Library of teambuilding games & icebreakers

This one is perfect for newcomers to agile practices. It’s quick and interactive, focusing on iterations and adapting to customer feedback. Teams work together to design a chocolate bar to please their “target market” (other team members), iterating each time depending on the feedback they get.

Set up:

Every round, one person is the Product Owner and they give basic instructions for making chocolate (like milk or dark chocolate, fillings, toppings, colors, packaging). They design the product on a whiteboard and then release it to their “customers” for feedback. The product owner takes the feedback to the group to reiterate for the next release. Working within timers for design, the cycle continues until most customers are happy with the end result.

As well as being a good energizing activity for large groups, Your North is a great exercise for sparking conversation about the importance of team alignment and direction. Even better, it’s also simple and fun to play.

Here’s how it works:

1. Ask the group to stand up, leaving plenty of space between them (everyone should be able to put their arms out to the side without touching anyone or anything)
2. Show the team where north is (this could really be north if you have a compass on your phone, but feel free to make it up otherwise!)
3. Tell everyone to cover their eyes with their left hand and spin around 10 times, keeping their eyes covered the whole time
4. When they’re done, ask everyone to stretch out their arm and point toward where they believe north is now (their eyes should still be shut)
5. The team can then open their eyes to see the many different directions in which people are pointing

How to play Jenga unstack

Try a condensed take on the popular game Jenga. Start by building the tower according to game instructions. Then see who can remove the most pieces in one minute without knocking everything down. You can do this as a large group and simply set the timer for a minute and see how far you can get, or you can have a Jenga tower prepared for smaller groups or pairs and have them compete to see who can remove the most. Either way, watch out for the falling pieces!

You might be surprised how many workforces enjoy a game of chess!

How to play online chess club

Creating an online chess club is easy and free. Schedule regular games throughout the year and reward the winner with a small prize like a voucher or cash bonus - monetary rewards are a great incentive for driving online social interaction.

How to play “If I were”…

One of the easiest games to play, this activity allows players to describe themselves in different situations. Simply read the prompts out loud and give everyone a chance to respond. Some things you can suggest are:

• If I were a country, I’d be….
• If I were a song, I’d be…
• If I were a food, I’d be…
• If I were a brand, I’d be…
• If I were a cocktail, I’d be…
• If I were a wild animal, I’d be…
• If I were a mythical creature, I’d be…

Ready for a question game with communication at its core? Quick, fun, and energizing, Question Game ticks all the right boxes. Here’s how it works:

Working in pairs, players must bounce rapid-fire questions back and forth for as long as possible. If someone hesitates for too long, says something nonsensical, or makes a statement instead of asking a question, they lose!

Here’s what it might sound like:

• “What’s your biggest fear?””
• “Isn’t that too personal for work?”
• “Are you dodging my question?”
• “What do you think?”
• “Why won’t you tell me what you’re scared of?”
• “Why don’t you just guess what my biggest fear is?”
• “Is it spiders?”
• “Does that mean you don’t like spiders?”
• “Are you turning the question on me?”

Another way to play the Question Game is in a group, where everyone takes turns asking the next question in the sequence. If they mess up, they get eliminated! The winner is the last person standing.

A gratitude board is a physical and visual representation of gratitude, which can be anything from notes about specific moments to vacation photos. The board can be set up in an office as an ongoing reminder of the positive aspects of the workplace and can be an excellent tool for promoting a positive mindset during the workday.

Here are some of the ways to create and maintain a gratitude board:

1. Provide your employees with materials, such as a backboard made of cork or cardboard, paper, writing utensils, pins, and plenty of room for positivity. If you're a remote team, consider a digital board or chat space dedicated to gratitude.
2. Create a list of the things you're grateful for. These can be big or small, from personal achievements in the workplace or something unique. Give employees a chance to write these reflections, or ask them to bring photos or keepsakes that can be placed on the board.
3. Keep up with the board and ask employees to add new items once a week or make updates on professional achievements when they happen.

Gratitude boards can be a simple but effective way to bring employees together and boost morale in the workplace. Regularly engaging with a gratitude board in the workplace can promote work-life balance.

This is a light-hearted team game that’s great for improving communication skills. Before you can start playing, you’ll need to divide the players into small groups, say 2-3 players per team—any more than this and things can become chaotic.

How to play the drawing challenge

To play the drawing challenge, each team must first designate one player to be “the drawer,” while the other players will be “the describers.” The describers will be shown an image which they’ll have to describe to the drawer within a given time limit. The more accurate the description, the more accurate the drawing will be.

The game is guaranteed to spark some laughter among your group while encouraging the players to develop their communication and listening skills.

Remember that game from childhood, “the floor is lava”? The one where you had to make it around the room without touching the floor. Good times. Shrinking vessel is somewhat similar, except you are working with a team. Strategy and Tetris skills will help me excel at this exercise.

