COLLABORATION · 10 MIN READ 12 Awesome Team Building Games Your Team Won't Hate By Brianna Hansen, August 10, 2017 "Not another dumb company team building game," says the displeased employee. Ouch. When this thought crosses your employees' minds, you can pretty much throw the benefits of team bonding games out the window. Team building activities and games are supposed to be not only educational, but also enjoyable. They help the team learn about each other — how each person thinks, works, solves problems, and has fun. To encourage your team to learn about one another without hearing a chorus of groans, here are 13 team building games your team will want to play over and over again: Quick Team Building Games 1. Game of Possibilities Time: 5-6 minutes Number of Participants: One or multiple small groups Tools Needed: Any random objects Rules: This is a great 5-minute team building game. Give an object to one person in each group. One at a time, someone has to go up in front of the group and demonstrate a use for that object. The rest of the team must guess what the player is demonstrating. The demonstrator cannot speak, and demonstrations must be original, possibly wacky, ideas. Objective: This team building exercise inspires creativity and individual innovation. 2. Winner/Loser Time: 5-6 minutes Number of Participants: Two or more people Tools Needed: None Rules: Partner A shares something negative that happened in their life with Partner B. It can be a personal or workrelated memory, but it has to be true. Then Partner A discusses the same experience again, but focuses only on the positive aspects. Partner B helps explore the silver lining of the bad experience. Afterward, they switch roles. Objective: Participants discover how to reframe negative situations into learning experiences together. 3. Purpose Mingle Time: 1 - 2 minutes Number of Participants: Any Tools Needed: None Rules: This one is for those of you looking for a great indoor team building game that won't take up much time. Before a meeting, have each individual walk around and share what they hope to contribute to the meeting with as many people as possible. If you want, offer a prize for the person who shares with the most people, and another for the person who successfully contributes what they shared. Objective: Improves meeting productivity and makes attendees think about how they're going to contribute, rather than just what they hope to get out of the meeting. Outdoor Team Building Games 4. Scavenger Hunt Time: > 1 hour Number of Participants: Two or more small groups Tools Needed: Pen and Paper Rules: Break the group into teams of two or more. Make a list of goofy tasks for each team to do as a group. Tasks can include taking a selfie with a stranger, taking a picture of a building or object around the office, etc. Give the list to each team, along with a deadline by which they must complete all tasks. Whoever completes the most tasks the quickest, wins! (You can even create your own point system according to task difficulty if you want!) Objective: Great team bonding exercise that helps break up office cliques by encouraging people to work with colleagues from other teams, departments, or just social circles. *Fun Fact: At Wrike, we hosted our own scavenger hunt using our tool to track the tasks. Check out how we used Wrike for fun! Wrike Uses Wrike for a Scavenger Hunt 5. Human Knot Time: 15 - 30 minutes Number of Participants: 8 - 20 people Tools Needed: None Rules: Have everyone stand in a circle facing each other, shoulder to shoulder. Instruct everyone to put their right hand out and grab a random hand of someone across from them. Then, tell them to put their left hand out and grab another random hand from a different person across the circle. Within a set time limit, the group needs to untangle the knot of arms without releasing their hands. If the group is too large, make multiple smaller circles and have the separate groups compete. Objective: This game for team building relies heavily on good communication and teamwork. It also results in a lot of great stories for the water cooler chat in the workplace. 6. The Perfect Square Time: 15 - 30 minutes Number of Participants: 5 - 20 people Tools Needed: Long piece of rope tied together and a blindfold for each person Rules: Have your coworkers stand in a circle holding a piece of the rope. Then instruct everyone to put on their blindfold and set the rope on the floor. Have everyone take walk a short distance away from the circle. Next, ask everyone to come back and try to form a square with the rope without removing their blindfolds. Set a time limit to make it more competitive. To make it even more difficult, instruct some team members to stay silent. Objective: Focuses on strong communication and leadership skills. By instructing some team members to be silent, this game also requires an element of trust across the team, allowing team members to guide each other in the right direction. Like this post? We have more! Subscribe to our content newsletter for your weekly dose of productivity and collaboration tips. Like this post? We have more! Subscribe to our content newsletter for your weekly dose of productivity and collaboration tips. Please enter your email Subscribe Please enter your email Subscribe 7. The Mine Field Time: 15 - 30 minutes Number of Participants: 4 - 10 people (even numbers) Tools Needed: Various handheld objects, several blindfolds Rules: Find an open space such as an empty parking lot or a park. Place the objects (cones, balls, bottles, etc.) sporadically across the open space. Have everyone pair up, and make one person on from each pair put on the blindfold. The other person must lead their teammate from one side of the open space to the other without stepping on the objects — using only the verbal instructions. The blindfolded person cannot speak at all. To make it more difficult, create specific routes the blindfolded team members must walk. Objective: This game focuses on trust, communication, and effective listening. This activity makes a great team building beach game as well. 