Working in a physical setup has become a thing of the past. Now that almost all reputed organizations have decided to operate remotely, it has become more significant to ensure that the employees enjoy working in a remote environment.
One way to do so is by hosting fun and gripping virtual team building activities.
In this blog, we will take you through a list of the top 35 remote team building activities that will help you keep your employees engaged, and boost virtual team bonding among your employees.
So, without any further ado, let us dive straight into the article and look at the best virtual team building activities.
Importance of Hosting Remote Team Building Activities For Employees
Here are a few reasons that explain the importance of virtual team building.
- Boost Team Bonding: Though your employees are physically apart from each other, it is still important to promote team bonding among them. Hence, To ensure your employees find it easy to work together, it is crucial to promote activities that boost virtual team bonding.
- Employees Enjoy Work: While it is easier to work from the office, remote working can get boring at times. Moreover, remote working can lead to the employees having lower job satisfaction that can compel you to replace more people in the team. Hosting online team building games and activities will help enable employees to enjoy working virtually.
According to an article by Gallup, the feeling of isolation in employees can reduce their productivity by 21%.
- Employee Engagement: One thing leads to another; employee engagement can affect work productivity. Participating in remote team-building activities can help employees cheer up, encourage each other, and get motivated to meet targets.
According to a study by Harvard Business Review, socializing between employees can help improve communication by 50%.
Top 35 Virtual Team Building Activities for Employees
Assuming now, you know how important it is to promote virtual team building, let us take you through some of the best remote team building activities for employees.
1.Virtual Cocktail Party:
Give your virtual team building a boozy twist by hosting a virtual cocktail party for your employees. You can invite a professional bartender who will teach you how to mix your drinks and make cocktails. We are sure a virtual cocktail masterclass will give you many reasons to laugh your hearts out and connect with your colleagues.
2.Virtual Tiny Campfire:
Virtual Tiny Campfire is one of the most popular remote team building activities to help you have a good time with your fellow employees. This virtual interactive event includes s’mores and a real tiny campfire. Send a s’mores kit to your employees before the campfire day. On the virtual event day, join together, enjoy s’mores, and share stories with each other.
3.Virtual Game Show:
It is probably one of the widely popular virtual team building activities. Gather all your employees over a self-managed virtual event platform, play fun and engaging games with remote employees, and call it an online team building games night.
There are various options you can choose the game of your choice from; like:
- Never Have I Ever: One of the most fun online team building games, Never Have I Ever will help you and your team to know each other a little better. The one that stands till the last wins the game.
- Pictionary: It is one of the most fun and widely played online team building games. It doesn’t matter if you have got basic drawing skills or not; just pick up a pen, draw the image, and let the players guess.
- Bingo: If you don’t know how to play Bingo, then either you’re lying, or you are lying. There couldn’t be another reason you don’t know this game that stands on top in the list of the best online team building games.
4.Online Pet Party:
How about making your pets a part of your virtual gathering and getting to know each other’s furry friends? Also remember, your pets are actual guests of this virtual team building activity. Introduce your team members to your pets, and share each other’s stories.
5.Virtual Scavenger Hunt:
Virtual scavenger hunts are the virtual team building activities that require the participants to complete the challenges mentioned in a list before time outs. The intent behind this game is to have fun and interact with the teammates.
6.Learn New Skills:
We are sure you all are experts in your respective fields. But, it is never a bad idea to learn something new. What better way to do so among the people you enjoy working with? Therefore, Inculcate some new learnings like MMA, basic culinary skills, etc. More than the skill, we are sure you will enjoy such unique virtual team building activities. This virtual team building activity will enable you to interact with your teammates, which, otherwise, wouldn’t be possible due to remote working.
7.Online Jamming Session:
We all have had jamming sessions with our friends in the past. Though you cannot meet over another jamming session physically, you can always do that on an easy-to-manage virtual event platform. Invite your colleagues over, play instruments, and jam with your colleagues. Online Jamming Sessions are literally everybody’s one of the most favorite remote team building activities for a reason, and they will become your favorite too.
8.Virtual Dinner Party:
You know that the one thing that employees miss the most about working together in an office is the gossip session over lunch. With things going virtual, recreating the same thing might get a bit challenging, but not impossible. Hence, host a virtual dinner party and relax with your coworkers. It is one of the easiest to execute remote team building activities. All you have to do is prepare your meal, and connect over an online event platform.
9.Online Dance Party:
Hosting a dance party is the easiest and one of the most effective ways to promote virtual team building. Don’t worry; you don’t need to know fancy moves; just let yourself loose, and enjoy the music. Also, it will help you inoculate fun and high energy into your meeting calls. You can also host some online team building games with the dance party to make it more fun.
10.Virtual Happy Hours:
It is one of the best low-key virtual team building activities that allow you and your team to talk to each other and have a relaxing time beyond hectic work schedules. This activity will enable you to foster a sense of belonging and communication when people feel isolated and alone during a virtual working setup.