How to play:

‍Mark the boundaries of the areas where team members will be placed. Slowly, the edges of the borders are moved and made smaller, and team members must work together to ensure they don’t fall outside the lines. They cannot step out of the line.

Materials you’ll need: Anything temporarily marks the floor, like a string or tape, even a blanket, will do. Enough space to fit a small team of 4-5 people at a time is also needed.

How many people: Mid-size to large teams

How to play Snowball fight

This activity is pretty simple and straightforward. If you live in a climate where snow is on the ground, get outside and dig in! Organize your larger group into smaller teams and have an old-fashioned snowball fight outdoors. For maximum fun, you can set up barriers or partitions in advance for people to hide behind, or set out supplies for building a “fort” for protection.

How to play Freeze

Slightly different from the drama-freeze game above, this exercise encourages more individual participation. Two people act out a scene, and then someone yells "freeze," and another person comes in and takes over the scene. It’s best to do this in an orderly fashion where the next participants are in a circle that you move around (or a line that you run down).

One wrong move and you’re out of the game! Blind Retriever hones your employee’s listening skills as they attempt to retrieve the object and avoid objects while blindfolded.

Great for: Listening and communication

Duration: 10 minutes

Players: 4+

You’ll need: One blindfold per team, various soft-edged obstacles

How to play Blind Retriever

Setup: Find a large open space. At one end of the space, place the object that your teams will need to retrieve and at the other end indicate some sort of start line. Then, position various soft-edged obstacles between the start line and the object. Avoid using any objects that could cause harm if somebody were to walk into/land on them. Finally, divide your group into small teams of about 2-4 players, allocate one person per team to be the Retriever and position everybody behind the start line. The Retriever is then blindfolded.

To play: When the game starts, the non-retrievers of each team must guide their blindfolded retriever to the other end of the room to collect the object using only verbal commands. If a retriever makes contact with any of the obstacles in the room their team is eliminated from the race. The team whose retriever collects the object first without touching any obstacles wins.

How to play Don’t answer that

Fun and laughter are guaranteed with Don’t Answer That. A verbal exercise this time, all participants have to do is stand in a circle asking each other questions! As you’d expect, though, there’s a caveat…

You don’t answer the questions directed at you.

The person standing to your left does it instead. For example, imagine that James asks you, “What’s the most embarrassing moment of your life so far?” You’d have to stay silent while Jeanette – the person to your left – claims it was when you got drunk at the last Christmas party and told the CEO you loved her.

The idea isn’t necessarily to be truthful (although it isn’t a rule that you can’t be!). The goal is simply to have a good time, make people laugh, and lift the mood.

Instructions:

1. Divide participants into small groups of 4-6 people.
2. Explain the game's purpose: Explore leadership qualities and promote collaboration.
3. Set the scenario: Stranded on a deserted island, reach a designated rescue point within a time limit.
4. Provide teams with whiteboards, markers, and roles (Leader, Communicator, Problem Solver, Timekeeper, Recorder).
5. Present challenges related to survival, discuss strategies, and have teams present solutions.

This game is an awesome Icebreaker that encourages leadership skills to be developed. It throws participants into a stranded island scenario where they must navigate challenges and reach rescue. By assigning specific roles and promoting collaboration, it unveils individuals' leadership qualities. Teams strategize, communicate, problem-solve, and make decisions under pressure. Conflicts may arise, but they're resolved through teamwork. It's a crash course in leadership, where participants learn and grow while having a thrilling time.

How to play Treasure hunt

Similar to a scavenger hunt, a treasure hunt is a lot of fun but with a bit more intention. Rather than collecting a random list of items, participants use clues to find more prompts and hints, until the group solves a mystery (or finds a treasure). You can also create a treasure map if you want to play into the “pirate” fantasy a little more. The important thing is that only clues point toward the next stop - areas of the map should not be spelled out, but involve some problem solving and critical thinking to figure out what the clue means.

How to play You teach me

Everyone learns differently and has unique perspectives on things. There can be a lot of value in hearing and understanding these perspectives from other people. For this exercise, you’ll need to divide people into small groups of no more than 5. Give them all of the training materials and notes you have for the training, and instruct them to work together to come up with their own presentation. Their goal is to cover the material for everyone else present, as if they were the teacher. Teaching others is actually a powerful form of processing knowledge, and having a different perspective will help attendees to learn the material more thoroughly.

Ready to put your employee’s engineering skills to the test? Paper Tower challenges your team to build the highest tower using nothing but a few sheets of A4.

Great for: Problem-solving, communication, collaboration

Duration: 5-10 minutes

Players: 6+

You’ll need: A4 paper

How to play Paper Tower

Setup: Divide your group into teams of about 4-6 players and give each team several sheets of A4 paper. It’s up to you how many pieces of paper you hand out, but make sure each team is provided with the same number.

To play: Teams have just five minutes to build the tallest tower possible using the paper provided. Teams are not allowed to use any bonding materials to strengthen their tower. Don’t forget to keep teams updated on the time by announcing how much time is left. Once the five minutes are up, measure the highest tower and discuss with each team what went well and what went wrong.

