Easy to Access Team Building Activities

Team building activities are a great way to bring people together in the workplace. After all, wouldn’t we all have a better time at work with people we could think of as friends rather than just boring old colleagues?

Here are some reasonably inexpensive team building exercises you can go in for if you’re looking to make your personal dynamic a little more inviting.

Duck in a Thunderstorm

A bit of a left-field choice here, but bear with us. Get the team round a table and give everyone a sheet of paper and a pencil. The game works thusly: everyone writes down a sentence of a thing or situation. People then pass their paper to the person on their left. That person reads the sentence, folds the paper down (to conceal the sentence from the next person) the draws a picture representing the sentence as best they can. The paper is then passed to the left, and the next person writes a sentence describing what the picture says.

Rinse and repeat until you’ve run out of paper. Essentially it’s a written and drawn version of Chinese Whispers. The fun lies in the confusion between what people started with and what it ends up as. Serve some drinks along with it for further hilarity.

Paintballing

It’s an oldie but a goodie. Shipping the team out for some be-khakied shootouts in the middle of nowhere is a classic team building exercise. You can help develop teamwork and strategy with each other whilst getting the adrenaline going in the great outdoors. It can also help team members let off some steam and give them an opportunity to shoot at their boss which they’ve no doubt been craving for some time.

Karaoke

Karaoke’s a fantastic icebreaker. It allows your team to drop their guard down around each other and have some fun in the process. If everyone makes a fool of themselves then no one’ll feel foolish. Add prizes and fancy dress for something a bit more full on. Bear in mind if some of your team are more on the shy or retiring side they might be worried about embarrassing themselves and not having a good time, so take your team’s different characteristics into account when picking your activity.

Video Gaming

There are plenty of places providing spaces for video game parties these days, from gaming bars to retro arcades. Video gaming offers a relaxed yet competitive space for employees to hang out with each other and have some fun. If you can, try renting an eSports venue where there are enough hubs for your team to play local LAN games together. Multiplayer gaming like this requires teamwork and cooperation and is usually very inexpensive to organise.

Orienteering

This is a fun activity to get your team out and about doing some gentle puzzle solving. It usually involves a walk following clues or directions to get from one point to the next. It’s a nice opportunity to spend some time away from the office environment while getting the grey matter going. There’s plenty of companies offering orienteering routes both in cities and elsewhere. Mix things up with a visit to some bars or a restaurant along the way to flesh the activity out and give people a chance to rest.