11.Online Breakfast in Bed Meet-Up:
Who said breakfast in bed is always for couples? Talking of our next pick from the best remote team building activities, you can enjoy breakfast in bed with your colleagues. What you have to do is connect over a self-managed virtual event platform, and enjoy your breakfast with your co-workers virtually. We are sure you all will have a great time.
12.Online Karaoke:
This virtual team building idea will present you with a never-seen-before side of your employees. An online karaoke session is one of the most fun remote team building activities that will help you make your work a bit more enjoyable. Not only this, but you will also get to connect with your fellow employees.
13.Virtual Award Show:
Who doesn’t like being appreciated, and that too in front of other team members? We all do. Therefore, Host a virtual award show, and acknowledge your employees’ dedication towards your organization. Show gratitude towards them. This virtual interactive event will definitely make them feel valued and motivate others to work hard. Add pomp and jazz, and play some unique online team building games to make it more exciting.
14.Online Fitness Class:
Promote a healthy lifestyle among your colleagues by hosting an online fitness class among your employees. It is one of the most out-of-the-box virtual team building activities, and there are several benefits of hosting one. With an online fitness class, you will be able to motivate each other to do their best. You can either invite a fitness instructor over the virtual event platform or play a video and work out together. Not only this, games and sports have always been considered as one of the best ideas to stay active. Hence, you can plan something around it also.
15.Digital Coffee Break:
Do you know the best part about working in an office setup? You and your colleagues can always walk up to that nearby cafe to get your favorite coffee. With remote working, it might not be possible anymore. Talking of one of our most favorite virtual team building activities, you and your employees can always connect over an online event hosting platform and enjoy your coffees together. Also, treat it as a real-life coffee date and share what you all are up to in your lives.
16.Virtual Craft Day:
Moving onto the next idea in our list of the best and most fun online team building games, you can host a DIY craft competition for your remote employees where they would have to build something out of materials available at home. Give them a time limit of 30 minutes. This virtual team building idea will bring out the hidden craftsmen in your employees. In addition, It is a good way to check how creative people in your team are.
17.Virtual Book Club:
Moving ahead, another interesting idea we have in our list of the best virtual team-building ideas is hosting a virtual book club. The intent behind a virtual book club is similar to that of an in-person book club, where people read a book together at the same time. Not only this, these people gather online to discuss it, and have discourses around the subject. Though not everyone in your team would be a reader; hence, we suggest you to start off with small stories.
18.Online Storytelling Night:
Okay, Just imagine, you and your employees are connected over a virtual event platform. All dressed up in their pajama sets, enjoying their hot chocolates, and listening to stories. Sounds like a perfect virtual team-building activity to us! Share stories from your office life, college life, or any incident that has made it to your memory with your colleagues.
Isn’t it an interesting virtual team building activity?
19.Virtual Improv Night:
Improv games are quite popular, especially in the west. These funny and quirky online team building games help you boost your thinking speed, improve communication skills and bring you closer to people around you. You can host a virtual improv night for your employees and see how quirky your colleagues can get. We are sure you all will enjoy this virtual interactive event. You can include virtual team building games like One-word story, Party people, To your right, etc.
20.Online Open Mic:
We all are aware of what open mics are. With things going virtual you can take your open mic, too, to a virtual event platform and host an online open mic for your employees. These interactive remote team building activities will allow your participants to share talent with others. With these virtual team building activities, you get to know your employees’ non-working sides and get to know them.
21.Virtual Baking Session:
How about hosting an online baking competition and unleashing the inner baker of your employees? Hosting remote team building activities like this will uncover various hidden chefs in the house. If you are hosting it on a large scale, you can send all the ingredients to the employees beforehand. The employee who bakes the most instagrammable cakes or pastries wins the contest.
22.Online Unconventional Day Celebration:
Though remote working is more convenient than working from the office, it leaves you with almost no social life. However, with virtual team building activities like Unconventional Day Celebration, you get to meet your peers, even though your screens. Celebrating off-beat days like world chocolate day, world laughter day, etc. will give you several reasons to share smiles with your work friends.
23.Online Meditation Session:
The recent times, especially the last two years, haven’t been good for our health, be it physical or mental. Though people have been more vocal and attentive towards their physical health, it’s high time we start working towards our mental health also. While you are hosting virtual team building games for your physical relaxation, take your mental health along with you. Host an online meditation session for your employees over an easy-to-use virtual event platform like Mixhub. We assure you your employees will thank you for this.
24.Virtual Team Pursuit:
The next on the list of the most interesting remote team building activities is a virtual team pursuit session. This activity will help you know your team better, make connections and boost virtual team building. You can conduct this activity in a few rounds where you can play different games in all the rounds. We are sure that by the end of the activity, you would have known at least a few of your colleagues.
