Great team building can happen with a mobile team building Scavenger Hunt. We’ve seen it many times before. While many clients go through third parties to run full days, consider adding a Scavenger Hunt to your next unique Team Building Day. Why? It’s fun. It’s memorable. It’s customizable to wherever you want to go and whatever you want to achieve.
Team Building in Chicago – Mobile Team Building Ideas by Social Scavenger from Social Scavenger on Vimeo.
3 Key Benefits to Team Building with Scavenger Hunts
What we have found by watching clients run Team Building games is that a Scavenger Hunt accomplishes a few really important things when it comes to team building.
1. Get individuals working together in entirely new ways
Nobody is going to want to do ‘every challenge’ in a Scavenger Hunt. That’s where the team factor comes into play. Everybody has their own skill sets and a Scavenger Hunt full of ‘challenges’ is a great way to bring these out. We aren’t talking about ‘go find a pen with the word “Dog bone” on on it, we are challenging our co-workers to do something unique. So the typical skill sets somebody brings to the table, often fly right out the window and you find out who’s got some great break dancing moves.
2. Getting out of the comfort zone
Nothing says coming together like shared moments. After you start a dance party on the street, or find somebody who’s birthday it is and sing them happy birthday…well suddenly the last minute update for the TPS report is a really easy obstacle. Breaking down people’s walls by putting them out of their comfort zone but working together, is better than just getting people to drink together! That works too, but get original here!
3. Post day team building Part 2
The downfall of a Scavenger Hunt is they are normally great for each team. But come end of day nobody wants to huddle around your sheet of paper or look in your bag of collectibles. What we have there is a failure to communicate. In the world of mobile scavenger hunts, you are now looking at live streams during the hunt, but more fun is sitting down after with a coke / beer and watching them on the big screen. Again you aren’t going to watch every team’s entire scavenger hunt (painful slow death), but you are going to pull up the best videos. So the ‘break it down old school dance styles in a public place’ challenge. Well that’s a good one. You can just go to the stream and watch each video on the big screen. With that all team members get to see what others were up to. Breaking down levels and perceptions.
5 Favourite Team Building Scavenger Hunt Challenges
We get to see a lot of challenges fly by through our mobile Scavenger Hunts. There is no such thing as the best ideas, because it’s almost ALWAYS in the execution. That said, some challenges typically get a funny reaction or interpretation.
1. Team Dance – this is always a video challenge. Video challenges by the way are awesome for fun factor. Public dances are the way to go, sometimes involving as many people as possible, other times specific styles etc. Rarely do these not make us smile.
2. Human Pyramid – what’s your insurance like? Don’t worry, even a 4 layer pyramid can’t cause too much injury.
3. Team Jam – this isn’t a sing song, but team’s seem to like to see how small of a space they can get themselves into.
4. Piggy Back High-Fiving – some variety of piggy backs and high-fives are common place. Simple but an easy way to start to get the team used to working with strangers and getting out of their comfort zone.
How to Add Educational Brand Education to your Scavenger Hunt
5. Interview a Stranger– it’s always fun to watch companies who build scavenger hunts around their brand. Unless they go overboard. If you have a known brand, asking the team to interview strangers that are in the demographic and ask a question (super simple to start with) is always an eye opener. People inside companies tend to think that others have any idea of what you do. It also forces them to learn how to quickly explain it themselves. The bottom line, if you aren’t Apple or McDonalds, there is a good chance nobody knows what you do!
There are approximately a zillion things you can get teams to do in the quest for Team Building, so whatever activity you are doing, think about adding in an element of ‘challenges’. Maybe a full Scavenger Hunt, maybe a simple 5 challenge game where teams earn up to 50 points to win x or y prize at your company dinner.
Have fun and get team building!
