20 Quick Team Building Activities For Small Business Leaders
Discover 20 quick team-building activities. From group calisthenics to crossword...
Ice-breaker games are a great way to get your next office party started on the right foot.
These quick, simple, and fun activities get everyone working together, communicating, and getting to know one another so that the camaraderie continues once the game is over.
In this article, we’ll introduce you to a number of ice-breaker games that you can use at your next office party — or team meeting or anytime — to bring your team closer together and strengthen their social bonds.
Ice-Breaker Games Your Team Will Love
1) Pop Quiz
Pop Quiz is a great ice-breaker game because it doesn’t put anyone on the spot to supply their own response or answer.
Divide the group into small teams (four or less works well), give them pens and paper, and challenge them to answer the questions that you supply.
Fun questions include:
- List pi to as many digits as possible
- Name the song based on the lyrics (you can do several of these)
- Correctly spell a difficult word
- Guess the number of jelly beans after looking at a picture
- Name three or four models of a certain make of car (e.g., Ford Fiesta, Fusion, and Expedition)
Be sure to have each member of the team write their name at the top of the paper then turn in their answer sheet. “Grade” their papers and present a prize to the winners later in the party.
2) Sort The Beans
You’ll need plenty of table space and lots of beans for this game to work — especially during an office party — so plan accordingly.
Purchase packages of beans that differ in color (e.g., red beans and garbanzo beans/chickpeas), dump them together, and mix them thoroughly.
You’ll also need two empty bowls for each team to place the sorted beans in. Alternatively, you could have teams sort their beans into piles on the table. Whatever works for you.
When everything is set, challenge the teams to sort the beans by type. The team that sorts all its beans first is the winner.
Award them a prize, and then get the office party going.
3) Would You Rather
Before the gathering, come up with a number of “Would You Rather” questions, like:
- Would you rather have a horrible short-term memory or a horrible long-term memory?
- Would you rather lose the ability to read or the ability to speak?
- Would you rather be in jail for a year or lose a year off your life?
- Would you rather know the history of every object you touched or be able to talk to animals?
- Would you rather your only mode of transportation be a donkey or a giraffe?
- Would you rather wear a wedding dress/tuxedo every day or wear a bathing suit every day?
- Would you rather spend the rest of your life living on a sailboat or in an RV?
Go around the room asking each individual a question. Then turn everyone loose and encourage them to explain their answers.
4) Who Is It?
Have everyone — or a small group of volunteers, depending on how much time you want to take — write a unique, strange, or unexpected fact about themselves on a piece of paper.
Put the pieces of paper in a bowl or bag and mix them up. Draw one piece of paper from the container, read it aloud, and challenge the group to guess who wrote it.
When the game is over, encourage the group to share the context of their answers with others at the party.
5) Done This, Done That
This is a simple twist on the game Never Have I Ever. Prior to the party, prepare a list of Yes or No questions that begin with, “Have you ever….?”
Examples of good business-/family-friendly questions include:
- Have you ever fainted?
- Have you ever hitchhiked?
- Have you ever been to Antarctica?
- Have you ever been bungee jumping?
- Have you ever ridden a donkey?
- Have you ever jumped from a 10 meter (32 foot) diving platform?
- Have you ever been trapped in an elevator?
- Have you ever read a whole novel in one day?
- Have you ever walked out of a movie?
Instruct the participants to stand up if they can answer yes to the question.
Done This, Done That is a quick and easy way to give people something to talk about once your office party gets going.
6) Rock, Paper, Scissors Tournament
This is a simple ice-breaker game you can play with a group of any size.
The nice thing is that it doesn’t rely on any real skill — it’s pretty much just chance — so everyone can play without feeling bad if they lose.
When the party starts, have everyone form small groups with their neighbors. Lead the groups in a round of Rock, Paper, Scissors. The people who lose have to cheer on the players who are still in the game.
When one person from a small group is the only one left, that person has to join another group. Continue playing and cheering until only one person is left standing.
Break The Ice Beyond Office Party Ice-Breaker Games
Ice-breaker games are all about working together, getting to know one another, and communicating better.
But you can encourage these activities without taking time out of your busy day to play a game by providing your team with open and easy lines of communication and an effective schedule that maximizes everyone’s strengths.
Sling can help.
Features include:
- Time-saving payroll processing
- Helpful overtime control
- Dynamic reporting
- Powerful and intuitive scheduling
- Customizable communication (e.g., location-specific or team-wide)
- Productive labor cost optimization
- Effective budgeting
- Comprehensive time-tracking (with geofencing)
- And much more…
Add to that Sling’s onboard artificial intelligence and you’ve got an extremely beneficial and flexible set of tools that will help your team improve the way they work, communicate, and relate to each other.
For more free resources to help you manage your business better, organize and schedule your team, and track and calculate labor costs, visit GetSling.com today.
See Here For Last Updated Dates: Link
This content is for informational purposes and is not intended as legal, tax, HR, or any other professional advice. Please contact an attorney or other professional for specific advice.
