Roberta Writes – Esther Chilton’s writing prompt and DL Finn’s Creative Perspective Challenge #poetry

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Esther Chilton’s writing prompt for this week is team. You can join in here: https://estherchilton.co.uk/2025/02/12/writing-prompts-52/.

I am not much of a team player. I have had some very bad experiences where my hard work and creative solutions have been accredited to more senior people on my so called team. I’ve also had situations where the team doesn’t listen and a crisis results. These situations have left a bad taste in my mouth and now I prefer to run my own processes with as little involvement from other people as possible.

No Team

There is no I in teamwork, so they say

My experience defies this simplistic view

There is always an I who leads the way

The one who takes control

Does most of the hard work

Burns the midnight oil

This is the same one who gets

To share the recognition and rewards

With the rest of the team

There is no team in

Taking the initiative

Or getting things done

But there are numerous I’s

***

The next poem is not new, but it fitted how I absorbed Denise’s picture prompt. You can read what other writers have created here: https://dlfinnauthor.com/2025/02/18/creative-perspective-challenge-two-links-and-haibun-writingcommunity-flashfiction-poetry-haibun-creativeperspectivechallenge/

Picture caption: A desolate scene in black and grey with a large building with towers and a bridge across a ravine

The Corporate Giant

It rears upwards

into the blue sky

a monstrosity

of reflective glass and

shiny stainless steel

towering over

the ant-sized people

who scurry about

in its imposing shadow

***

An emotionless giant

it is bereft of a soul

it feeds on small businesses,

corner cafes, fruit and nut shops,

independent butcheries, bakeries,

confectionaries and cake shops

even book sellers and

small stationers

are swallowed whole

disappearing into the gaping maw

of the corporate giant

***

It shreds and ingests

taking the sustenance it seeks

spitting out the bones

independence and individuality

creativity and uniqueness

mere entrails, unwanted and discarded

it stamps on difference

in its pursuit of profits

imperfections and belmishes

an unacceptable blight

on a perfect track record

***

What remains will finally

emerge as a mirror

reflecting the sameness

uniformity and consistency

it holds so dear

providing its market

with the conformity

and rigidity

that has taken over

and turned the world grey

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Published by robertawrites235681907

I am a writer of young adult fiction and poetry

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87 thoughts on “Roberta Writes – Esther Chilton’s writing prompt and DL Finn’s Creative Perspective Challenge #poetry”

  3. I’m sorry you’ve had those bad experiences, but understand 100%. I’ve had some bad team experiences as well, but a good team can be great (when it is needed). Each member needs to have a very specific role and understand it. There can be questions a discussion, but there must be a leader. But, yeah, I have very often been the one to take the initiative and do it, if I can.

    Anyway, I enjoyed both poems.

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    1. I have never worked with a great team, to be honest. I can imagine it can work well with the right people. I was so disappointed when I learned that senior people were taking the credit for my work and thought leadership publications. I’ve never really gotten over the disillusionment and breach of trust.

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      1. It does sound pretty awful.
        For some of the tech projects I worked on it would be impossible for one person to do it all, no matter how talented. There are a lot of moving parts and each part needs an expert.
        I was never the type of leader that would get super far ahead, but I believed in the motto, “The team takes all of the credit, the leader all of the blame.” I think that gave me much better results from the team than leaders who took the credit and passed the blame.

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  7. I do prefer to work alone too, Robbie. Why writing is so perfect. I love the poem you shared for the challenge. It struck a nerve as to what is happening now. We need the creative stores and minds so our worls is so gray and drab, I agree! Thank you for joining in!

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    1. HI Denise, I’m pleased you liked this contribution. Your picture brought a grey and drab world to mind for me. South Africa has a lot of problems with bad attitudes, lack of resources, and entitlement among employees. It doesn’t contribute to an easy and productive work environment.

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  8. Robbie, No Team captures the frustration of unrecognized effort so sharply for me; and The Corporate Giant is a powerful take on soulless expansion, with vivid imagery of small businesses being devoured. Strong writing!

    Much love,
    David

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  9. It seems that we have all found the right way to be individualists.Lol Thank you, Robbie! A wonderful description of what I also prefer. Teamwork is not bad, but with sad experiences in the past you are forced to be number one yourself. Best wishes, Michael

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  10. As a teacher, we tried to teach teamwork. It doesn’t come naturally. We gave jobs to each person on the team, one being leader. With a lot of work kids and adults learned how to do teamwork successfully. It takes skillful teaching and monitoring to ensure that all is going well in the team. But it can happen, and when it does, it is so much fun, and so rewarding.

    Admittedly, it is hard for me to be a team player, but even blogging has become so much more fun as we have become a team of collaborators, helping one another along.

    Your last poem is thought provoking as well. It reminds me of the movie, “You’ve Got Mail.” There is life in organizations as well as organisms, I think, and even the small ones, if they want to thrive, somehow do. The giants, like Montgomery Ward and Sears (the two biggest retailers when I was a kid) have crashed like dinosaurs, and online businesses, the mom and pop stores of old, have sprung up and dotted the landscape with their successes. Life is a mystery, and the older I get the more mysterious and awesome it is to behold.

