Laurie
Perhaps we need a little attitude adjustment Laurie. Contrary to what you might think, some of the highet morale exists in companies where Employee Activities Committees and yes, even jaded HR Professionals recognize the need to include such activities - ongoing.
And just wait……………….Spay and Neuter your HR team is coming up in October.
Thanks for the plug. Keep up the good work.