A Chinese company based in the northeastern province of Liaoning is faced with online backlash after a mainland social media user exposed the “unreasonable” fire-eating activity that employees were forced to eat fire during a two-day team-building event.
Social media user Rongrong reportedly told a mainland news outlet that she worked for less than a year at the education organization and witnessed the fire-eating activity, as per the South China Morning Post.
“The purpose was to show the company’s leadership our determination, to show that we wanted to win, and we wanted to make money,” she said.
In the particular activity that required employees to place flaming cotton buds in their mouths, employees were supposedly told that it will help them build more confidence and also help them overcome their fears.
According to Rongrong, she was very scared of the activity and “found it degrading.” She was very hesitant but feared that not participating would cost her job.
It was further alleged that many Chinese companies implement fire-eating during team building events, claiming that it could help unlock employees’ potential.
Rongrong’s revelation sparked widespread outrage across social media platforms in China, but this isn’t the first time unsafe or questionable team-building and employee motivation activities were reported in Chinese companies.
In 2020, a real estate company in China was accused of abusing its employees after a video went viral over its supposed motivational activity for a worker, wherein the employee had to do push-ups in the street, in public, while water was poured over him.
That same year, another Chinese firm was under fire for allegedly forcing staffers to slap themselves in the face while chanting slogans. Viral footage showed that the employees knelt on the ground, slapped themselves, and appeared to punish themselves in different ways, such as slamming their hands hard on the floor.
Last year, a Hong Kong firm also faced the public’s wrath after an anonymous user on Facebook revealed that the company employed a “motivational” strategy wherein workers were forced to slap their “lax” colleagues in the face.
Amid growing criticism, the company Rongrong accused of unsafe team-building activities has yet to provide a statement.
The post Outrage As China Company Allegedly Makes Employees Eat Fire In Team-Building Activity appeared first on International Business Times.
