Top Ten Team Building Training Games



Alliteration Introduction



This is an outstanding game that enables players to get to know each other’s names. At the beginning all the players have to be placed in a circle. The game starts when a player introduces himself by making a gesture, and alliterating to his name, e.g. "I’m Wonderful Wendy" or "I’m Smart Steve". The following player points to the first, repeats the previous player’s name, trait and gesture, and does something similar about himself. And so on. Game ends with the first player having to do each other player’s gesture, repeating their names and attributes.



This game has been designed to establish the importance for all the individuals working in a team to get familiar with each other’s name as it is one of the basic principles of team building.



Human Driver Challenge



This game is considered as one of the most impressive tools for Team Building training. This Challenge needs groups to interact with each other in teams and perceive behaviors at an Emotional level when they Build a Cart and Race It. The game enables the players to discover the Emotional Drives and primary stimulating factors in a team environment so they can be more conscious of how they are influencing other team members. Apart from learning related to Leadership, Innovation, Cooperation and Team Cohesiveness, this diverse game is able to tie in teachings on Colored Brain and manifest Exactly How people Act and React to each other in groups. It has 6 distinct games and each set supports from 4 to 8 people. (This Game applies DC Organizational Development Psychology)



Animals



This game is played among an even number of players. Everyone is given an animal, but it is essential to make sure that there are 2 of each, and that nobody knows which other player is which animal. Then they are assigned a number of activities, which the animals perform. Such activities may include -

Eating. Eating when he / she is really hungry

Drinking. Drinking when he / she is really thirsty

Lovemaking

Grooming

Fighting

Sleeping



At the end, players are asked to locate the other animal of their kind. Others are asked if they found out who was which animal. To add some variations to this game, 2 players may be considered as humans.



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Blind Lead



This is a very renowned training game for Team Building. In this game one player is blindfolded, and the room is filled with obstacles (few chairs can be used or all kinds of junk can be placed haphazardly on the floor). The concept is that the other players of the group will guide the blindfolded player through the room, by talking.



6 Episodes



This is an excellent game to teach group storytelling. Players are given a huge task, like ’The launch of a new flavor of coke’, or ’Building a new clubhouse for the girl scouts’. The players get 1 minute to prepare 6 scenes, in which the given task needs to be accomplished. After 1 minute there is no more discussing, they just play the 6 scenes. It is important to keep track of time and see if they can make their minds up. Quarreling will just hold them back, so this will only work if players agree; they should immediately accept any usable ideas.



Greetings



This is a popular team building training game where all players start milling about the room. Then they are asked to greet each other, perhaps just by shaking hands. Players just shake hands, move on, and greet the other players they meet. Then the players are asked to greet each other in a more specific manner. Some examples are as follows:

greeting each other like a friend who has not been in touch for a long time

greeting someone who isn’t really trusted

greeting an ex-lover

greeting someone actually hated

greeting someone you have a undisclosed crush on

greeting someone you had a one-night stand with

greeting someone that sold you a crappy used car

greeting someone with bad breath

greeting someone like you are a cowboy, a soldier, a nanny, a Russian farmer

And so on.



Free Falling



Despite being a little bit risky, this game is very effective to build trust. This game has a number of versions. In the most risk-free and straightforward form all players are placed in a circle, one player at the central point. The player in the middle closes his / her eyes, slowly turns around, and then lets himself / herself fall backwards (or forwards). The other players need to catch him / her.



There are many other versions of this well-known game. For example one player stands on a chair or a table, the others in front of him. Player closes his eyes and lets himself / herself fall, hopefully he / she will be caught by the others.



Scorpion



At first a number of players are placed in the middle of the room, eyes closed the others stand by the walls. One of the middle players is tapped on the shoulder and he / she becomes the ’killer’ or the ’vampire’. The trainer give a go-sign, and all ’blinded’ players start milling around the room. When the killer bumps into someone, he / she squeezes that persons forearm to ’kill’ him. When a victim dies, he utters a scream, opens his / her eyes and is ’out’. Game is over when all potential victims are dead. The audience standing by the walls needs to confirm that blind players don’t bump into any object or hurt themselves.



To have some variations to this game, the following features may be added:

When a ’vampire’ runs into a victim, the victim becomes a vampire too

When 2 vampires bump into one another, they become normal mortal souls again



Translation for the Deaf



This is a three players' game. One will be a specialist on a topic given by the audience; another will be the interviewer and the third will provide simultaneous translation for the hearing impaired, using ’sign language’.



It has been noticed that this game can provide very good results if the interview itself does not go too fast, so the translator has plenty of time to translate. Returning keywords that the translator can always translate the same way can also be very helpful. A gimmick is to translate everything literally, even ’dummy’ words, like ’oh’, ’great’, ’hm hm’.



Yes Lets



This is an excellent warm-up game which involves picking a group activity, like throwing a party or organizing a picnic. One player starts, saying "Let’s ..." filling in what he / she plans to do. Then he / she starts doing exactly what she said she wanted to do. A second player jumps in, saying "Let’s ..." do something else, to advance the group activity. Both players say "Yes, let’s do that" and start doing whatever suggested. Third player jumps in, suggests what to do, and again all players loudly agree to do it, and actually do it. This is continued till everyone has suggested something.



This fantastic game is widely known and the group activity used in this game has been proved very effective in team building.



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