Hidden agendas: Why team building helps the sneaks in the workplace

Sneakiness is one of the most corrosive behaviours in the workplace.

It is perhaps a rung or two down from the big ones of sexual assault, bullying, harassment and fraud. Nonetheless, it also has the capacity to do untold damage to an organisation by demolishing trust and alienating staff, leading to disengagement.

Trust historically was not something people necessarily expected to find in the workplace. Managers in hierarchical organisations (i.e. nearly all of them) could leverage the power of their position to promote their agendas.

With the advent of the human resources movement, and the faddish adoption of “teams” as an organisational unit – and nowadays, God help us, as a form of address – trust was placed firmly on the agenda.

It was held that for teams to be successful they had to develop trust in their team members. Trust, it was declared, could be engendered by the open sharing of information. Information is power, and failing to share it inevitably creates power imbalances.

Many fine words and expensive training courses continue to be devoted to team bonding. These often include facile trust exercises such as falling backwards into the arms of one’s colleagues. Since the decline of the office Christmas party, and the blue-nosed attitudes towards supplying a surfeit of alcohol, the likelihood of stumbling backwards, and the opportunities for your colleagues’ catching practice have been diminished.

The problem with trust building is that it provides an excellent cover for the sneaky. Building expectations of open and even communication can create a room full of naive suckers ripe for manipulation by the sneaky.

Sneaks become sneaks, or are sustained in their sneakiness by pragmatism. If and when they are caught, they justify their actions with a needs-must argument. Of course this argument is never tested prior to their acts of sneakiness because they know full well their colleagues would never stand for it. However, usually there are enablers or patrons that stand to gain from the sneakiness, or at least avoid being a victim of it.

Sneakiness thrives because the majority of us do not go to work to engage in political games. Though ironically, given the recent news out of Canberra, even multiple experienced senior politicians can be surprised by covert acts.