We had another epic game of CodeNames at work this afternoon. Eight of us – all at the same management level and in all different parts of East Anglia and the South East – indulging in high-stakes online tomfoolery and problem-solving. I don’t care what Head Office’s take on this might be – I think it’s boosting morale among the workforce and greatly improving inter-site interaction which can only serve to increase our productivity as a group as we move forward into an unusual future. I’m amazed it hasn’t been noticed yet, although Those Above Us do tend to take an extraordinarily long time to take their heads out of their arses long enough to acknowledge anything that’s going on around them. But even if they do work out what we’re doing, I don’t see how they can complain. We’re salaried, not paid hourly, and we’ve all put in a ridiculous amount of extra hours over the course of this year. Speaking for myself, I have covered sicknesses amongst my staff, I have taken on extra duties at the store itself, to help the other department managers out over there, and I’ve frequently spent evenings at home keeping up with things via my laptop. Do I get thanks, bonusses, praise or promotion for that? No, I do not, so I think it’s perfectly fine for me and my colleagues to take an extended lunch break once a week, and hook up online for some silly fun, and some fun silliness. It’s team-building, and it’s also utilising parts of our brain that we need for work tasks. We’re not wasting time and energy on a no-brain, neanderthal shoot-em-up or a button-mashing platform sports game, we’re indulging ourselves in a work-it-out, strategy role-play that gives us all a break from our usual office-based mundanity.
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