Have you noticed the energy at the office dwindling? It seems like an ominous gray cloud has been parked over everyone’s cubicles for months and there is no sign of it breaking up. Sounds like your company is in desperate need of some creative employee engagement activities.
In an era where people spend one-third of their lives working, it’s crucial to keep employees engaged. Introducing elements of fun in the office increases productivity, raises employee satisfaction and happiness, and improves loyalty. Overall, talent engagement activities impact the company’s operations.
Understanding the needs of your employees can boost morale, ultimately creating a work environment that everyone wants to be a part of. No one says work has to be serious all of the time, nor should it be. So to help you add excitement to your company’s routine, I’ve put together a list of my top employee engagement activities and creative employee engagement ideas.
10 Employee Engagement Ideas
1 – Cook-Off
What’s more enjoyable than food and a little friendly competition? It’s as easy as adding to the company potluck. Cook-offs can be a great way to encourage creative employee engagement. It can also be a fun way to exercise team building, making it one of the most effective employee engagement ideas.
The great thing about a cook-off is the many different ways to host one. You can have your employees bring in pre-made dishes, or you can spice it up by having a showdown. Preselect ingredients so everyone has to figure out what to make from those given ingredients. Examples of office cook-off themes are chili, wings, and cookies.
Of course, some planning is involved for something like this, but it’s easy to do if you have the resources. You must pick a date, find a location, notify your staff, and determine the awards. First and foremost, put together a team of people to help organize the event. If it goes well, you could make your company cook-off an annual event! Food always has a way of bringing people together and building camaraderie. Almost every city has cooking programs that do corporate events, so you can find a professional supplier-facilitator, offering fun work engagement ideas.
2 – Trivia Night
Trivia competitions have become more popular in the last few years. It seems like every restaurant and bar has one or two nights a week that they host trivia. Hosting your company trivia night can be another great way to encourage creative employee engagement. If several teams are involved, you can follow the venue model and host a weekly trivia night or even a tournament. This is a prime example of employee engagement ideas in the office.
There are so many ways you can host your trivia night. You can use board games and apps or take on the challenge of writing your trivia questions. If you have it in the budget, hiring a professional trivia host for employee engagement to write questions and emcee for you is always available.
3 – Coming Together with Music and Song
Music has to be my favorite creative employee engagement activity. I am partial since I’ve been helping companies with Team Building Through Song® for years. But there is no denying that it’s fun to be a part of the energy music creates! Everyone might have different musical tastes, but no matter the genre, music evokes emotion, and what drives us more than emotion? This is one of the most creative ways to engage employees.
Through our team building process, you can have a large group write a song together or break off into smaller groups for some competition. Once the songs are written, we record! Everyone participates, whether they offer lyric ideas, play instruments, or sing. It’s a great opportunity for everyone to come together to share ideas and create something magical, making it a powerful talent engagement activity.
4 – Scavenger Hunt
What could be more engaging than bringing out the kid in you and everyone on your team! Scavenger hunts can bring us back to childhood, but they can also be high tech and challenging. It can be as quick as a 15-30 minute jaunt around the office. Or you can create your own amazing race and have your staff spend all day driving around the city to find the next clue. Scavenger hunts are fun because they are incredibly customizable, offering creative ways to improve employee engagement. And they give you the perfect opportunity to break everyone up into teams.
5 – Office Decorating Contests
It’s time to break out the scissors and glue. You’re going to get crafty with this one. Office decorating contests are a fun way to boost employee engagement year-round. You can plan one for every holiday or season! These are excellent employee engagement ideas in the office.
When planning, make sure you give clear guidelines for acceptable decor. Even though you should let your employees’ creativity run wild, there are probably limitations to what they can tape to the office walls.
The wonderful thing about decorating contests is that you can always make something out of nothing. This can be a metaphor for solving problems in your work life, making it a great example of creative ways to improve employee engagement.
6 – Escape Rooms
Escape rooms have been popping up everywhere. You get an hour to escape from a room that your team has been locked in. In that hour, you have to think laterally while working together to finish puzzles and find clues to help you escape. Exhilarating, right? Don’t panic! If you get stuck, there is always a professional whom you can ask for clues. These are fantastic talent engagement activities.
