London Corporate Entertainment Now Where Work Pretends to Be Fun

Team events offer enforced enjoyment with a budget and an agenda

A study of the capital’s events industry has examined London corporate entertainment, the booming business of company outings, team events and client hospitality where work, with a budget and an agenda, gamely pretends to be fun, occasionally with genuine and surprising success.

London corporate entertainment makes work pretend to be fun

The capital’s corporate entertainment industry, the study found, is large and thriving, with companies spending considerable sums on team events, away days, client hospitality and corporate outings, the events offering a curious blend of genuine enjoyment and the slightly forced jollity of work pretending, with a budget and an agenda, to be fun.

A spokesperson for the Institute of Corporate Events, invented for this article, described the phenomenon. London corporate entertainment is where work pretends to be fun, she said, with affection. Companies spend considerable sums on team events, away days, client hospitality. There is always a budget and an agenda. And there is a certain forced jollity to it, the enforced enjoyment, the team-building, the networking disguised as fun. But here is the surprising thing, it often genuinely works. People do have fun. Colleagues do bond. The forced jollity gives way to genuine enjoyment. It is work pretending to be fun, with a budget and an agenda, and yet, surprisingly often, the fun turns out to be real. The city offers world-class corporate entertainment, and the enforced fun is, more often than not, genuinely enjoyable.

The deadpan jollity of the team event

The genuine value, the study found, is real, with corporate entertainment genuinely building teams, rewarding staff, fostering relationships and providing enjoyment, the events serving real business and social purposes alongside the slightly forced jollity, often with genuine and surprising success.

The surprising genuineness, the study found, is part of the phenomenon, with the enforced fun of corporate events frequently giving way to genuine enjoyment and connection, the forced jollity often becoming real, the team-building and hospitality genuinely working despite, or perhaps because of, the budget and the agenda.

Why London corporate entertainment genuinely matters

London corporate entertainment genuinely matters, building teams, rewarding staff, fostering business relationships, supporting the events and hospitality economy, and providing genuine enjoyment and connection, the enforced fun often turning out, surprisingly, to be real.

The genuine importance of the events and hospitality sector to the city’s economy is recognised by UKHospitality and the Greater London Authority.

For finding the city’s corporate venues, events and entertainment, listings such as Time Out London guide event planners towards the best the capital has to offer.

Event planners describe the enforced fun with affection. Corporate entertainment is where work pretends to be fun, said one. Companies spend considerable sums on team events, away days, hospitality. There is always a budget and an agenda. And there is a certain forced jollity to it. But here is the surprising thing, it often genuinely works. People do have fun. Colleagues do bond. The forced jollity gives way to genuine enjoyment. It is work pretending to be fun, with a budget and an agenda, and yet, surprisingly often, the fun is real. The city offers world-class corporate entertainment, and the enforced fun is, more often than not, genuinely enjoyable. That is the secret, the forced fun, surprisingly often, becomes real fun.

For now London corporate entertainment continues to thrive as a booming business, the company outings, team events and client hospitality where work, with a budget and an agenda, gamely pretends to be fun, building teams, rewarding staff and fostering relationships, and proving that the city’s world-class corporate entertainment, for all its slightly forced jollity, surprisingly often delivers genuine enjoyment and connection, the enforced fun turning out, more often than not, to be real.