However, not every team member is prepared to deal with the stress, fatigue, and tiredness that online meetings represent.
A great way to deal with these challenges is by implementing team building activities for conference calls. Let’s go over the best team building games that perfectly suit virtual calls for companies of all sizes.
3 Benefits of Virtual Team Building Activities for Conference Calls
Conference calls are part of remote employees’ day-to-day life. Virtual teams can be more productive, but might also face multiple challenges that stop them from unleashing their full potential.
Implementing virtual team building on conference calls is a smart way to overcome the barriers of virtual teams. These are three of the most impactful benefits of virtual team building activities for conference calls.
1. Fight Against “Zoom Fatigue”
Zoom fatigue is real - Stanford University warns that the overuse of online video call platforms, such as Zoom and many others, causes tiredness, worry, and general burnout in remote employees.
“Zoom fatigue” is not exclusive to Zoom, and it can affect team members in multiple companies and different industries.
Stanford University recommends creating and implementing best practices for videoconferencing to avoid fatigue related to virtual conference call platforms.
Implementing interesting team building activities in conference calls is a smart way to reduce the fatigue associated with joining virtual meetings on a regular basis.
2. Improves Remote Team Morale
Virtual team building exercises have many proven benefits, such as increasing employee engagement, boosting team morale, and promoting virtual team bonding.
However, making a virtual meeting fun is something challenging for most companies, which leads to video conferencing burnout and fatigue, as mentioned above.
By successfully implementing a team building activity on conference calls, companies, and organizations can improve the efficiency, happiness, and engagement of their employees.
3. Help Remote Teams to Focus and Improve
A recent study by Polly shows that most company virtual conference calls are “too stressful” for the majority of employees.
37% of team members claimed that there were “too many conference call meetings,” and most of them could have been avoided in most cases.
Over 75% of employers multitask while on conference calls, and they do it to complete other work-related tasks or check their emails/phone notifications.
By turning certain conference calls into interesting events, remote team members can stop associating video conference calls with stressful and overloading activities.
Ultimately, this leads to improved team focus and better professional results.
How to Choose Virtual Team Building Games for Conference Calls
According to TMCnet, 80% of a company's virtual conference calls are 1:1 meetings which can be intimidating and stressful to employees.
Therefore, when choosing a fun team building activity for conference calls, have the following factors in mind:
- The activity must include all team members - it should be a group activity in which each team member can participate.
- Quick team building activities are better than long ones.
- Choosing an activity that the whole online team likes is key to keeping team members engaged.
15 Team Building Activities for Conference Calls
As virtual team members rely on human interactions with coworkers and other team members, it is necessary to work on remote team building to avoid burnout and workplace frustration.
Luckily, these 15 team building ideas for conference calls are exactly what your team members need.
1. Classic Snack Time
We all snack while working remotely, and your team members are no exception. Since snacking is such a normal thing to do during the day, implementing conference snack times with the team will make remote workers feel closer together.
Besides snacking, the point is to promote team bonding and make remote employees talk to each other while having a little break from the hassle.
- Best For: small groups.
- Average Duration: from 10 minutes to half an hour.
- Materials Needed: something delicious to snack on and scheduled by the team leader.
- How to Play: go on a conference call while all the team is snacking something. Show up your snacks, and talk about life (nothing work-related) for 10 to 30 minutes.
2. Virtual Escape Rooms
Virtual escape rooms will test your team member’s skills to the limit. The concept is simple: team members are trapped inside a virtual room, and they need to work together to escape.
Participants join the event via a conference call and play the web-based virtual escape room together. As team members guess and discover how to escape, they’ll be brought close together thanks to the power of collaboration.
- Best For: small and medium-sized groups (from 4 to 50 people).
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: Teamland’s Virtual Escape Room.
- How to Play: Set up the duration and participants of the event. Then, join a virtual meeting and the virtual escape room via a web browser to play.
3. Virtual Pub Crawl
Have you ever gone to a pub with your friends, got a drink, and then went to another pub? That’s pub crawl!
Surprisingly, virtual pub crawls work pretty well too. The team building game consists of having a drink while jumping from one part of the Internet to the other. One minute, your team can be checking Twitter, and the other minute, they’ll be exploring interesting websites while talking about them.
- Best For: small groups.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: a nice drink and a list of websites and interesting Internet things to see.
- How to Play: gather your team in a virtual meeting and ask them for ideas of things to see together. Browse the Internet while commentating on how interesting (or boring!) the websites/videos/images are. You can even pair it with a Cocktail class.
4. Conference Call Bingo
Bingo is an activity that never gets old, and with virtual team building bingo, you can continue the bingo hype without limitations!
Teamland’s virtual bingo is fast-paced, highly energetic, and extremely fun. Jump onto a conference call with just teams and enjoy an afternoon of vibrant virtual bingo together.
