You’ve heard the whispers, you know deep down what is about to happen because the office around you is buzzing with the secrecy and excitement that goes with a teambuilding event. You’ve noticed your incoming work email has an extra unopened gem, ready to be viewed. But, you know you don’t want to just yet- The sweat builds on the back of your neck and your pulse starts racing as your more nervous because you've just seen the words ‘Work Talent show- Everyone must enter- No exceptions’.

Ok, so the email above is an extreme version of what you might recieve because even your boss probably isn’t cruel enough to have a no exceptions policy. However, talent shows do seem to bring out the very oddest and brightest in people and there are always a lot of surprises and closet genius’s amongst the event. There is never really anyone that enters that is mediocre. They are either very good or very bad. When Bob from accounts mentions he has a trick up his sleeve to win the prize money there is nothing else you can do but wait in dreaded anticipation.

Talent shows are a company’s way of bringing the workforce together. It’s a teambuilding event that can either be introduced as a corporate event or just a bit of relaxed office fun where essentially you get together with your colleagues and organise the event, events management at its best.

Whether you know it or not we all have something that we are truly good at, the trouble is that some of those talents are not particularly right for this kind of corporate event. How would Karen from reception show off her dress sense? Clearly it is a talent to be able to put tweed with leather and to somehow have the look work. The same goes for Jim from Customer support, he is sure that he can eat an impressive 10 course meal without leaving anything but to be honest I’m not really sure that ‘eating’ works within the talent show genre. The most popular of the talents is to sing and dance, but when Margaret from Acquisitions says that she will do her version of a belly-dance you can’t help but wonder where she gets her courage from…

Being able to run a marathon, or being a closet Chess player are talents that cannot necessarily be entered. Writing an essay for example cannot be featured in a talent show- it would be massively boring otherwise. So, what else is there that you can do besides singing and dancing during your teambuilding in kent that will help you win the competition?

The mind boggles…