And even if you work remotely, team bonding is an important part of running a productive, effective team. The list continues below — read on to find fun icebreaker games, ice breakers for large teams, and more. So get the fun vibes flowing in your next virtual meeting with these ice breaker questions, or plan them as a part of the post-meeting happy hour. You could even suggest them to your team leaders for everyone to have a good time together.

For this game, have everyone bring in an embarrassing photo and tell the story behind it. Each round, the game will highlight a random letter of the alphabet and let players come up with any noun or phrase that starts with said letter. The best part — players can dispute answers amongst each other to take the win. This is a perfect icebreaker for your overly competitive colleagues.

Encourage active participation

These questions serve two purposes — first, they allow your coworkers to get into a sillier, more creative mindset. Second, they encourage conversation on topics typically reserved for outside the office, which enables members of your team to get to know one another on a deeper level. Drawasaurus is one of my favorite online drawing games to play with colleagues. Players get to choose from three random prompts to quickly interpret and draw their vision.

• In that meeting, members can talk about their personal life, work-related topics, play games, or make simple small talk.
• You can use pretty much any game or activity you want to break the ice before your meeting, as long as it gets people talking and smiling.
• And if you’re really trying to go for some bonus points, consider pairing your icebreaker activity with snacks for the entire team to get the energy in the room pumping.
• Each person will explain the item’s background, why they have it, or why it matters to them.
• Have someone write down well-known names on sheets of paper and then hand them off one at a time to a team member.
• To play two truths and a lie, all you have to do is tell two truths about yourself and one lie.

Virtual environments like Slack simulate spontaneous conversations typically found in physical office environments. You can also create a peer mentoring initiative where individuals are paired and encouraged to interact on their own. One of the biggest complaints about virtual icebreakers is that they waste valuable time. Feel free to set a timer and start the official part of the meeting once it goes off.

Best Icebreaker Questions for Meetings

Consider how many people will be in your meeting to make teams on sites like Arkadium and The Washington Post. Split everyone into teams by department or role to help them sharpen their conversational skills while having fun. Nonsense questions help everyone release workplace stress by shifting their focus to silly challenges.

They can even provide suggestions for activities and games to try at the next meeting, which deepen the interest. Virtual team icebreakers are interactive activities that help remote teams connect on a personal level. They’re useful in situations where people are unsure of how to start. Using songs as icebreakers for remote teams is one of the simplest ways to liven up a virtual meeting.

#21. Two truths & one lie

For instance, if there are ten members in the meeting, you can group them according to their responses and reshuffle each time there’s a majority of responses. Members will answer “what it is that they desire” (just referred to Lucifer, one of my favorite shows!), and even interact with other members about their choices. Do what it takes to ensure that everyone takes part in this fun game. If there are too many members participating in the game, you can reduce the recitation time to make sure everyone gets a go. I explained the game to everyone and told them that everyone has to tell two truths and one lie about themselves.

Collect three statements about each of your colleagues – two of them should be true facts and one should be a lie. Tell your colleagues to provide a lie that’s not so obvious so as to make it harder for others to guess. Seeing each other’s backgrounds will break https://remotemode.net/ the ice and give you something to talk about during the first minutes of the call. It’s much more fun and you’ll spark creativity among your colleagues. You can use a Slido word cloud for that, but instead of words, your participants will submit an emoji.

This virtual icebreaker is fun because it requires extra effort to find out more about each person. You can begin with everyone just throwing random facts out there, asking questions, and seeing where they can make connections—even if it’s a stretch! For example, you might say, “I love to cook.” Another coworker might then say, “I’m a terrible cook, but I love to eat.

These wishes can make for interesting discussions that can feed into the rest of your workshop. Every member of a team is also an individual, and in this game, participants are invited to imagine themselves as the member of a pirate crew! Start by sharing the image of the crew of a pirate ship and ask each person to choose who they most identify https://remotemode.net/blog/15-effective-icebreakers-for-virtual-meetings/ with. Then ask everyone to share, either in the chat, verbally on in breakout groups. In remote meetings with large amounts of participants or you are very short on time, asking people to speak up and share on camera can be tricky. Chat Waterfall is an effective way of getting contributions from large groups and avoiding cross-talk.

Q: What are some fun icebreaker games for work in 2023?

Give a few moments and then have everyone press enter at the same time. The result is a wonderful cascade of answers you can then choose to highlight as a facilitator. Add a follow-up if you can or sum up the results as a segue for your next activity. Virtual team ice breakers can also be effective ways to catch up and save time later in the meeting. A quick check-in round can help surface issues, wins and potential discussion points. They can also help set expectations and ensure alignment before the group moves forward.

Did your team members love “Jurassic Park” or Disney princesses? Contrasting genres and debut decades could result in plenty of laughs. There are numerous websites where you can make a poll and get a private link for it. Your coworkers could answer the survey in real-time during a meeting or before a conference call.