TEAM BUILDING

Team building is much more involved than a getting-to-know-you icebreaker. (Please see our page about using What's Your Verse? for an icebreaker if you are looking to have introductory or get-to-know-you conversations.) The team building activities we suggest are designed to help your team collaborate better, learn about how they make decisions, and support each other. When using What's Your Verse? for team building you will have to consider the size of your group and how you want to divide the group based on your hopes for the activity. Because of the many different situations of group sizes and your goals for the activity you really will need to do some game crafting of your own. The team building activities below are for using WYV? in team building assuming you want to work in groups of four to six. If that fits your situation just get started. If you find yourself wanting to work in smaller or larger groups, or maybe only have one group, you will want to take the ideas in these activities and modify them in a way that leads to the team interactions you are hoping for. If you have not played WYV? in its game version you will first need to do that. From there, and using the example below, you will be able to craft a team building activity that works for your group.

ACTIVITY 1

Let's assume you are working with a team of 12 - 24 people. First, divide the team into groups of 4 - 6 people. As people may not have played the Gameplay version of What's Your Verse?, begin this activity by playing one round using the GAMEPLAY rules - Option 1. This is a fun and playful way to start a team building exercise and will help everyone understand the objective. More than that, this begins the event with each person working individually - working with their own ideas and making all the decisions for themselves. This will serve as an immediate contrast to the larger goal of your team building exercise where working together and group decision making are required.

After completing a round of GAMEPLAY, set out the following rules for the next activity.

Deal three cards to each member of the team. Each person must choose two of their cards to propose as the basis for the team's four-lyric verse. Together the team decides which person's two-card set will be used to build upon in the next turn; place those two cards in the center of the table and discard all other cards. Next, each player receives two more cards. Together the team must decide which of these cards they will add to the first two to be used in making the team's verse. Add that card to the original two and discard all other cards. Lastly, each player gets one more card and the team must decide which of these they will add to the three previous cards they have chosen; add that card to the other three keepers and discard all other cards. Now, each team finalizes how to use the four chosen cards to write the team's verse. Once each team has finished, each team shares their verse and a winning team is chosen.

ACTIVITY 2

Activity 2 follows the same script as Activity 1 until you get to choosing the fourth team card. In this activity, once the third card is chosen by the group, each player again receives one more card. But, this time everyone must keep their one last card hidden. The team must choose the last card without seeing the lyric. They must work together with some players stepping forward with the conviction that their lyric is the best fourth lyric or step back trusting their teammates discretion. Once they have chosen the team member to trust that team member's lyric joins the other three lyrics and all other cards are discarded. The activity finishes the same way with teams taking turns sharing their four-lyric verse and a winning team is chosen.

ACTIVITY 3

Activity 3 pushes the team to not only make team decisions but to be individually creative while supporting one another. This third activity plays out just like Activity 2 through the choosing of the first three cards. Then, instead of getting a final card, each team member has to write a fourth lyric.  After providing enough time for each member to be creative and thoughtfully craft the best lyric to complete the team's verse, the team must decide whose lyric to use.  This will challenge team members individually to write a great lyric and collectively as they work discuss each other's lyric while having to agree to choose one team member's lyric. With three lyrics already chosen, usually a number of people will come up with what they think is a great last lyric.  Working through the challenge of making the best choice, regardless of whose idea it is, is a powerful team building exercise. We think your teams will be stronger for the exercise. Depending on time, this last exercise is a good one to repeat.