Organizing activities that require teamwork can sometimes be demanding. Some activities may be unexciting, and participants can grumble and not want to be involved. However, when done well, these meetings can add a lot of value to meeting or training while allowing everyone to have fun at the same time. We are going to present you 10 team activities at work for promoting the creativity and team-building.
Benefits of Team Games at Work
Even though some people might be skeptical about playing games at their workplace at first, it is undoubtedly a great way to integrate! The ice-breakers can:
- help to create a relaxed environment where colleagues share ideas and engage more fully,
- encourage members of the team to share ownership of the working environment,
- build rapport among colleagues and foster a productive working environment
- prepare members for collaborative group work
Examples
These activities can be used in Erasmus + projects to help participants get to know each other. With these 10 team activities at work you can completely reshape the working environment!
1. Integrity Activities and Energy Rises or Icebreakers
These activities are ideal for initiating a meeting or group training where people do not recognize other members in the group or where interest is beginning to diminish, and where energy levels need to be increased.
- Compliments
Everybody tapes a sheet of A4 paper on the back and the group is mixed together, each introduces itself to the others one by one and makes a short talk of about 30 seconds.
After this brief conversation, each person writes secret praise to his colleague’s page before moving on to the next person.
Finally, the participants read some praises and try to guess who wrote them. It’s a great way to realise what is other people’s a first impression of us!
- Line Up!
A quick and fast-paced game to start a meeting or training will be useful, especially in the morning, in the first job, or just after lunch.
Explain that you say your command aloud and that everyone should line up as quickly as possible according to that command.
Examples can be height, age, hair length, birthday month, and so on. It’s pretty good for quick communication and interaction. It can also be made in two sets to make it competitive.
- What Is My Name?
A post-it note on each person’s forehead is stuck with the name of a famous person.
Then the participants should move inside the room by asking three yes / no questions to each person they speak to find out which famous person’s name is written.
- 2 Lie 1 Truth
Each person changes positions in order to tell the group three different pieces of information, two of which are true and one lie. The rest of the group asks questions about these four facts to guess which is not true. The questioned person has to lie in a convincing way.
It’s a fun and interactive way to get more interesting information about them, rather than just learning their name and where they’re from.
2. Short Term Team Building Games
These are good teamwork exercises that don’t take too much time and only require minimal equipment. It may help to ensure everyone’s focus again after the break or use it as an introduction to the next part of the training or meeting.
- Perfect Square
In this activity, team members have to form a perfect square while blindfolded.
Get everyone to stand in a circle while holding the rope. Once the circle is formed, they can lay the rope on the floor. Each participant then puts on their blindfold, and have them take 5 steps backwards. The task is to work together to form a square while blindfolded. The activity ends when the team thinks that they have formed a square.
This exercise is great for focusing on communication and teamwork.
- Human Node
Direct everyone shoulder-to-shoulder in a circle, tell them to raise their left hands and hold a person’s hand in front of them. Then ask them to do the same with their right hands.
They will become jumbled and the purpose of the exercise is to solve themselves within a certain time limit without releasing the hands they hold.
Again, it is quite good for communication, leadership and teamwork.
- Minefield
This exercise, which is very simple to prepare, and it tests your communication skills.
Using a rope or similar, lay the winding road on the ground. Place noise-making toys, balloons, or any other similar things on the road that will take on the task of “mine”.
The team member will be blindfolded and will only be guided by the voices of the other members of the team, walking along the path without pressing the mines.
3. Advanced Level Problem Solving Team Exercises
These exercises require more time to complete but are great ways to promote teamwork, communication and creativity, and often determine leadership skills.
- Escape Room
If you want to take your team out for teamwork activity, the escape room challenge is the perfect way to come alive and work together as a team.
Escape rooms require team members to collaborate to find clues and solve puzzles, and ultimately get out of the room where they are covered.
This event has become very popular in the last few years, and in many cities, you will find places that offer these opportunities.
- Mixed Puzzle
Give each group a puzzle and indicate that the winner will be the first team to finish. However, some pieces of each puzzle are mixed with parts of other groups.
In order to win, they need to find out which pieces are missing and somehow convince other groups to get them back. They can be connected to people and be as creative as they want.
- Treasure Hunt
It is a classic, but one of the best and most adaptable ones.
Give each team a list of tasks to complete and the time limit for completion. You can choose anything, but try adding tasks that include different options, such as long tasks, shorter tasks, and even outdoors that are mobilizing and even leaving the room. They may need to subdivide themselves to complete as many tasks as possible before the deadline expires.
The activities is great for teamwork and communication and also shows who are the leaders.
Questions for the discussion
After playing some of the 10 team activities at work that we presented, you can reflect on the activities performed. Here there are some examples of the questions you may use to reflect on the experience.
- What problems did you encounter during the challenge?
- Did you identify a leader? How was leadership demonstrated during the challenge?
- How well did you communicate during the challenge?
- (If the activity was done in two rounds) What did the team improve on in the second round?
- What did you learn from the challenge?
Perhaps the best way to use this list is not to try to implement the exercises exactly as described here but to try to adapt them to your situation.
Ultimately, you’ll recognize the people you work with. Be creative with these ideas and be sure to find activities that are ideal for your team-building needs.
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