11 Office Games & Activities to Do At Work for Fun
The traditional office culture characterized by a 9-to-5 work schedule, often leaves employees uninspired and less innovative.
As going to work with the same routine everyday can be hectic and tiresome at times.
To counter this boredom and lack of productivity, organizing office games and activities can improve employee creativity, reduce work stress, and better communication skills.
Adding these activities within the office environment allows teams to take a break from their regular tasks and participate in both physical and mental playful pursuits.
These enjoyable themes facilitate better understanding among team members and the development of effective solutions through their creative thinking.
In this blog, we will discuss some of the most engaging, fun, and attention-grabbing office games that enhance employees’ ability to think differently and having fun at the same time.
- Desk Bingo
Desk Bingo is a very common workplace activity; it is done with designing and printing bingo cards with various office items.
These may include water bottles with flowers, leather laptop bags, and a particular plant on a desk. In this activity, employees will observe their surroundings and mark the items they find on their bingo cards.
Participants who successfully cover an entire line of objects on their cards, whether vertically, horizontally, or diagonally, and call out ‘bingo’ will be declared the winners.
This game can be organized into two teams, adding a competitive element that inspires players to complete in the game more excitingly.
Other than including office items, you have the option to add various questions to the bingo cards. Consider adding diverse categories such as history, science, fiction, social media, movies, and many more.
The below chart offers some sample questions for Desk Bingo:
- Alphabetical Story Circle
To play this fun-oriented office game, the team members gather in a circle. One of the participants starts a story by using a specific but random alphabet or letter. The next participant should keep the story on by using the next letter in the sequence.
At one time, several teams can participate to make the game more competitive. When one team is assigned to start making a story starting with a random letter, the rest of the team will use the following alphabet in sequence to complete the challenge.
The team that used all the consecutive letters successfully and arranged the whole story with a theme will be declared the winner.
For example:
“Anthony came to our home to take revenge.”
“But he did not find anyone and got angry.”
“Clearly, he was finding someone to talk to.”
In case you get confused when choosing a random letter to start the game, a random letter generator can be used to decide the starting letter, in case players are unsure.
A random letter generator is designed to provide alphabet ideas and you can instantly select random alphabets for the game.
The tool allows you to set the language and number of letters of the alphabet that you can use for the competition
To start your story, you can select a random letter using this random letter generator: https://randomlettergenerator.io/
- Answer within 30 Seconds
Prepare a mixture of general trivia questions about the office or colleagues. Arrange different teams by dividing employees into various groups, and see which team gives more correct answers within 30 seconds.
Examples of such questions are: “When was the company founded?”, “Who was the first CEO of the company?”, “Which co-worker has an old ticket-collecting hobby?”, “Where was the CEO’s office in the old building?”
By asking these questions, employees gain a deeper understanding of their colleagues and the workplace. This activity improves connections and their awareness of each other’s personality traits.
- Childhood Photo Guessing Game
While looking for office fun games, consider a childhood photo guessing game. The procedure of this game is predictable, as per the name of the game. The participants of the game guess who is in a specific childhood photo. But some rules should be followed:
- Managers or employers should ask the employees to bring their childhood photos.
- First, employees will not show their childhood photos to their team members.
- Give numbers to the photos, pass them to each participant, and they will write their guess regarding a specific photograph.
- The winner will be the one who rightly identifies the maximum number of photos.
The teams can also think about adding the childhood photos of celebrities. This game generates excitement within the office, and even introverts enjoy participating in this engaging activity. To enhance the enjoyment of the game, management may consider arranging a prize of a small picture frame for the winner. Social media post makers make creating engaging posts about such office games easier, helping teams share fun moments online.
- Sell a Random Object in a Minute
When it comes to playing a game that boosts creativity, “sell a random object in a minute” should always be on your list. To start this amazing game, the players will select a random object and assign it to one of the participants to sell it within a minute.
Team members can choose various objects such as a pen, a diary, a watch, a water bottle, and several other things. It is a fun activity and you can be short of random objects when you keep on playing.
