Field notes from the works golf day

The email goes out in June with a golf emoji in the subject line. It says "all abilities welcome", which is a legal disclaimer, and "a fun Texas scramble format", which is a threat. You reply-all with a thumbs up. It's happening.

The car park

The sales team arrive together, already loud, in matching polos nobody asked them to match. Someone from IT has brand new everything, the tags off but the creases still in. And the quiet one from accounts lifts a tour bag out of a tiny hatchback, and thirty people silently recalculate their afternoon.

The first tee

The CEO hits first, because of course. It goes forty yards, hard left, into a bush that will be discussed at three Christmas parties. Thirty-one adults say "unlucky" in perfect unison. "Unlucky" does more heavy lifting at a works day than any word in the language.

The middle holes

The scramble does its dark work. You'll hit exactly one good shot all day, the team will use it, someone will say "that's why we brought you", and you'll live on that sentence until roughly November. Meanwhile the accounts guy is quietly four under through six, playing a Kirkland he found in his bag, saying nothing. Nobody has ever seen him practise. Nobody, it's now occurring to everyone, has ever really seen him at all.

The prizes

Longest drive goes to a man who'll mention it in meetings until he leaves the company. Nearest the pin goes to a shank that came in off the cart path, which everyone agrees is technically golf. The novelty prize table has a beer-can headcover on it, and the bidding war for it is the only sincere competition of the entire day.

The dinner

Two hours, three speeches, one slideshow. The CEO's drive has already been reframed as "a bold line". Nothing was decided at any point today. Everything was noticed.

You'll be invited again next year. You'll say yes before the email finishes loading.