“Can we create escape rooms for interviews?” Christopher asked.

He meant it as a joke. Even followed it up with an “LOL.”

But actually, he’s onto something.


Christopher Lin, the host of the podcast Leading People First, wrote a post on LinkedIn — a mini-rant, really — about the problems with interviews.

“You will NEVER know a person’s true personality during interviews,” he starts.


My friend, Kathy Klotz-Guest, wrote this in response:

And she’s right!

People’s personalities come out when they play. Their collaboration style, their leadership style — everything comes out when they play!

As Kathy said in a later comment:


“Interviews are lying on both sides sometimes. And not always intentional. Both sides are presenting who they think they SHOULD be; not who they are.”


(Reminds me of my dating days… 🙄)


And it brought to mind the games my family plays with my 13-year-old nephew “across the pond” when we meet on Zoom on Saturday mornings.

He loves playing games — the more competitive, the better! His competitive side (and his sore loser side, on the rare occasions he loses..) really comes out.

My mom is very vocal about what she doesn’t know, and is quick to ask for help and offer it.

Lately I’ve noticed I have a tendency to go into a cave and focus intensely on the task at hand. (Hmmm… I’m not sure I’m thrilled about that!)


And that’s when Christopher asked, “can we create escape rooms for interviews? Lol.”

In fact, it may sound ridiculous, but it would actually be a brilliant way to do interviews.

Why?

Escape rooms require a lot of teamwork. You can learn a ton about someone from how they work an escape room together.

It’s one of the reasons I love facilitating with play: because not only is play how we learn, but play reveals who we are.


And THAT is a great case study of the business case for play, and how play is not the opposite of work, but how we make work more effective.



I love using play to help leaders and teams make breakthrough progress and feel energized in their newly discovered capabilities. If you or your team could use help getting somewhere faster and more joyfully…

click here to reach me via my contact form and my assistant, Trish, will help schedule a time for us to have a chat, so I can learn more about you/your team.

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