25.Virtual Ice Breaking Activities:
Virtual Ice Breaking Sessions are simple virtual team building activities that will help you and your employees know each other better. As the name suggests, Ice Breaking activities enable you to warm up a conversation before an online meeting or virtual team building session. There are various kinds of activities that you can incorporate into your online session. For example, start by sharing your name, designation, and your favorite ice-cream flavor.
26.Virtual Talent Show:
We all have a special talent that makes us stand apart from the crowd; your employees also have some unique talent. It’s time to help them present it to the world. Host a virtual talent show where all your employees will showcase their unique talents. You never know how many in-house pop artists and Michael Jackson’s you have. This is one of our most preferred virtual team building activities, and it will help you know each other’s undiscovered sides.
27.Online Music Concert:
Nothing will help you relax more than a musical night. Let go of your work blues and enjoy a relaxing musical concert with your work peers. Dance to the beats of your favorite music, and have an experience worth remembering. Choose an easy-to-use virtual event platform that will allow you to have a live music band and make your entire experience more exciting.
28.Virtual Movie Night:
It is another exciting idea from the lot of the best remote team building activities for employees, where you would enjoy a movie with your peers. All you need to do is ask your employees to vote for one name among 3-4 options and pick the name that receives the most votes. Then, connect over an effective virtual event hosting platform like Mixhub, and enjoy the movie night.
29.Digital Gratitude Event:
You should express gratitude once in a while for all you have in your life, and taking part in such virtual team building activities help you add meaning to your life. Host a digital gratitude event where you all express what you are grateful for. Also, donate things to the needy, and You can also start a fundraising campaign. Trust us; nothing can match the feeling you will get after this virtual team building activity.
30.Virtual Mixers:
Mixer events allow divergent groups to come together and interact with each other. They are generally large-scale virtual team building activities where people from different departments connect. To make the entire virtual interactive event more interactive, you can divide the participants into smaller mixed teams. It will allow people to know each other conveniently.
31.Online Magic Show:
How about enjoying a magic show with your work friends, and learning some tricks yourself? Sounds fun, right! Host a virtual magic night, and invite a magician to perform some tricks for you all. Also, request him to teach you a few tricks, so that you can make your friends go wow the next time.
32.Virtual Stand-up Comedy Show:
Nothing better than hosting a virtual stand-up comedy show, and sharing laughter with your work friends. You can either invite a professional stand-up comedian or host a comedy contest, where your colleagues will participate. The one who gathers maximum laughter wins the crown of the comedy king/queen. We are sure your employees will like this virtual team activity idea and enjoy it to the fullest.
33.Virtual Personality Test:
It is one of the most unique virtual team building activities that will help you understand your work peers better. Going through a personality test will also help you understand yourself better; for example, you will know if you are an introvert or extrovert, thinker or feeler. Also, opening yourself up to others would help you bond and connect with others effectively.
34.Online Call of Champions
Talking of online team building games, one interesting idea is hosting online call of champions. Here, you have to assign roles to all the employees during virtual meetings. Consider their behavior and distribute titles accordingly.
For example:
You can assign the title of a social butterfly to the employee who is very much active and knows almost the entire organization.
Apart from it, give the title of Party Animal who is up for a party anytime, etc.
35.Live Remote Co-working:
Now that organizations are adapting to remote working permanently, chances are you will rarely get to meet your coworkers in person and work together physically. However, you can always work together virtually, thanks to easy-to-use virtual event platforms like Mixhub. It will give you a sense of a real-life work environment.
Some Expert Tips to Conduct Remote Team Building Activities:
- Introverts would generally try to avoid participating in virtual interactive events. However, it depends on you how you encourage them to participate. Such activities and events are a good chance for others to interact with the introverted members of your team, who generally prefer sitting in a corner during physical meetings.
- Experts suggest conducting 2.5X more virtual team building activities than regular team bonding sessions.
- Try to dedicate a few minutes of your regular team meetings to team-building sessions.
- Now that the world is going back to normal, we will suggest you conduct physical team-building sessions every once in a while.
Virtual Team Building Activities FAQs
Q1.What is virtual team building?
Virtual team building allows to build stronger relationships and foster a sense of connection among team members. The key feature of virtual team building is it is conducted over virtual event platforms.
Q2.How do you do team building virtually?
All you need to do is plan an activity, select a self-managed virtual event platform, invite your team members to participate, and you are good to go.
Q3.What team building activities can be done virtually?
There are several team-building activities that you can do virtually. A few of the most popular virtual team building activities are:
- Virtual Talent Show
- Virtual Music Concert
- Online Magic Show
- Virtual Personality Test
- Online Call of Champions
- Virtual Meditation Session
- Online Team Pursuit
Q4.Why is virtual team building important?
Though remote working culture is more convenient, it sometimes leaves people with a sense of loneliness. Moreover, people find it challenging to connect with their colleagues and work together. With virtual team building, you can foster a sense of trust and connectivity among them.
We hope you found this article interesting. If you are also planning to conduct virtual team building activities for your employees and team members, get aboard with one of the best and most economical virtual event platforms, Mixhub. Book a Demo, Now!
