Communication games are activities and exercises that help colleagues exchange information more effectively. Can You Hear Me Now, Telephone and Mad Gab are a few examples. The goal of these games is to emphasize the necessity of clear communication in order to improve employees’ verbal and nonverbal communication abilities.
These activities are related to connection games and relationship building games and are a sort of team building activity.
Here is a list of fun games to improve communication skills at work.
1. Can You Hear Me Now?
One of the simplest virtual communication games is Can You Hear Me Now? Participants will need paper and pens to play the game. Each round, one player describes an item for the other players to draw one shape or line at a time. As an example, consider the sun, a tree, a stoplight, or a kitten. The goal of the game is for players to guess the object before the picture is finished.
The game stresses the need of providing clear instructions while also demonstrating how seemingly simple phrases can have unexpected interpretations. It’s also entertaining to see how the drawings turn out.
2. Back-to-back Drawing
Back-to-back Drawing is an activity that focuses on description and active listening. Participants sit back to back in pairs. Player one has a finished drawing or painting, while player two has a blank piece of paper and a writing instrument. Player one must relate a story or describe a picture to player two, who must then attempt to sketch the depicted scene. At the end of the activity, the two players compare the images by placing them side by side.
This practice puts participants’ listening and instructing skills to the test. In most cases, player two is not permitted to raise questions while drawing. You can, however, amend this rule and allow participants to engage in a one-sided conversation during the game. You might even wish to play the game both ways, with two distinct photographs, and see if the final images are more similar when players are permitted to converse during the exercise.
3. Taboo
Taboo is a party game based on words that involves creative thinking and communication. A player draws a card from the deck at the start of each round. Each card contains a forbidden term as well as a list of other forbidden words. Without utilizing any of the words on the card, the cardholder must assist other players in guessing the phrase. If the word was coffee, other forbidden words may include brew, beans, cafe, caffeine, and java.
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This activity encourages players to consider other methods of explaining concepts, which can be valuable when teammates do not understand an idea the first time they hear it.
4. Mirror
Mirror is one of the simplest nonverbal communication games. Players form teams and compete against one another. One player serves as the leader, while the other serves as the follower. The leader starts moving without saying anything, and the follower mimics each movement. Participants must rely solely on their body language. After a few minutes, the players trade roles and the activity is repeated.
5. Birthday Lineup
The Birthday Lineup is a simple nonverbal communication game for large gatherings. Participants must line up in chronological order by birth month and day without conversing. Participants might, for example, write down birthdays or gesture with their fingers for the month and day. Once everyone is in place, the participants reveal their birthdays one by one and whether or not the line goes in perfect order.
6. Yes?
Yes? Is one of the most exciting communication games available. The most crucial method of communication in the activity is eye contact. Players form a circle. The person whose turn it is looks across the circle at a teammate and asks, “Yes?” The teammate responds, “Yes.” After then, the players trade places. As the game progresses, participants can form new chains so that more than one person moves or speaks at the same time. The more active chains there are, the more difficult it is for players to concentrate and respond. This game trains players to stay awake and multitask in stressful situations.
7. Blindfold Stroll
Blindfold Stroll is one of the best team building communication games. To do this activity:
- Set up an obstacle course
- Blindfold one player
- Ask other players to guide the player through the course by shouting directions.
To make the game more fun and exciting, you can time course completion or introduce traps and penalties. Whatever way you play, this activity emphasizes the need to give precise instructions, and gives teammates practice giving each other directions.
8. Lip Reading Liars
One of the most entertaining team communication games is Lip Reading Liars. This game can be played in-person, online, or in a hybrid work context. The game’s premise is that selected players must interpret the meaning of a scene without the use of sound.
Each round, one or two players either wear noise-cancelling earbuds or turn off their computer’s sound. Then, for three minutes or less, two to four other actors act out a scene. To figure out the intricacies of the scene, the interpreters must try to analyze lips and body language. When the sketch is finished, listeners remove their headphones or restart the audio and recap the situation.
9. Mad Gab
Mad Gab is one of the most entertaining verbal conversation games available. In this game, participants read aloud a series of random phrases that, at first glance, appear to be nonsense but, when read correctly, sound like a common saying. Before time runs out, players must guess the phrase.
Woe Ark Fro Ma Ho Ma, for example, means “work from home.”
10. Another Way to Say
Another Way to Say is a game in which players are challenged to think of synonyms and alternative ways to say familiar words. The round begins with a single participant speaking a phrase. The other players respond with similar phrases until they run out of possibilities.
If the first sentence is “the end of the work day,” options could include “quitting time,” “time to punch the clock,” “happy hour,” “overtime,” “after-hours,” “rush hour,” “commute home,” and so on.
The activity can be a last-man-standing game in which the player who continues to contribute the longest wins the round, or players might collaborate to come up with phrases. The goal of the game is to demonstrate how many distinct ways a notion can be expressed. Players are encouraged to coin new terms and utilize descriptive language, although the group may also challenge inventive responses.
Summary
One of the most difficult soft talents to develop is communication. People communicate in a variety of ways, and the chance of misinterpretation and misunderstanding is considerable. It might sometimes be difficult to communicate thoughts in a clear and understandable manner.
Communication games and exercises allow teammates to practice conversing and exchanging ideas in a fun, difficult, yet low-pressure setting. These activities can help teams enhance their speaking and writing skills, as well as their listening skills and make players more perceptive and mindful of messages. Not to mention that many of these exercises challenge participants to speak in novel and unexpected ways, which might help them express themselves in new ways on the job.
