Team building ideas: how to choose an activity for your team
Decide what you want from the day first
Most enquiries start with the name of an activity when they should start with the purpose. "We want the new joiners to get to know the old hands" and "we want to unwind after a hard quarter" lead to completely different answers: the first needs tasks that force people to talk to a stranger, the second needs enjoyment with no scoreboard at all.
The second question is whether this is an event of its own or an interlude inside a larger programme. A short slot before dinner and a full day call for a different number of activities and a different pace. Everything that follows depends on that answer.
The mix of the team decides more than the theme
A mixed team — from people in their twenties to people near retirement, from the sporty to those who will arrive in dress shoes — is the most common case and the most important constraint. Activities where the fastest or strongest wins split such a team: some join in, the rest stand at the side looking at their phones.
So we choose tasks decided by coordination rather than muscle: accuracy contests, craft tasks, historical challenges where the technique can be explained in a minute and where a beginner beats an athlete if the team coaches them better. In that kind of activity everyone has something to do and nobody feels left out.
Activities that work for a mixed team
Accuracy contests — archery and crossbow shooting, or axe and spear throwing — are the safest choice when you know little about the group. The technique is simple, the safety rules are clear and the result is visible immediately, so teams start coaching each other without being asked.
Craft workshops and coin minting work on the opposite principle: there is no contest at all, and everyone takes home what they made themselves. That suits teams who already compete at work. Warfare contests and the juggling school sit in between — playful, but without serious competition.
When to choose a structured programme
If there are several teams and you want the day to have a beginning, a climax and a winner, a list of separate activities will not do it — you need a programme where the tasks are built into one story and the results are counted. That is when a host who runs the clock and a clear ending become part of it.
A medieval-setting team-building programme is exactly that: a service of its own, not a bundle of activities. The theme, the tasks and the scoring are fitted to your team's size and purpose. How many people fit and what decides the price are set out on the service page itself.
Outdoors or indoors — and what about the weather
Most activities work either way, though not equally well. Accuracy contests need a safe run of ground, so they come into their own outdoors; craft workshops and coin minting are equally at home in a hall or a courtyard.
The backup plan is worth agreeing at booking rather than the evening before the forecast. In practice it comes down to one question for the venue: is there a room or a canopy the programme can move into without changing the time.
What to put in your enquiry
Four things let us answer precisely the first time: the date, the venue, the headcount and one line about the purpose — to get acquainted, to unwind or to compete. If you know the team includes people who do not do sport, or who dislike public attention, say that too: it changes the choice of activities, not the price.
With an enquiry like that we send a proposal within one working day, with specific activities and a price. If you would rather start from the range of options, start on the corporate events page, where every programme is gathered in one place.