)
)
)
Remote work is great. No commute, no dress code, and more time to get your deep work done.
But the one concern most leaders have about their teams is the culture. By that, they usually mean, “We used to have fun together in the office, and now remote work feels stale and boring.”
So, leaders are searching for ways to inject more fun, build connections, increase team chemistry, and make the digital work environment as engaging as in-house work ones.
Team leaders who look to fun activities to build team connections are on the money. Workplace studies have shown that teams that engage in fun activities like gaming are more productive and have more work-life balance.
We’ll get to a few fun games to play on Zoom with coworkers in a minute, but first let’s look at Unwork.
What is Unwork mode?
Unwork is one of the four modes of work that high functioning professionals and teams experience throughout the day.
Unwork is the mode of work where, as the name suggests, you’re not doing ‘work’. Unwork is essential for great teams, and it’s the grease that keeps things moving when things get tough.
Unwork happens in physical offices around coffee, the water cooler, printer gossip, group lunches and all the other in-house work opportunities for communication between coworkers.
As a leader, you probably didn’t create any of these encounters. In a digital workplace, you have to intentionally make the space for Unwork. Plan for at least 30 minutes a week of scheduled Unwork time with the team.
Fun games to play online with coworkers
So, what are some fun games to play online with coworkers?
Here’s a bunch of options to check out. Find the ones that match your team’s personality.
1. Socializing
Just getting people chatting around is the simplest way to do Unwork. The conversation can flow naturally, as long as it doesn’t drift into work topics. Socializing is great because there are no winners and losers (like in a game), and everyone is usually on their best behavior :-).
Your team may need nothing more of a prompt than “How’s life going?”. But sometimes it can be helpful to have a list of nice questions to take the pressure off in case the conversation stalls.
Check out our list of check-in questions to keep the conversation flowing.
Casual socializing is a great opportunity to demonstrate empathy and follow up with a team member on something they might have mentioned last time. If Greg said he took his dog to the vet during yesterday’s lunch, ask him what happened today.
2. Book clubs
If your team has a common interest, get together and discuss or listen to a book together and talk about it.
3. Personal challenges
This could be something like a fitness/health goal or a bucket list challenge. The challenge should be inclusive and interesting for everyone involved. Take time during Unwork to update or demonstrate how you’ve moved forward in your challenge.
4. Watch parties
Get together and watch a movie, TEDtalk, or something else that inspires you. Film yourself doing a reaction videos as a team, or MST3K style.
5. Guided experiences
One in a while, do something a little more involved. Sean Hoff from Moniker Partners, or Team Building Hub have a lot of great options.
6. Scavenger hunt
Split into two teams. Each team creates a list of things around a house/office for the other group to find.
7. Pictionary-type games
This one’s always a hit and very easy to do. Check out Skribbl.io or Drawize.
8. Gartic Phone
Gartic Phone is like Pictionary and Telephone combined.
9. Wordle
The worldwide sensation, coming to a team near you. (Or go unlimited!)
10. Powerpoint Karaoke
Imagine giving a presentation with slides you’ve never seen before. Ok, that’s what this is.
11. Codenames
A fun guessing game that works best with an even number of players.
12. HeadsUp
Charades, from a distance.
13. Tabletopia
Board games, card games, chess, and a lot more.
14. Trivia
Lots of options here. Try out Water Cooler Trivia, Wikitrivia, or play a Sporcle quiz together.
15. Escape rooms
Puzzle Break and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes are great.
16. Jackbox games
Jackbox has a ton of fun options that are well worth the price.
17. Mobile games
Many mobile games have a collaborative party mode. Stumble Guys is a favorite on our team. Also, Among Us and Spaceteam.
18. Built-in games
Video platforms like Around.co have built in games that you can quickly load and don’t have to fumble around with other technology.
19. VR games
If your team is exploring VR in the workplace, you’ve got a lot of fun collaborative games like Beat Saber and Acron (where only one person needs a VR headset).
20. Steam
Once you get serious about games to play on zoom with coworkers, you’ll want to check out the whole market of options in Steam, such as Don’t Starve Together.
21. Holiday check in
This is a great activity for multi-cultural teams. Every few months, have everyone share about an upcoming holiday and its significance. This is also a way to have more inclusive meetings by not scheduling them on important days.
22. Mixr
Mixr is a dedicated platform where you can host tournaments playing common online games and track leaderboards for your teammates.
23. Puzzle Party
Google lets you do a puzzle together while chatting
24. GIF battles
There’s a cool Trello template to use to create a team GIF battle. Create your own experience and see who the monarch of GIFs is.
How to make Unwork activities a success
Put them on the schedule. This should be a recurring block of time for your team. Don’t delete it and treat it as just as important as your weekly alignment meeting.
Alternate game masters. If you have one person who loves to schedule fun stuff, that takes a big load off. But it’s usually nice for each person to be responsible for Unwork on a rotation so that no one has to carry the full load.
Plan ahead. Don’t wait until the meeting starts to decide what to do. If the idea flops, just close it down and jump into a round of check-in questions.
Don’t skip it. If you are the leader of the team, you need to be present and engaged. If team members feel like it’s not something you take seriously and you continually schedule other things over it, they will get the message.
Digital meetings can be just as fun as in-office. But leaders must be more intentional to create time to find games to play on zoom with coworkers and just have fun together.
What does your team do for Unwork? Let us know!
