For anyone who has organized a team meal, the hardest part has always been making it more than just a ‘makan session’. Team meals are a conduit for conversation and team cohesion, and a simple cohesion activity over lunch can be effective at doing this.
However, there are few problems with activities over lunch. Firstly, your team is seated. This means that activities are limited to speech and not movement. Everyone is also trying to enjoy their food. Hence, any activity that requires your team members to drop their forks will not be welcome. Lastly, you probably don’t have a lot of time and resources to spend on the activity as compared to a full-blown team bonding day.
With that in mind, we have come up with 6 short and simple cohesion activities that you can do over lunch. They are simple to execute, require little planning or resources, and importantly, they achieve the goal of communication between team members.
P.S. the Catersmith team has tried and tested ideas 1, 2 and 4! Idea 4 is our favourite, of course.
Is your team lunch about getting the team together, or is it just a free food, makan session?
1. Core Value Heroes
It’s easy for team members to forget the company’s core values when they are just lifeless words printed on a wall. Take the opportunity to remind them and see them in action.
In this activity, your team members each identify an action that a teammate did, which exemplified one of your company’s core values. The name of the teammate, or hero, is written on a slip of paper together with a description of the action.
Over lunch, everyone shares what they've written with one another. While showing each other some appreciation, they also develop a deeper understanding of what the company's core values truly mean. The activity ends with the written note being given to the respective heroes.
2. Made Me Smile
This is a simple activity for when time is short, but the team needs a quick morale boost. Probably a good idea if you are having lunch on a Monday!
Each team member is invited to share about one thing that made them smile that week. Whether a big or small incident, team members should be encouraged to appreciate the beauty in each sharing. After all, research has shown that happiness is infectious!
3.The End Of The World
What would you do in the office today if the world was ending tomorrow?
Invite your team members to write this down on a slip of paper that goes into a mixed pile. Randomly pick them out and have everyone guess who the author of each slip was. You’ll have a pretty good idea of how well the team members know each other by the end of this activity!
4.True Confessions
This is an activity that we borrowed from Jimmy Fallon’s The Tonight Show - this one is too awesome to miss!
Each team member receives a slip of paper on which they write one truth and one lie. Go around the table and have team members pick out one of the two slips, and have the author read it aloud. The others are allowed 3 questions about the statement before they make a guess whether it was a truth or a lie.
Playing this game will bring out all sorts of facts about your teammates that you'd never have known. It’s also tremendous fun when you manage to call someone’s bluff!
Photo credits: Entertainment Weekly
5. Baby Face
Prior to your team meal, have everyone submit a photo of themselves as a baby of no more than 3 years old. Quickly drop them into a power point slideshow and flash them during the lunch.
Without much prompting, your team members will probably start guessing who the babies are. The larger the group, the more fun this gets!
6. Company Mascots
When was the last time you held a colour pencil? Chances are, if you don’t have a 5 year old kid, it was eons ago.
Bring out the kids in your team members by equipping them with colour pencils, then get them to draw a mascot that they feel represents your brand well. Invite them to explain the choice of colours, animal and props, and how they embody your company's brand.
This is a great chance to unleash some creativity and lots of engagement with your company's brand.
Sure, these activities are simple enough. But if you don't have much bandwidth to plan them, we’re here to lend a hand. Catersmith can help you create team experiences through food, by planning meals that are supplemented with tools you need for simple engagement activities.
Contact us today to find out more!
