Community building activities are group exercises that encourage participants to work towards a common goal, learn more about each other, and generally create a sense of group togetherness and belonging.

You might be wondering how community building is different from team building (and if you read our blog, you know we are huge on team building). The key is scope: Simply put, community building exists at a larger scale. While team building tends to center on the groups that a person interacts with immediately - for example, their own department - community building is focused on anyone associated with the group. Whereas team building is for the people you work with most often, community building is helpful for people that you also collaborate with like partners, different offices, or other stakeholders. The general goal is to make connections and to make participants feel like part of a larger whole. 

What does a successful community building effort look like? We’ve come up with 18 great ideas to help your team increase loyalty and engagement while adding some fun to daily life. 

18 Community building activities

1. Shared photo album

A simple and free community building activity involves capturing the moments that make your culture special. Just add members to a Cloud album or Google Drive folder and have people add pictures as they take them. You can break things up into themes like different events or groups, or keep one big folder for everything and just have people add them at their convenience. You can also use these albums to learn more about each other. For example, if you have a virtual team, have everyone upload a photo of the view outside their window. You might have everyone upload their favorite Christmas photo or what they did over the summer. Then employees can browse as they have time and get to know their colleagues better. 

2. Team shout-outs

It’s important to celebrate each other when positive things happen or when someone experiences success. Groups can come together to prop each other up when peers state the good things that each other have done. At the beginning or the end of a larger group meeting, set the stage for people to give “shout outs” to each other. Peer recognition is a very powerful form of recognition; some people appreciate it even more than getting recognition from a supervisor. Let people know in advance that they’ll have the opportunity to offer such shout-outs so they can think about who they want to recognize and what they want to say, and feel comfortable doing it in front of the group. 

3. Friendly note Friday

Fridays are the perfect day to practice some friendliness and positive self-talk. Begin a new tradition by saying that “Friendly Fridays” offer a new  opportunity to leave a note for a colleague or person in the larger group. People can write as many notes as they want, or just one. They can make them anonymous or sign them, and leave them in a mailbox or on a desk. The point is that if they have something nice to say about someone - whether they love their coworkers jacket or appreciated them proofreading documents this week - they share that in a meaningful way. You would be surprised how much simple gestures like this can mean to someone, in addition to contributing to a culture that people want to be a part of. 

4. Snowball toss

If your team is going through a particularly stressful time or it seems like morale is down, this exercise can help. Have everyone right down one thing that is bothering them or weighing them down. Then, have everyone stand in a circle and crumple up the paper, throwing the “snowball” at someone across the room. Each person should pick up one of the “snowballs” from the ground, and everyone will take turns reading it out loud. In this way, your team can have a discussion about how to make the listed item less daunting or stressful, or offer to help. This is a great way to give some extra support to people who are overburdened - you never know who might be just the help you need! 

5. Morning meetings

Having some team time structured into your day can ensure that everyone will get some face time - even if only for a few minutes. Consider starting each morning with a short meeting where people can discuss any updates or share priorities or what they might need assistance with. If you have important projects in the works, this is a good time to share progress reports or bring up potential challenges. If once per day would be overkill, try holding the meetings once or twice a week - for example, every Monday, or each Monday and Friday. If you want to be extra nice, bring some bagels and coffee! 

6. Monthly meals

Food really has a way of bringing people together, and you can bring that energy into work by hosting meals on a regular basis. No matter how busy your colleagues are, everyone has to eat, right? Set up a meal each month to bring the community together in a casual, fun way. There are lots of ways to structure your monthly meals. You could have a dinner club where the venue changes each month (maybe through voting or a rotation of choices), or you could pick a restaurant based on themes such as region. If you’re a bit tight on budget, you could host catered lunches right at your office. You may even consider turning these lunches into a “lunch and learn” format where people have the opportunity to learn something new or deepen some skills. The important thing is that this meal happens on a regular schedule that people can count on, making it something they’ll look forward to consistently. 

