Engaged employees can crush their goals and enormously contribute to the bottom line. On the other hand, team members who are bored or uninterested in their jobs can be little more than dead weight.
If you have employees who aren’t on fire for their jobs, you aren’t alone. Gallup’s 2024 State of the Global Workplace Report found that a whopping 62% of people are not engaged with their jobs.
What can companies do to increase morale and create a more highly engaged workplace? Well, there are many ways, like improving company culture and compensation, showing recognition, and respecting work/life balance.
A fun option to build team spirit and foster connections is through games. Employee engagement games can break the day-to-day monotony of work, inspire creativity, and foster skills like communication and patience.
Benefits of Employee Engagement Games
The most obvious advantage of planning employee engagement games is to increase engagement and productivity, right? Yes, but there are other benefits a company will reap, too.
- Build a culture of continuous improvement. By using games to increase employee engagement, organizations highlight their commitment to employee development. Over time, this method can teach employees to always be looking for ways they can improve as individuals and as a team.
- Increase employee retention. Disengaged employees may choose to look for roles they are more excited about. Employee turnover can be expensive for companies. According to the latest results from The Harris Poll, employee turnover costs an average of $36, 295 annually. Using games along with other methods for building engagement can help you stop employees from leaving.
- Enhance collaboration. Teamwork can be a big driver of an employee’s satisfaction. Most games require working together to win, which can strengthen co-worker relationships and build a more inclusive working culture.
- Reduce stress and burnout. Fun, engaging activities that break up the workday can reduce employee stress levels and give them a break from the pressures of their jobs. Games can lift their mood and energize them, which can help them get back into the swing of things.
- Encourage innovative thinking. Games often require participants to think outside the box and look at things from another point of view. These exercises can help team members build their problem-solving skills and more successfully contribute to a company’s innovative efforts.
Best Employment Engagement Games
There are dozens of games companies can choose from when they’re trying to increase employee engagement in the workplace. Some of them depend on the time you can devote to the game, the number of players, personality types, the location where the game will be played, etc. Here are 10 of our favorites.
Improv
Similar to charades, Improv is played by giving a person a prompt for them to run with. The second person adds to the story, then the third person, and it keeps going until everyone has added their part.
Improv requires the players to tap into their creativity, work together, and relate to each other in different ways.
Office Trivia
Create questions based on the company’s history, industry-related questions, and fun facts about employees. Put employees into teams and do a round-robin Q and A (think Family Feud) to see which team can give the most correct answers.
This game helps employees connect with the company and strengthens their relationship with the other people on their teams.
Guess Who
Write a handful of questions and have every participant answer anonymously. Collect the answers, then randomly read one of them. For example: “What movie star would you want to be stranded on a deserted island with?” Then have everyone guess who wrote the answer.
Guess Who can help employees get to know each other better, which strengthens team bonds.
Scavenger Hunt
This game is a winner because it can be played on-site, off-site, or virtually. Split into teams and give them riddles to solve so they know where to look for the coveted items.
This fun game helps individuals communicate more clearly, use problem-solving, and give them a chance to enjoy some healthy competition.
The Floor Is Lava
Lay out (or mark off) several tiles in a conference room or outside. Split into teams with the goal of getting every member from one side of the “lava” to the other. One person calls out the instructions to help their blindfolded teammates miss the “lava” according to the directions.
If you want to have lots of fun, build camaraderie, and improve communication, this game will help you do it.
Escape Room
Either take the team to a physical escape room in your city or set up one on-site or virtually. Each team must solve riddles or complete puzzles to move through the room to escape by the deadline.
An Escape Room game helps employees focus on problem-solving, collaboration, and time management.
Get tips, industry benchmarks, strategies to boost scores, and more!
Pictionary
Played just like the traditional living room game, you divide employees into teams and have a representative draw (either on a whiteboard or by using virtual tools) clues for their teammates to guess before time runs out.
A ton of fun, creativity, and time management will be the outcome of playing this game.
Puzzles
If there’s space in a meeting room or kitchen, set up a large puzzle for employees to work on during their breaks. This will encourage employees to sit and talk with each other while they work it and help them de-stress and relax a little bit. Plus, puzzles help people feel a sense of accomplishment when they’re completed.
Name That Tune
Another game that can be played on-site or virtually, Name That Tune is set up with a “host” who plays a song for each team. When a team member thinks they know the song, they buzz in and finish the lyrics.
This game fosters team collaboration and creates a healthy competitive spirit between teams.
Minute to Win It
Set up some quick 1-minute challenges around the office or virtually. Some challenge examples are stacking cups, counting a jar of jelly beans, or transferring peanuts from one side of the table to the other just using chopsticks. Employees can either divide into teams and perform the challenges in a relay, or each person can run their own race.
Minute to Win It is an exciting game that will test the players’ patience, inspire creativity, and encourage teammates to cheer each other on.
Choosing Employee Engagement Games
Managers need to be thoughtful and inclusive when choosing which games to play. Some of the considerations should be:
- Each employee’s location. If you have remote employees, choose virtual games to ensure they can participate.
- Age and physical ability. Be cognizant that some physical games may not be suitable if you have older employees or ones with physical impairments.
- Team dynamics. Close-knit, long-term co-workers may benefit from highly competitive, problem-solving games, while newer teams may get more out of get-to-know-you-type games.
- Specific objective. Whether you want to improve communication, strengthen employee relationships, inspire creativity, reduce stress, or sharpen problem-solving skills, identifying your goal is key to picking the gain that offers maximum impact.
- Time and resources. Some games require specific materials and lots of space. Opt for games that don’t require extensive pre-planning and set up.
Employee Engagement Games Really Work
Employee engagement games are fun and break the daily workplace monotony, but they do more than that. They’re powerful exercises that inspire creativity and collaboration, sharpen problem-solving and communication skills, and strengthen team relationships. Integrating these activities into your workplace will help you build a more motivated workforce, stronger team dynamics, and improve employee soft skills.