In such a case consider using a random object generator to get object ideas as many as you want. You can select the number of objects to generate, and click the “Generate” button; the results will be provided within seconds.
To generate objects, you can use this random object generator: https://randomobjectgenerator.org/
This activity involves a healthy professional exercise where team members can build up their confidence and get creative ideas for selling products.
- Truth & Lie
Have you ever played the Truth & Lie game before? Don’t worry if you haven’t got any idea about the rules of this particular game. This is one of the best office games that can be played for fun and to get to know each other’s personality traits.
The rules of the game include that a participant will tell three statements about their personality, two of which will be true, and one will be a lie. The opponent will have to guess which two statements are true.
You can also change the rules of the game, where you can add two lies in your statements and one truth. The winner of the player will be the one who makes the highest number of correct guesses among other participants.
- Post-it & Solve the Puzzle
This game works well as a quick energizer where team players race to complete a puzzle. Start the game by breaking a famous quote or a phrase into different parts. Separately write down its parts on sticky notes and stick them randomly on a wall or a whiteboard.
Now, arrange teams according to the number of colleagues in the office and ask them to rearrange the quote correctly. A team is declared the winner that works faster to complete the rearrangement and puts all the sticky notes in the right sequence.
In this fun activity, co-workers not only improve their cognitive skills but also become mentally and physically energetic. The workplace atmosphere is modified, which influences the productivity and creativity of employees.
- Guess the Emoji
To break the ice in the silent office, you can consider playing the “guess the emoji” game. Begin playing this game by showing a random set of 5 emojis, and one of the team members acts out any of these emojis without saying any relevant word.
The rest of the team members will guess the relevant emoji. This is an imaginative game where acting participants rely on their instincts to imitate interesting emojis.
Other team members try to understand the acting participant’s actions without verbal communication. They engage in a skill development process that improves eye contact, comprehension of expressions, and builds a stronger connection with their teammates.
Play Guess the Emoji here: https://poki.com/en/g/guess-the-emojis
Make this game more interesting by combining two images or objects that sound like something specific like a feeling, an action, or an object.
- Search and Collect Discarded Items
This is also an interesting office game in which players become curious about finding the hidden and discarded items in the office.
To play this game, one of the employees arranges a list of discarded items in the office that are hard to find. Adding multiple players to the game can make it more hustle-filled and rushed.
The office will turn into a rivalry where all the team members will be looking for the same objects. The player who collects the maximum number of items will be declared the winner. You can add to this list random objects like a red stapler, a blue pen, a varnished desk, a discarded artificial plant, and others.
- Typing Race
The best way improve the writing or typing skills of the team members while also having fun is adding a typing race to the office games list. To take part in this game, the team members will have to arrange the keyboards for typing and take some further steps:
- Add the interested participants in the competition
- Set a time frame in which all the players will have to write the displayed words.
- When the time is up, ask all the contestants to stop writing.
- The player who has written the maximum number of correct words will be the winner.
This game is considered the best for improving hand-eye coordination and developing typing skills in the contestants.
- Random Object Drawing
For enjoyment and creativity, office employees can engage in the random object drawing game. In this activity, participants will split into two or more teams, with one team assisting in completing a drawing while the primary artist modifies the shapes and colors.
The assignee for the drawing can suggest various random objects, including some obscure ones, such as a flamingo riding a bicycle, a unicorn soaring without wings, or a plump mouse consuming baked goods.
Now, the artists will ask their opponents to guess the subject of their drawing and give it a specific name. The teams that achieve the highest number of correct guesses will be the winners. This is an excellent exercise for enhancing creativity and conceptualization.
Final Thoughts
When thinking about office games, do not limit them to startups or the fun companies only. It does not matter whether you are running a law firm, a non-profit organization, or a digital marketing company.
Bringing fun-oriented games will help to elevate the office environment and make the team members active, enthusiastic, and creative.
Adding different games to the weekly schedule will keep the whole team energetic, as the start of the week or weekends will no longer be boring or hectic.
You can include games like selling a random object in a minute, alphabetical story circle, typing race, search, collect discarded items, post-it & solve the puzzle, and many more.
