Play Pandemic! It’s a great way to get to know your team.

[#1]

TLDR: Playing together is a great way to get to know each other. A cooperative game like Pandemic is perfect for team building as you’re working together to defeat the game.

As some of you know I’m a massive board game geek. I own over 200 different board games and still regularly buy more. And I love playing them with my family and friends.

Since I joined Umano last October I’ve been wanting to talk about how board games can help you and your team get to know each other better. This will help you work better together too. You might even see the positive impact of playing a game or two in your TeamX metrics!

There are many types of board games, but for the purpose of team bonding I want to focus on the cooperative games (or Co-ops). These are games where you as the players all work together to defeat the game itself.

One of my favorite co-ops is Pandemic (still pretty relevant) where you’re all scientists working together to rid the world of 4 simultaneous epidemics without letting them turn into full-on pandemics.

Credits: Michael Basil

During this game you will learn all about:

• Communicating clearly and concisely as a team.

• Understanding and using each others unique skills to achieve a shared goal.

• The communication styles of your team members.

• Planning as a team, taking into account all possible scenarios.

And if you want to measure the impact playing co-ops can have on your team, check out TeamX.

If you like playing this game, there is an entire series based on that gives you many hours of fun team bonding! Check them out here: Pandemic series | Wiki | BoardGameGeek

Please let me know if you would like more team related board game tips in the comments. Or share your own favorite team bonding board games.

Cheers,
Peter

[Amanda Barber]

To get people up and moving around, I love the game Happy Salmon. One round takes about 2 minutes and it's just a fun and silly way to get the blood pumping again during a day of meetings. (Only works in-person though!)

Thanks for sharing this - I love the idea of bringing more play to my team.

[Peter Van de Voorde]

Thanks for the recommendation @Amanda Barber , I haven't heard about Happy Salmon yet.
But it looks like a cool game, anyone following along can check it out here: https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/194626/happy-salmon

[Matthias Gaiser _K15t_]

@Peter Van de Voorde, I love co-op board games and I also think it's a great way to form teams together.

One game which comes spontaneously to my mind which we often play within my team is Codenames. This is not a real co-op game since you still compete with two teams against each other. But within your team, you really need to try to think the same way as your other teammates.

There are 25 cards on the table with a word on each of them. The cards can either belong to a team, be neutral or 'sudden death' card. Every team has one person who explains their cards to their team and the rest of the team needs to guess which cards belong to their team. All what you can use for explaining is one word which somehow relates to your words and a number how many cards you mean.

For example, water 3 - and your team can then guess if you meant ice, ship, ocean, rain, etc..

I'd love to hear your recommendations!

PS: And I'm a big pandemic fan as well (also way before the pandemic hit us).

[Frederik Vantroys]

Love co-op games as well.

If your team is into the horror theme : Horrified isn't bad

True Crime, the Crew

[Peter Van de Voorde]

Thanks @Matthias Gaiser _K15t_ and @Frederik Vantroys for your comments and recommendations.

I've played codenames before and I believe I have a version of The Crew somewhere around the house ;)

I'll follow up soon with another article about another game that I believe is a great one to get to know your team members.

[Matthias Gaiser _K15t_]

Maybe, I'll join in on your initiative - waiting for your other article!

[Peter Van de Voorde]

Here ya go @Matthias Gaiser _K15t_ : https://community.atlassian.com/t5/Teamwork-Lab-articles/How-playing-Dixit-can-help-you-better-understand-your-team/ba-p/2396895#M1529

[Collista Lewingdon]

Just here for the game recommendations. :)

[Sam Thing]

Thanks for sharing, more team related board game! 

[Charbel Jarjour]

Thanks for sharing!