Work, rest and play: Corporate 'therapy' sees staff untangle knots and move mints with their minds

'WE LIKE to do things a bit differently, it's about rediscovering that inner child," says Gavin Oattes with a broad grin.

It's exactly the kind of phrase that might make many employees on workplace team-building days roll their eyes to the heavens.

For those who have – literally – walked over hot coals for their job or, worse, chucked themselves backwards on to trust mats hoping to be caught in the arms of the office colleague they love to hate, it's enough to send you running, screaming for safety.

Instead, a wave of laughter spreads through the Mansion House at Edinburgh Zoo, where 20 representatives from various businesses have gathered for a taste of motivation-producing, team-building, production- raising corporate "therapy" aimed at wringing even more out of jaded employees than ever before.

The latest in workplace motivational technique aims to send us back in time, to an age when profit margins, deadlines and sales figures were stuff for mummy and daddy to worry about.

Our inner child, it seems, is about to take over the workplace.

To bring it out, former primary school teacher turned comedian, now motivational therapist Gavin, 30, has brought his skipping ropes to the zoo.

"We want to help people to help themselves and change attitudes, perceptions and mindsets," he says. "We want to encourage people to live life to the full.

"It sounds dead corny but our aim is to inspire the world."

The world can wait for the time being. Right now, he's attempting to inspire Edinburgh movers and shakers – attending this free taster course, he says, are representatives from the likes of Edinburgh Chamber of Commerce, HBOS, Tesco and Babcock.

They are split into three groups, the skipping ropes tied into giant knots and each person told to grab an end section.

What follows involves much twisting, turning and manoeuvring of bodies. The fastest team to untie the knot in the multi-coloured ropes lets out a winning cheer. Their prize – a Curly Wurly.

It's a flavour of the rest of this slightly bizarre motivational child-theme workshop – optimistically called Fun@Work – where those who do well are rewarded with "traffic light" red, yellow and green lollipops and encouraged to use coloured pens and crayons to make their notes.

"The workplace makes up such a huge part of people's lives, so why wouldn't you do everything you can to make sure you enjoy it? It leads to greater results for each organisation," insists Gavin.

Gavin is director of Tree of Knowledge, which takes its motivational techniques and tricks to business as well as primary and secondary schools.

The latter are familiar territories for father-of-one Gavin, from Trinity, who used to work as a teacher at Tranent Primary School.

There were five years working as a stand-up comedian, and a year out travelling the world and performing at a number of big venues and events.

Now he's brought his workshop to the zoo. "We deliberately picked a venue that reminded people of when they were a child."

His corporate clients indulge in childish games which Gavin and his Tree of Life colleagues insist will boost motivation, self-confidence and positivity.

One challenge involves a Polo mint, a piece of thread and the power of positive thought . . .

"The Polo mint is on the end of a piece of thread and the person holds it above the compass," explains Gavin. "They aren't allowed to move their hand or arm. I ask them to imagine the Polo swinging from north to south on the compass. It starts to move. You can hear people saying, 'oh my God, how is that happening?'. It's hilarious."

Of course it moves because even the tiniest muscle movement is enough to send a vibration to the thread.

It might all sound a little, well, childish. But at least it's less physically threatening than some team-building and motivational courses that others have found themselves on, such as the Californian home security firm that allegedly attempted to boost productivity by demanding staff members eat baby food, wear nappies and endure spankings with a rival company's yard signs.

Sadly some workplace teambuilding events can go horribly and tragically wrong: a Malaysian government worker died earlier this week after undergoing a commando-style, team-building exercise at a training camp in Kedah.

Visiting Professor at Heriot-Watt University, Cary Cooper, 70, agrees that not all corporate team-building hits the right spot – and not everyone will respond to finding their "inner child".

"This kind of motivational training wouldn't work for some people but it is up to management to decide whether they think it would work for their staff," he says.

Among those taking part in the zoo workshop is Noreen Daglish, 45, who works for Tesco in Dunfermline.

"A lot of the stuff that was mentioned at the workshop would be really good to bring in," she says.

"If you're stressed, just taking that five minutes out can help, rather then flying off the handle."

The skipping ropes untangled, there's advice from other members of the Tree of Knowledge's team, which includes a zoologist who once toured schools with a creepy-crawly roadshow, a forensic scientist and psychological illusionist.

"As kids, the way we view the world is spot on," says Gavin. "There's no reason why the workplace can't be fun too."