Looking for some ideas to beat that next virtual game with your colleagues effectively?
Being game developers and online team building facilitators, we always look for ways to challenge teams to collaborate more during online games to improve team bonding and individual participation within a group and strengthen teamwork towards reaching a common goal.
So what are some of the best ways to collaborate as a team in a virtual setting?
Here is how your team can collaborate better in your next online team building activity:
Assign roles
The key to effective collaboration in any team is having the right people in the right place so assign some basic roles within your team. The roles you need to complete a game effectively might differ per type of game but generally it is a good idea to assign a leader who delegates the tasks, a note taker, an information gatherer, and someone to share the game screen so everyone has a point of reference, other useful roles can be a time-keeper and a researcher.
Share screen
For all our virtual activities we recommend one person in the team to share their screen with the rest so there’s one point of reference while everyone else in the team also has the game open on their own computer and the team as a whole can explore multiple parts of the game at the same time.
Determine the objective
All to often teams get stuck or lost in the information given in a game without first figuring out what the actual objective is. In our Virtual Amazing Race for example we specifically mention what the challenge is but there’s always teams that read over it or get lost in the virtual scenes. Once you can define a problem or objective you will know much better what to look for within all the information given and to separate what you need and what you don’t need.
Delegate tasks
With limited time at hand during these games and often multiple tasks to complete, it is important to split up the work so you can work on multiple tasks at the same time and complete the game faster. In our Virtual Amazing Race for example, the leader could assign one person to look around the 3D scenes while another person reads all the text, and a third person tries to complete the location challenge.
Specific collaboration tools
Some specific tools for collaboration that are useful in tackling virtual games are taking notes and screenshots and sharing them in the chat of the conference platform you’re using during the game like Zoom or Microsoft Teams or through a shared folder like Microsoft Onedrive or Google Docs. You can also use external chats like Slack. Another useful tool is a whiteboard which is available in MS Teams or use one of the external apps like MIRO.
In our Virtual Escape rooms for example it is very useful to have the information gatherer take screenshots of all the information in the room and paste those screen shots in the chat, so everyone has them at hand at any time to solve the puzzles easier.
Final advice
Some final advice is an obvious one but often neglected. As virtual team building facilitators, we always move between breakout rooms to see how teams are doing and help where needed and what we often see are teams that either don’t talk or talk so much and over each other that important information or even straight up solutions are missed, especially when teams are under time pressure. So, keep the communication going and keep listening to each other!
We hope this post will help you and your team on your next online team activity, good luck and have fun!
If you’re looking for some ideas visit our list of virtual team building activities here.