7. Group collage

If you’d like an activity that’s a bit more hands-on, look no further. Have your team put together a collage based on each individual’s contributions. One of the most popular models is having each person bring in a photograph, and then using those photos to piece together a larger image that covers a wall. Or, you can be more creative and use anything from photos to magazine cutouts to digital creations. You can even make a digital collage using a tool like Canva. Determine a theme or general direction and then see what people come up with! Bonus points for creating the collage in a space that will be viewed regularly - it’s a great reminder of the special team you’re building! For more team building activities for work, make sure to follow our blog.

8. Volunteer experiences

A sense of doing good is important to most people. No matter how much you enjoy your work, chances are you feel more fulfilled when you can truly share your offerings with others. Look for experiences that your entire team can do together to better your community. You could research building a house with Habitat for Humanity, or reach out to your parks organization to see if there are some spaces that need cleaning up. The options are nearly limitless, as there are so many organizations who would be grateful for your help. We compiled a bunch of corporate charity ideas in this post if you need more inspiration. 

9. “Give a minute, take a minute”

Do you ever see those little jars of pennies at the gas station? People can leave a spare coin and then the next person who is a bit short can use it. Do the same with your time by creating a “give a minute, take a minute” board at work. Think of it as a pool that people can use when they need a little extra assistance with tasks. Offerings could be quick work-related jobs like mailing a package, or even personal ones like proofreading an email to your landlord. When you need a little extra help, write it down on a slip of paper and pin it to the board. Conversely, when you have a little extra time at work, make sure to pursue the board and see if there is anything you might be able to help with. This not only encourages teamwork and collaboration, but it’s a good way to meet new colleagues or people you don’t interact with as much. Note: this effort works best when it’s not just the same people doing the “giving” over and over, so make sure to gauge the participation of your team before implementing a system like this. 

10. Team newsletter

When you want to truly build community, you need to be in tune with other members of the group. A regular newsletter can facilitate this and keep everyone in the loop. Newsletters are a perfect way to keep everyone apprised of what’s going on in the group, special events coming up, or particular accomplishments of members. You might include a few regular sections like team shout-outs, new member profiles, and a calendar of things to watch for. You could also make the newsletter as playful as you want, including trivia, recipes, book reviews, etc. - whatever is interesting to your specific team. You will need at least one volunteer to create the newsletter template, curate content, and distribute it. Once a month is a pretty good cadence for such a newsletter. 

11. Virtual clubs

A very simple community builder for virtual teams is what some people call a “slack club”. A slack club is a group or committee that’s formed based on a participant's interests. There could be one for movie buffs where they watch movies, review them, and discuss in an online forum. Or, there could be a travelers club where people share itineraries, give tips about upcoming trips, review hotels, etc. Club members can arrange virtual meetings or even in-person ones on occasion. They should have a digital space where their documents and discussions can “live” and be more active with their hobbies. Giving people the option to join such clubs means they are sure to interact with people outside of their immediate group. It’s a great way to meet people that you otherwise wouldn’t, such as those in an office across the country. 

12. Decorating competition

Make your work space more personal and welcoming by hosting a decoration competition or challenge. In a competition, team members will decorate their own cubicle or other space in the way that best suits them - photos from home, comfy blankets, nice lamps, etc. In a challenge, the team members work together to decorate a community space like a conference room. They can determine a theme and then collaborate on supplies and other elements. Either way, it’s a fun way to brighten up a space that might otherwise be dull, and it brings people together for a common goal. Plus, if your colleagues are pretty creative, it’s sure to lead to a lot of laughs too. 

13. Wellness challenges

Lifestyle challenges have become more common in recent years, and for good reason. These challenges focus on reaching a shared goal together, and as more organizations realize the importance of healthy employees, wellness has become a worthy objective. You can be as broad as a “weight loss challenge” where people seek to lose weight, or you can be as specific as “hydration club” where people aim to drink more water each day. Lots of wellness initiatives focus on getting in steps, being more active, joining a gym, or learning new healthy recipes. No matter your focus, people will find it motivating and encouraging to be part of a team that wants the same things. When people continuously try to improve, everyone wins. Make sure to review some of our other ideas for working together as a team, too. 