Photo by Afif Kusuma on Unsplash
Remote work is great. No commute, no dress code, and more time to get your deep work done.
But the one concern most leaders have about their teams is the culture. By that, they usually mean, “We used to have fun together in the office, and now remote work feels stale and boring.”
So, leaders are searching for ways to inject more fun, build connections, increase team chemistry, and make the digital work environment as engaging as in-house work ones.
Team leaders who look to fun activities to build team connections are on the money. Workplace studies have shown that teams that engage in fun activities like gaming are more productive and have more work-life balance.
We’ll get to a few fun games to play on Zoom with coworkers in a minute, but first let’s look at Unwork.
What is Unwork mode?
Unwork is one of the four modes of work that high functioning professionals and teams experience throughout the day.
Unwork is the mode of work where, as the name suggests, you’re not doing ‘work’. Unwork is essential for great teams, and it’s the grease that keeps things moving when things get tough.
Unwork happens in physical offices around coffee, the water cooler, printer gossip, group lunches and all the other in-house work opportunities for communication between coworkers.
As a leader, you probably didn’t create any of these encounters. In a digital workplace, you have to intentionally make the space for Unwork. Plan for at least 30 minutes a week of scheduled Unwork time with the team.
Fun games to play online with coworkers
So, what are some fun games to play online with coworkers?
Here’s a bunch of options to check out. Find the ones that match your team’s personality.
1. Socializing
Just getting people chatting around is the simplest way to do Unwork. The conversation can flow naturally, as long as it doesn’t drift into work topics. Socializing is great because there are no winners and losers (like in a game), and everyone is usually on their best behavior :-).
Your team may need nothing more of a prompt than “How’s life going?”. But sometimes it can be helpful to have a list of nice questions to take the pressure off in case the conversation stalls.
Check out our list of check-in questions to keep the conversation flowing.
Casual socializing is a great opportunity to demonstrate empathy and follow up with a team member on something they might have mentioned last time. If Greg said he took his dog to the vet during yesterday’s lunch, ask him what happened today.
2. Book clubs
If your team has a common interest, get together and discuss or listen to a book together and talk about it.
3. Personal challenges
This could be something like a fitness/health goal or a bucket list challenge. The challenge should be inclusive and interesting for everyone involved. Take time during Unwork to update or demonstrate how you’ve moved forward in your challenge.
4. Watch parties
Get together and watch a movie, TEDtalk, or something else that inspires you. Film yourself doing a reaction videos as a team, or MST3K style.
5. Guided experiences
One in a while, do something a little more involved. Sean Hoff from Moniker Partners, or Team Building Hub have a lot of great options.
6. Scavenger hunt
Split into two teams. Each team creates a list of things around a house/office for the other group to find.
7. Pictionary-type games
This one’s always a hit and very easy to do. Check out Skribbl.io or Drawize.
8. Gartic Phone
Gartic Phone is like Pictionary and Telephone combined.
9. Wordle
The worldwide sensation, coming to a team near you. (Or go unlimited!)
10. Powerpoint Karaoke
Imagine giving a presentation with slides you’ve never seen before. Ok, that’s what this is.
11. Codenames
A fun guessing game that works best with an even number of players.
12. HeadsUp
Charades, from a distance.
13. Tabletopia
Board games, card games, chess, and a lot more.
14. Trivia
Lots of options here. Try out Water Cooler Trivia, Wikitrivia, or play a Sporcle quiz together.
15. Escape rooms
Puzzle Break and Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes are great.
16. Jackbox games
Jackbox has a ton of fun options that are well worth the price.
17. Mobile games
Many mobile games have a collaborative party mode. Stumble Guys is a favorite on our team. Also, Among Us and Spaceteam.
18. Built-in games
Video platforms like Around.co have built in games that you can quickly load and don’t have to fumble around with other technology.
19. VR games
If your team is exploring VR in the workplace, you’ve got a lot of fun collaborative games like Beat Saber and Acron (where only one person needs a VR headset).
20. Steam
Once you get serious about games to play on zoom with coworkers, you’ll want to check out the whole market of options in Steam, such as Don’t Starve Together.
21. Holiday check in
This is a great activity for multi-cultural teams. Every few months, have everyone share about an upcoming holiday and its significance. This is also a way to have more inclusive meetings by not scheduling them on important days.
22. Mixr
Mixr is a dedicated platform where you can host tournaments playing common online games and track leaderboards for your teammates.
23. Puzzle Party
Google lets you do a puzzle together while chatting
24. GIF battles
There’s a cool Trello template to use to create a team GIF battle. Create your own experience and see who the monarch of GIFs is.
How to make Unwork activities a success
Put them on the schedule. This should be a recurring block of time for your team. Don’t delete it and treat it as just as important as your weekly alignment meeting.
Alternate game masters. If you have one person who loves to schedule fun stuff, that takes a big load off. But it’s usually nice for each person to be responsible for Unwork on a rotation so that no one has to carry the full load.
Plan ahead. Don’t wait until the meeting starts to decide what to do. If the idea flops, just close it down and jump into a round of check-in questions.
Don’t skip it. If you are the leader of the team, you need to be present and engaged. If team members feel like it’s not something you take seriously and you continually schedule other things over it, they will get the message.
Digital meetings can be just as fun as in-office. But leaders must be more intentional to create time to find games to play on zoom with coworkers and just have fun together.
What does your team do for Unwork? Let us know!
Photo by Afif Kusuma on Unsplash