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    1. I think the success of small businesses has a lot to do with the strength of the economy. When economies are shrinking and the population is under financial pressure, small businesses often fail. That is why so many professionals in my country stay in corporates. There is no security in small business here. As for teams, they don’t work when their are bad attitudes and people are entitled. The expectation is then to do as little as possible for as much as possible.

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      1. That’s sad. I expect it is the same in the workplaces here, too. As a teacher, cooperative groups were the way to go a decade ago. With Covid, things changed drastically and everything went distant. A friend of mine told me that teaching is still different and kids work separately on computers and the teachers are overseers. She’s subbing, so it could be different for full-time teachers. The idea behind teaching kids to work cooperatively is that most people do have to work cooperatively – or did. Covid changed the workplace a lot as well. You bring up the most interesting and deep topics in your poetry, my dear friend.

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        1. Thanks, Marsha, I write out what is impacting me at a moment in time. I agree that Covid changed the world significantly, but this teamwork issues has been a problem in my life since I started working over twenty five years ago. It is definitely linked to attitudes.

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  13. I generally prefer to work on my own, too. Though I can understand teams are needed and work, if each has a specific role.

    There’s a lot toxicity in large corporations, as you’ve expressed.

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    1. Not really, there aren’t many job opportunities in South Africa as our economy is shrinking. We’ve looked at leaving but where do we go? Everywhere is a disaster and the grass is generally not greener. I’d probably end up back in corporate anyway.

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  17. Great poetry, Robbie! I agree with their statements, though I sometimes think teamwork makes the job easier. Corporations’ only concern is profit. They view their employees as a resource for gaining profit, not as individuals with a mind and heart.

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    1. HI Tim, I think teams work when all the members know how to do their job properly and are prepared to play their roles and do the necessary work. I have never experienced that situation at work. I always end up having to do nearly everything myself so I now prefer not to make double work for myself by involving others. I am sure this is different in the USA as it is a capitalist country. There are some better corporates, but not if bottom lines are under pressure.

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      1. Where I worked, a General Motors engine development and durability lab, it was teamwork. I often had to go beyond my job to help others, but it didn’t make me angry, for some strange reason. The short-term result was praise from teammates and supervision, and a nice yearly bonus.

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    1. HI Thomas, I know that teams can work but they never have for me. Corporates are not all the same either, some make more of an effort to encourage a work / life balance and are better corporate citizens. If they take that road though, money can’t be everything.

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  19. You’ve nailed capitalism perfectly. When money becomes the goal, all individuality and creativity is lost.

    Corporate teams are often like that. But other kinds of teams, like sports teams, even those with “stars”, cannot thrive unless everyone does their part. There could be work teams that were successful that way, but it would still require strong leadership I think. A sports team needs a strong leader too–that’s why they call them managers.

    I do prefer to work alone myself, I hated office politics and was much more productive as a freelance designer. (K)

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    1. HI Kerfe, it is true that making money the only goal squashes all individuality and creativity. A balance would be better but that never seems to happen. You are correct about sports and other teams. My poem is about teams in a corporate environment. I never played team sports, as I was a runner so I’ve never really had a good team experience.

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  23. Corporate culture as you well know from experience can and is brutal why do you think I retired early?…Your poems portray the reality very well …I hope you are having a great week, Robbie xx

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  25. As an elementary school principal for 7 years, I can’t agree more. There is always at least one that just wants to ride the coattails of the ones who do all the work. The Corporate Giant is a bleak image, but unfortunately, this is happening all over the world. Both very creative, and realistic poems, Robbie.

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  27. Sorry that you’ve had bad experiences with teams in working on projects. And that second poem… whoa, that’s powerful. It’s a bold reminder that we can support small businesses.

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    1. HI Lauren, I think it depends on who you are working with. A lot of people aren’t team players and all the effort and work lands on one person. That has always been my experience. The USA employment scene is much more ruthless than ours. If you don’t perform, you get fired so people work harder and do what’s expected of them – well, this is what I think.

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  30. In a team, invariably one person shoulders all the responsibility unless each one is assigned a specific role and all are equally responsible. I prefer working on my own. Your poem captures that frustration so well. I have never worked in a corporate environment but my friends who do call it toxic. Very powerful writing, Robbie.

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  31. Not a shallow moment on this blog. Love it!

    Agree about team work.

    In film we use the term “team work”, but in fact without people (the # 1s of the departments, and the director on set and the big producer over everyone) calling the shots, the process collapses, or becomes a chaotic mess.

    Your corporate poems fits with my thoughts.

    The big enigma to me is that you are so amazingly creative, yet work in the corporate wrld.

    Respects!

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    1. Hi Resa, I never considered going into an artistic type of work world ever. Probably because my dad was a landscape designer and he always struggled to make ends meet. I didn’t want to struggle financially my whole life. I am unique in my corporate world though 💜. I don’t like teamwork, I’m a lone wolf generally.

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