14. The chain game

This community builder is centered around a game where people try to find similarities between group members. To play, all the participants should stand in one large circle. A leader will kick things off by standing in the middle of the circle and making some sort of personal statement. It should be relatively specific, but not too much - for example, “I have traveled to China”, or “I have a black lab”. Any participants that the statement is also true for move to the middle of the circle. The first person who can touch the speaker will link arms with them, beginning the “chain”. The exercise continues until eventually everyone is part of the chain. You would be surprised what kind of similarities you can come up with, and the discussions that can be facilitated within your team. It’s also a nice visual reminder that members are part of something bigger than themselves. If people don’t know each other well, you may want to start with some other group icebreakers or getting-to-know-you games too. 

15. Question of the week

This activity requires very little thought and no resources. It involves coming up with a thought-inspiring question for team members to answer publicly. Each week, simply post a prompt (either in person or in a digital forum) and ask team members to contribute their answer. They can do this via an online forum, by email, or in your next meeting. From there, respondents should be able to reply directly and facilitate conversation. You can take things a step further and post polls or take votes on things. This will foster conversation during times that there is no official business to discuss, and set a lighter tone for what’s to come. 

16. In-office classifieds

In this space, coworkers can exchange goods or services. For example, perhaps someone has delicious home-baked goods to supply if someone can help them write an important letter. Or, people might have spare desk supplies or tickets to a local show that they’re ready to trade. Maybe someone will help clean a messy desk for an unused basketball game ticket. You get the idea. You’ll need a large space with plenty of papers and pins to utilize this “barter board”, and of course remind everyone that ads posted need to be work-appropriate. Building community, a board like this gives employees a chance to share their expertise and resources while helping one another. It’s also a good way to meet new people and learn new things! 

17. Recommendations and reviews

This is a concept that can be done physically in person, or virtually on a digital platform. The fact is that people tend to trust personal reviews far more than advertising or marketing messages. Spreading word-of-mouth on positive experiences is a good way to embrace the community you work in as well as the community you live in. Suggestions for great restaurants, reliable car repair, or the best barber can offer real value to people doing research. If you want, you can structure your review board into different categories like restaurants to try and books to read; this will make it easier for people to research what interests them. Many people use Slack and create various Slack channels for this purpose, but you can use lots of other tools or just paper and a bulletin board. Traveling teammates are likely to benefit the most from this, as they aren’t familiar with the area and will rely on coworker recommendations. When you host virtual colleagues, vendors, or clients in your office, make sure that they know this resource is available. 

18. Game nights

Sometimes simply having fun together and enjoying each other’s company is the biggest community builder. You can facilitate this by hosting game nights (or afternoons, or whatever works for your schedule). This allows your team to gather, compete, and get to know each other. With a game to focus on, some of the awkwardness of interacting with new people is alleviated. It’s an easy way to break the ice and create a foundation for future relationships. Set up a monthly gaming occurrence where you bring in various games that are fun to play in a group, like Pictionary or card games. Try to keep it at the same time each month so that people can plan around it. Check out our list of other ideas for encouraging team camaraderie, too. 

Community building: A critical part of company retreats

One of the most critical elements of successful community building is consistency. As mentioned above, when you have things planned in advance - even informal fun - it makes it easier to plan around and people will look forward to these activities. We suggest choosing a few of these activities and making them part of your regular work schedule. 

Additionally, community building activities are an important part of larger events like company retreats or team-building sessions. Business leaders should look for opportunities to go beyond single community building events and plan a full-scale team building retreat, with strategy sessions, group activities, and some fun time built in. If that sounds overwhelming to you, just reach out to Surf Office. We can help your company to plan a team building retreat that is unique to your staff and your culture, and builds community and positive culture.