8. The Egg Drop Time: 1 - 2 hours Number of Participants: Two or more small groups Tools Needed: Assorted office supplies Rules: Split everyone off into groups of three to five people and give each group an uncooked egg. Put all the office supplies in a pile. They have 15 to 30 minutes to use the supplies to build a contraption around the egg that will keep the egg from breaking when dropped. Some suggestions for supplies are: tape, pencils, straws, plastic utensils, packing material, newspapers, rubber bands. Once time is up, drop each egg contraption from the second or third floor of your building and see which eggs survive the Eggpocalypse. Objective: This classic team building game is an engaging (and messy) exercise. It uses teamwork and problem solving to bond team members. The more people the better, so this makes for an "eggcellent" corporate team building game! Make sure you have an extra supply of eggs in case some break (ew!) during the construction process. Ice Breaker Games 9. The Barter Puzzle Time: 1 - 2 hours Number of Participants: Four or more small groups Tools Needed: Different jigsaw puzzles for each group Rules: Have everyone break off into small, equal-sized groups. Give each group a different jigsaw puzzle with the same difficulty level. The goal is to see which group can complete their jigsaw puzzle the fastest. However! Some pieces will be mixed around in other group's jigsaw puzzles. It's up to the team to come up with a way to get those pieces back — either through negotiating, trading, exchanging team members, etc. Whatever they decide to do, they must decide as a group. Objective: This activity will rely heavily on problem solving and leadership skills. Some team members might stand out and some might stand back, but it's important to remember that the entire team must come to a consensus before a decision is made. 10. Truth and Lies Time: 10 - 15 minutes Number of Participants: Five or more people Tools Needed: None Rules: Sit everyone in a circle facing each other. Have each person come up with three facts about themselves and one lie. The lie should be realistic instead of extravagant. Go around the circle and have each person state the three facts and a lie in a random order, without revealing which is the lie. After someone shares, the others must guess which is the lie. Objective: This is a great ice breaker game, especially for new teams. Helps eliminate snap judgements of colleagues, and gives introverts an equal chance to share some facts about themselves. 11. Blind Drawing Time: 10 - 15 minutes Number of Participants: Two or more people Tools Needed: A picture, pen, and paper Rules: Divide everyone into groups of two. Have the two individuals sitting back-to-back. Give one person the pen and paper and the other person the picture. The person with the picture describes the picture to their teammate without actually saying what it is. For example, if the image is a worm in an apple, do not say, "Draw an apple with a worm in it." The person with the pen and paper draws what they think the picture depicts, based on the verbal description. Set a time limit for 10 - 15 minutes. Objective: This is an activity that focuses on interpretation and communication. Once the drawing is finished, it's always interesting to see how the drawer interprets their partner's description. 12. This is Better Than That Time: 15 - 20 minutes Number of Participants: Any Tools Needed: Four or more objects Rules: Pick four or more objects that are different (or the same objects that look different). Split all your participants into even teams. Describe a scenario where each team has to solve a problem using only those objects. This can be anything from "You're stranded on a desert island" to "You're saving the world from Godzilla!" Have each team rank the objects based on their usefulness in that specific scenario, along with their reasoning. Objective: This exercise inspires team creativity in problem solving. The idea is to not make the scenarios too easy so it becomes obvious which objects are most useful. Additional Resources for More Team Building Games: Looking for even MORE fun team building games? Check out our Ultimate Guide to Team Building Activities That Don't Suck How does your team handle roadblocks? Here are the Top 15 Problem Solving Activities for Your Team to Master From finding hidden treasure to breaking out of prison, The Escape Game offers a wide range of adventures for your team to explore outside the office. Here are some Free Team Building Tools you can search for based on goals Here's An Epic List of team building games that are fun and unique Read about 13 Top Team Building Exercises for great ice breaker games Here's a whole Teampedia where teams actually add their own games Check out these Team Building Toolkit from University of California, Berkeley Any fun team building games you like that aren't on this list? Share them in the FR EE G U ID E comments! Trouble Finding the Right Collaborative Tool? Projects stalled. Endless feedback loops. Find the right solution to end it all. Our guide for creative teams can help. First Name Last Name Enter your business email + Phone number What department are you working at now? Select here What is your job level? Select here Get the Guide FR EE G U ID E We promise to play nice with your email address and phone number. See our Privacy Policy. Trouble Finding the Right Collaborative Tool? Projects stalled. Endless feedback loops. Find the right solution to end it all. Our guide for creative teams can help. First Name Last Name Enter your business email +965 Phone number What department are you working at now? Select here What is your job level? Select here Get the Guide We promise to play nice with your email address and phone number. See our Privacy Policy. TEAM MANAGEMENT TEAM BUILDING GAMES TEAM BUILDING RESOURCES FOR WORK TEAM BUILDING BUSINESS TIPS Comments (0) Recommended Articles COLLABORATION · 5 MIN READ How to Throw a Killer Office Holiday Party Your Team Will Love Holding an office holiday party? 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