Quite often, the escape room venues have limited capacity. If you have many participants, it’s in your best interest to call ahead and book a day when enough rooms are available. They typically allow teams of 6 to 8 people. The themes of the rooms are ever-changing, so there is always a reason to go back and try another room. Go find an escape room near you and put your staff to the test for some fun work engagement ideas.
7 – Indoor Skydiving
Have you ever wondered what it is like to fly? Indoor skydiving is pretty close to it! If you have a team of thrill seekers, indoor skydiving is the perfect employee engagement activity for your company, providing truly fun work engagement ideas.
Do not worry; there are highly trained professionals who put you through a crash course of hand signals and techniques when you go into the wind tunnel. There’s nothing like the adrenaline rush pumping through your veins to put some pep in your step. Plus, you get a certificate with your name on it after you have completed your flight. It may be a little scary at first, but nothing that you can’t overcome with your work family cheering you on.
8 – Sailing Classes
Sailing is the epitome of working together to accomplish a task. If you’ve ever sailed, you know how it feels to have the wind rushing through your hair and the taste of sea spray on your lips. It’s pretty magical to use the sheer force of the wind to take you places. When it comes to sailing, communication is key, so it’s great team building, making it a unique talent engagement activity.
This fun activity is not just a quick exercise. You’ll have to dedicate at least a day to your team. Check out the American Sailing Association website to see if any classes are near you, offering creative ways to engage employees.
9 – Local Tours
If you’re looking for a low-key but informational engagement activity, why not find a local tour? This could be a brewery, museum, or ghost tour. Most of the time, they are relatively short and easy to get people on board for. Sometimes it’s fun to have experiences together that don’t require any high-energy tasks to complete. The most energy that may have to be exerted is walking, making them easy employee engagement ideas in the office for a quick outing.
10 – Community Service
Is your team passionate about a cause? Take a day to give back to your community. Plenty of local volunteer opportunities will make your team feel like they are creating their own positive impact on the world. This could be anything from cleaning a park to working in a soup kitchen. The opportunities are endless when it comes to helping out your community. At the end of the day, you all will have a shared sense of enlightenment and purpose, making this one of the most rewarding top employee engagement activities.
A planning tip is to get input from your team about everyone’s interest in community service. This will help you develop a list of organizations to volunteer with, offering creative employee engagement ideas for giving back.
Bonus Employee Engagement Ideas
1. Pet Pageant
If your team is a little bit shy, a pet pageant is a great place to start building engagement in an easy, low-stakes way. To create a pet pageant, you only need to place a large corkboard in an easily accessible office area. Each employee brings a photo of his or her pet, along with an index card with a description of the pet to pin up next to it. Make sure everyone writes their name on the index card as well, so other team members can identify whose pet they are looking at. This is one of the most heartwarming creative employee engagement activities.
Once everyone has a chance to put their pet up on the board along with a story or detail, give everyone the chance to vote on their favorites. Make sure to include several categories so there can be lots of winners (i.e., cutest, funniest, best smile, best hairdo, best story, etc.). Have a pet pageant party for the office where the winners are announced. You might even have the party outdoors so your team can bring in their pets to enjoy the party. People will bond over pets, building a sense of belonging for all, and making it one of the most fun work engagement ideas.
2. Shout-Out Boxes
Assign each employee a co-worker to make a “shout-out box.” You can make this activity creative by providing craft items like stickers, glitter, markers, and paint. This is a great opportunity to let your inner child out to play. Add music and snacks to make the atmosphere festive and playful. This is a simple yet effective employee engagement idea in the office.
Once the boxes are finished, display them in an accessible area. Encourage everyone to leave anonymous notes of kindness in each shout-out box. Your team can acknowledge each other for a job well done or even just say something as simple as “thanks for being kind today.” This is one of the great creative ways to improve employee engagement.
Make sure to bring up the boxes at meetings to keep the note-taking ongoing.
Take Action To Boost Engagement
Now that you have a few employee engagement ideas and activities to restore your team’s passion, it’s time to start planning! Whether you use one of these creative employee engagement ideas I’ve provided or come up with your own, taking time to celebrate shared fun experiences with your workforce will most definitely pay off.
Take action and start planning talent engagement activities for your employees now to break up the dark cloud! Your team will thank you.