Happy New Year!

As we enter our 10^th month of working under the murky cloud of COVID, attitudes remain bright and cheerful within the good ship Geollect. Since the first wave and consequent lockdown, we have welcomed several new joiners to the clan. With each new joiner the team has settled within a new rhythm with admirable ease considering that our “getting-to-know-you” stages were entirely virtual! Despite the separation, it has been incredibly exciting to see the breadth of our expertise grow with each new joiner.

Towards the end of the year we had racked up a number of socials that took us through the changing seasons of lockdown, by the end of November we had done several quizzes and games, I had raised almost £900 for the Bone Cancer Trust by doing 2000 burpees in 2 weeks(!), various special versions of the Geollect in-house game: “The Unknown Banger” and even a horse racing social (Well done Ben L for winning the Go Pro!).

In my (nearly) two years at Geollect, Christmas is deemed a very important time for us to come together, to celebrate and blow off steam after working hard through the year – and Christmas 2020 was more important than ever. The uncertainty of the COVID situation undoubtedly put a line straight through any kind of in-person party, but that didn’t mean that we couldn’t adapt and overcome in true Geollect-style! Punctuating the onset of the Christmas season was the marvellous Thankgiving Social comprising several rounds of USA-themed quizzes and games, and potato head carving competition where each person had to emulate another member of the team in potato form – this brought tears of mirth for days!

After this came the precision planning of both the virtual Christmas social and the Secret Santa gift exchange, we were determined that we were going to find a way to make merry! Each member of the Geollect team were given a little “Party Package” containing everything to make the virtual social more interactive. There were kazoos for Caroling games, Christmas-themed transfer tattoos, gingerbread men for decorating, and a few other treats. Also included was an individual “Geollie” award, loosely based on the “Dundies”. To give you an idea; Ashley Gwinnell won the “Swishiest Ponytail” award, check out his profile on our Team page to see if you agree.

Secret Santa was also very much worth the effort of gift delivery and collection between over 20 people, Josh was very proud to now own the tiniest vacuum cleaner on the market and Ryan received some very “fun” slippers indeed!

Despite the tribulations of living and working within the confines of COVID-19 restrictions, and thereby doing our best to limit the harm done by the pandemic, we look forward to smashing 2021 whether we can work together in person or from home for just a little while longer while the vaccines roll out. Either way, there will be more socials to come!