- Best For: small and medium-sized groups.
- Average Duration: from 1 to 1.5 hours.
- Materials Needed: Teamland’s virtual team bingo.
- How to Play: go on virtual meetings while playing bingo, thanks to the power of Teamland!
5. Virtual Dance Party
Dance parties are great in-office activities for Friday nights, but remote teams can also jump onto virtual meetings to dance along and enjoy life. However, this activity is only recommended if all team members are on board with it.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: conference call software and a nice playlist to dance to.
- How to Play: gather together in a conference call, preferably during a Friday night, and dance along to the rhythm of the music.
6. Virtual Team Trivia
It’s Trivia Time! Virtual team trivia activities are a fun way to mix both remote and in-person teams together.
In-office employees can participate in the trivia from breakout rooms, whereas remote team members can go to virtual meetings to show their knowledge.
- Best For: all group sizes (hybrid).
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: good trivia questions and a conference call platform.
- How to Play: go over the different trivia questions. Award points to the first person that provides the correct answer to the trivia.
7. Virtual Praise Train
Praise trains are great for complementing team members after achieving a remarkable milestone. This is one of the best quick team building activities for conference calls, as it can be played without too much effort.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 15 minutes to 30 minutes.
- Materials Needed: conference call platform organized by the team leader.
- How to Play: motivate team members to praise each other on their work ethics or professional abilities. Make them realize how important they are to the company.
8. Virtual Office and Home Tour
Some remote team members work from their own office at home - make them show their setup! Alternatively, you can also engage in a home tour via video conference.
- Best For: small and medium-sized groups.
- Average Duration: from 45 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: a virtual platform for video conferencing.
- How to Play: gather all team members in a single call and make them go around their offices or homes. We recommend setting a time limit to avoid making this activity too long.
9. Virtual Happy Hours
Happy hours are the perfect way to celebrate company and professional achievements. Likewise, virtual happy hours are less expensive, equally engaging, and great for improving team bonding of all team sizes.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: fun activities (short games) to do during the happy hour and nice drinks to celebrate.
- How to Play: go on a conference call with your team while drinking and appreciating the team’s effort.
10. Meme or Clip of the Day
Memes and fun clips are part of the Internet, and each one of your team members has a sense of humor worth discovering.
Ask them to show their favorite meme or clip of the day (or the week) as their coworkers react to these clips.
- Best For: small and medium-sized groups.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: conference call platforms and fun memes or clips to show.
- How to Play: simply ask team members one by one to show their favorite clip or meme that they have recently discovered. It sounds really simple, but it is a great and fun activity that your team will totally love.
11. Song or Movie of the Day
There are countless songs and movies that your team members are eager to share with others.
By asking them to show their favorite recent movie or song, other team members learn more about their personal preferences and passions.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: conference call platforms to show and talk about recent songs or movies.
- How to Play: ask team members to show their favorite new song or movie. Some people can be very passionate while talking about songs or movies, so make sure to set up a time limit to avoid extending the activity for too long.
12. Bucket List Challenge
Your team members have dreams and aspirations in life, and it’s worth learning about them! Playing a short remote Bucket List Challenge is a great icebreaker that will help new coworkers to integrate into the team.
- Best For: all group sizes (hybrid).
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: conference call platform.
- How to Play: ask each team member to mention three things on their bucket list. Others can complement their bucket lists so they get to know each other better.
13. Video Game Night
We live in a world where there are thousands of online games that you can play with your team members.
From casual games, such as Mario Kart, to more skill-based video games, such as Call of Duty, there are plenty of options to choose from.
- Best For: all group sizes (hybrid).
- Average Duration: from 1 to 2 hours.
- Materials Needed: decide on a game to play on PC or console and jump onto a conference call platform to talk while playing and competing.
- How to Play: set the rules for a short game tournament to decide who is the company’s video game master.
14. Five Finger Showdown
Five Finger Showdown is a fast-paced, quick, and enjoyable conference call activity that helps team members to learn more about each other.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 15 minutes to 45 minutes.
- Materials Needed: a conference call platform and creative questions.
- How to Play: ask team members to raise their hands and then ask questions such as “I have been to Europe.” If they have been to Europe (in this example), they will lower a finger. The player that puts all fingers down first wins the game.
15. Pet Check
Pets are our faithful companions during remote shifts. Asking your team members to show their pets is a great way to discover their furry friends - some pets might even surprise you.
- Best For: all group sizes.
- Average Duration: from 30 minutes to 1 hour.
- Materials Needed: conference call platforms and team members who have pets.
- How to Play: ask all team members to show their pets on camera. They should talk about why they have chosen their pet’s names and how the pet came into their lives.
By implementing and engaging into team building activities for conference calls, remote and hybrid teams will bring closer together, which will help both employees and companies alike.