The Human Spring teaches participants the value of trust, cooperation, and interdependence – three core qualities of effective teams. If your workforce appears divided, there’s been recent conflict, or levels of collaboration seem to be dwindling, then we highly recommend it!

Here’s how to play:

Divide the team into pairs (consider doing this for them in order to break up the usual cliques and encourage mingling), ensuring that partners are of a similar size.

Next, ask the pairs to face each other and put their hands up, with their elbows bent, and palms facing the other person. They then have to put their palms together (i.e. person A’s palms should be touching person B’s) and lean towards each other, bit by bit, until they’re holding one another up.

That’s the easy bit! The real challenge comes next, when they have to start moving their feet further and further back, while keeping their palms together.

The beauty of this exercise is that each rearward shuffle makes it harder to stay upright without the support of their partner.

Eventually, their feet should be so far back that they’re relying solely on their teammate to stay upright. The pair with the greatest distance between their feet is the winner. They should then swap partners and do it all again!

What you need:

• N/A

Not something that can be played as a group, but something that can really help with setting goals. Habitica is an online platform and mobile app that gamifies goal-setting and task management. It transforms your goals and habits into a role-playing game where you create a character, set goals, and earn rewards for completing tasks.

In this game, you begin by crafting a character to embody you. Input your tasks, habits, and daily goals, each linked to a specific achievement. Successfully completing these earns in-game rewards, like experience points and virtual currency, allowing your character to level up, unlock new features, and face challenges. Neglecting tasks or failing incurs consequences for your in-game character.

This game shows the person first-hand what it’s like to set a clear goal and how it feels to reap the rewards. It also shows the person that not meeting your goal will result in consequences. In theory, this can be then applied in real-life work!

Top Tip: Set this as homework for all the group!

This activity tests the strength of every link in the chain. In paperclip chain relay, teams compete to craft the longest paperclip chain within a time limit.

‍Set up:

1. Split everyone into teams of 4 to 6. Enough brains to brainstorm, but not too many cooks to spoil the broth.
2. Hand out equal piles of paper clips to each team. Ready, set, clip!
3. Decide on a time limit. 5 to 10 minutes should do the trick. Start your timer and keep it viewable.
4. Roam the room and cheer teams on as they make the longest chain possible. When time’s up, measure each chain to find the longest.

Instructions:

1. Divide players into teams.
2. Provide each team with a set of materials such as blocks, cards, straws, cups, and tape.
3. Set a time limit of 10-15 minutes for the teams to build the tallest tower.
4. Ensure that each team follows the same rules and uses the same materials.
5. Once the time is up, measure the height of each tower and declare the winner.
6. Discuss the strategies used by each team and how they could improve in future rounds.
7. Repeat the game with different materials or variations to continue challenging the players' leadership skills.
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This game unleashes potential leaders' creativity, teamwork, and strategic thinking. Just like a tower, leadership requires a solid foundation, balance, and the ability to reach new heights. It challenges leaders to allocate resources efficiently, communicate effectively, and inspire their team to elevate their performance.

Visual puzzles are all about teamwork through description. One person describes an object, and their teammates sketch it based on those instructions—without seeing the original object. The results? Usually hilarious, but also a great way to test communication skills.

This game is perfect for enhancing your team’s ability to give and follow clear directions. Plus, the unexpected drawings add a bit of fun and laughter, making it an enjoyable way to break up the workday while sharpening those communication skills.

How to play:

• One person describes an object (e.g., a mug or a bike).
• Teammates sketch the object based only on the description.
• Compare the drawings to the original for some laughs!

When the whole gang's aiming for the same bullseye, see it as though it’s a motivational magnet. Shared goals keep everyone on track, turning coworkers into the dream team who want to see the best in you.

Shared goals activity - Vision board creation:

• Set up a creative station with magazines, newspapers, scissors, glue and large poster boards.
• Instruct colleagues to create individual vision boards by cutting out images, words and phrases that represent their career goals, aspirations and values.
• Encourage participants to share their completed vision boards with the group and explain their choices.
• Discuss common themes and goals that emerge, showcasing the team's shared aspirations.
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This visually engaging activity strengthens the sense of unity and purpose among colleagues.

This game is a fun and energetic game that gets the blood pumping, and its team members get to know each other in an informal way, which is essential to boosting workplace morale.

How to play:

‍Stand in a group, and the first player answers one of the written prompts on the ball after reading it aloud, so the group knows what they’re answering. After they finish, they call out the next person's name to that they will be throwing the ball (they wouldn’t want to hit an unsuspecting player in the face), and they do the same as the first player.

The game continues until everyone has a chance to answer a question.

Materials you’ll need Enough space for people to gather comfortably and throw a ball.

How many people: An icebreaker thumbnail or a DIY version can be a soccer ball with phrases written on it.