At one event, those present were also taught how to build a “mini Mexican railway”, using plastic tubes to guide a ball from across a room.
The two activities were part of an “ice-breaking and team-building” event laid on by Zing Events, a company charging more than £2,000 for the gathering of 38 DfT staff last December.
Back in the day, those courses used to use lots and lots of Lego bricks and paper clips. At the end of the course I attended, I managed to find around 25 different uses for a paper clip. 
Whenever I read about team building events, it’s usually employees who felt it was a waste of time, and in this case, money. I wonder if there are studies to see if any of this helps anything.
This is an old article, but it makes for interesting reading
@butterscotch , Well it obviously helped the freinds of the transport
mimister to become rich butterscotch !?
Donkeyman! 
Reading that article shows that ‘fun’ doesn’t work. Unless they were team juggling, that team building was likely a waste of money.
Yeah, wow $46 billion industry in the US. Quite lucrative.
Gawd, I loathe team building exercises and ice breakers.
And it doesn’t help that to do our job you need quite a robust personality and all our team hate them too, and we’re likely to say what rubbish it is out loud!
There was the time when we were all asked to share our favourite place in the world and Keith refused with “if I tell you that, you’ll all go there and who’d want that” and I said “my first husbands grave” (my first husband isn’t really dead!)
And then there was a team building exercise where we had to co-ordinate lowering a stick to the floor with just two fingers each
I flatly refused and said I was a manager so if I ever wanted a stick lowered to the floor I’d assign a team member to do it, preferably one with all their digits
I’ve been to so many, they are usually pointless time wasters
And there was a plate spinning one where you had to learn to that trick where you spin a plastic plate on a pointed stick
On my post course assessment the comment I got was that I’d learned how to spin my plate first ( I’d played the game before when I was a kid) but I didn’t help the others learn how to do it
Interesting insight on my personality? Damn right, let the losers learn how to spin their own damn plate! 
I’ve been on them too Maree total waste of time IMO and a waste of money
Oh, “team building exercises” have made a come back, have they?
As I recall, team building exercises were very popular in the nineties and noughties - then when “austerity” hit us all and everyone had to tighten their belts, it was “if you’re lucky enough grab a life raft, hang on to it, cos it’s everyone for themselves in this world full of lay-offs and redundancies.”
I’ve been on a few dozen team building exercises in my banking career - some were a waste of time but some really did help to build the team spirit by getting to know each other’s personal strengths and personal challenges.
I found quite a few of our small group team building trips and charity projects, doing practical things together, did help to develop more understanding, trust and respect for our colleagues.
And sometimes it was just managers who couldn’t get any money budgeted for rewards for their team members using them like outings, which was sometimes appreciated and sometimes not.
Yes, I’ve known that happen,too @butterscotch
