Board Games

At my office we don’t have the ping-pong and air hockey distractions I’ve heard are common at the Google’s and Pixar’s of the world. What we do have is a board. A cork board.

I’m not even complaining. My coworkers and I invented a variety of board games to inject a little fun into the walk from the cube to the toilet (the board is located more-or-less in a hallway.) Here I’ll outline some of games we tried. Feel free to steal any of these if you want to bring a little life to your board room.

Getting to Know You Boards

Board topics may include “what’s your favorite (fill in the blank)” “what cartoons did you watch as a kid” “what time period would you time travel to” and the like. Basically, just excuses to tell your coworkers something about yourself.

Telling Coworkers About Them Boards

Speaking of coworkers, these boards are about posting what you think about other people. It’s risky, I know. Stick to boards like “so-and-so actor should play so-and-so coworker in a movie” or “this should be so-and-so coworker’s theme song” and not “these smell like so-and-so coworker.”

The Run-On Sentence Board

Someone posts a word and someone else posts another word and hopefully the result is a semi-coherent run-on sentence.

Here is a nonsensical example:


The Stickman Story Board

Someone draws a stickman doing something and the next person continues the stickman’s story. I think a little improvisational play is particularly good team building and this manages that without demanding too much artistic skill.

The Big Picture Board

Okay, this one may take a little drawing talent. The best way to do this is to paper the entire board and start with an outline of a scene for everyone else to add their illustrations. We did this board around holidays so our scenes where haunted hillsides for Halloween or snowy towns for Christmas. Once the background was complete, everyone sketches in their additions, be it vampires or snowmen. Once we didn’t draw at all. Instead, we each put up pieces of torn colored paper or candy wrappers to make a collage of a co-workers face. It turned out surprisingly well.

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