Following the discovery of ancient paintings -depicting wrestling and sprinting- found in Southwestern France caves, it is believed that sport manifestations already appeared about 15300 years ago. For a very long time, sport was associated to military training and represented the ultimate test for a warrior’s strength.
Soon, alongside the competitive aspect, sport developed into games and leisure activities to entertain kids or adults in their free time. What does this entertaining sport has to do with the competitive sport? First of all, any sport is governed by a series of rules that needs to be followed. Secondly, sports are taught to beginners from more experienced or senior fellows. If we think in these two very simple terms, and we apply it to any type of sport, we quickly realize that sports instruct people to:
1. be aware of the presence of rules,
2. play safely within the frame of the guidelines,
3. respect the other participants.
These concepts are the ground foundation of any work group. In the case of a concrete institution -such as a company, a university, or a factory-, the latter one demands the employees to perform their job within the precise limits, with no disruption of the colleagues’ work. To certain extend, I can also claim that entrepreneurs and self-employed workers need to adapt their activities to a perhaps invisible, but certainly existing structure, represented by the client or collaboration network.
Despite of how simple this might sound, it is fairly easy to assemble a team, but building an efficient and compact group of colleagues working together is one of the hardest things to achieve. Then, how do we achieve a powerful team spirit? I most likely do not have the perfect answer to this question, but I want to share with you my impression on how sport plays an incredible role in my day-to-day job.
Rewinding back at the time as my PhD in London (UK), I must say that after university years spent between exams and lab trainings, I soon discovered that I liked very much playing sports. I think that the trigger of this epiphany was the day in which, on the push of my colleague and friend Jennifer, I bought a bike. With her, I started cycling to work, every day. Sometimes, we would drop the bike and run instead to the institute. The same year, I was introduced by my friend and for some-time-flatmate Tom to squash. Together with other colleagues, we started playing regularly, before heading to the lab. Both running, cycling or squash appointments ended up dictating the cadence of my working days, and trained me to be diligent in respecting the common 7:30 meeting, planning my day to fit time for sports, and using sports as a vehicle to fennel out negative emotions.
When I moved to Grenoble (France), I continued running and cycling with a few colleagues, but most of all I had the wonderful chance to wipe off the dust from my roller-skates. Leo, PhD student in my same team, who used to be a professional racing skater, taught me that to be fast, despite of differences in personal style, one need always to learn a precise motion, for a clean and fluid performance. I think that this depicts not only skating, but also executing a perfect job.
Now, Japan. I am currently on a short collaboration in Sapporo Hokkaido. I can sum up my work experience in Japan so far as such: WORK HARD, PLAY HARD. Truly, working days are long, but I found there is also plenty of sport occasions. Sport is highly encouraged by the group leader and the presence of the whole team is requested. In only one month since my arrival, we trained running together, attended a 6h marathon relay, practiced and competed in a baseball tournament. According to Dr Yasusuki Fujita, leader of a fantastic and vibrant molecular oncology team at the Hokkaido University in Sapporo (Japan), these sport events refresh the mind, reinforce the team spirit and encourage the group to strive for common success.
Moreover, any new comer, like me, is welcomed into all the lab sport activities, and challenged to strike a home-run during the real tournament, even though this new comer has never even played baseball before! All this gave me the impression that it did not matter what experience a player had at start. The team would cheer for each of the members equally. Similarly, as winners or losers, the team would share a fun-time celebratory meal! Reasonably, I have been too short into this team to appreciate its evolution through the several sport days, but I am witness of a great harmony, mutual help and trust between the team members. Most likely, because the “playing and partying together” time is carried on the daily working life.
Now, no matter what the sport each country preferred to play, I really appreciated the effort of the team leaders to bind his/her employees through sports. Sport is something we all can look forward to, because it is a break from work and allow us to forget our position in an institution, sharing fun together, far from the stress a job can bring.
Now, you just have to name! Which sport do you play for team-building in your country?