Categories
Employer Branding

5 Interesting Work Social Ideas

Think your staff are getting tired of the same old corporate social events?  Many companies play it too safe when it comes to social events for their employees, plumping for the traditional office Christmas party or the run-of-the-mill Thursday after-work drinks in your local.  If you fancy shaking things up a bit and giving your team an event to remember, here are just five exciting alternatives for your next work social…

1. Escape Games

Escape games are becoming wildly popular with office parties.  The idea is simple – you and your team are trapped in a room with an hour to get out and must solve cryptic clues and mentally-challenging puzzles to escape.  Not only are they great fun, but they also have the added advantage of forcing people to work together as a team and are much more interesting than your traditional team-building away days.  Happy hour in the local watering hole will start to look very dull after an hour of high-intensity escape room games!

2. Flashback Friyays

Fridays can be a very dull and dead day in the office, with everyone winding down to the weekend by quietly internet shopping and ‘checking their emails’ for an hour come four o’clock.  Add a bit of energy to the last day of the working week by turning them into a Flashback Friyay.  You could invite staff to an after office hours party themed by decade – who can resist the urge to don a scrunchie and choker to relive the 90s, accompanied by some Spice Girls tunes or the dulcet tones of Mariah Carey?

3. Host a Cook-off

Shows like MasterChef and The Great British Bake-off have convinced a lot of people that they’re a dab hand in the kitchen.  Often their self-belief goes far beyond their actual culinary talents, and the results can be hilarious.  You could try dividing your staff into small teams and getting them to cook using a particular ingredient or cook a particular type of cuisine.  Host a cook-off, and you’ll inject a healthy dose of competition into your work social, as well as enjoying the laughs which come with cake mishaps and dodgy flavor combinations.

4. Board Game Battles

Turn the boardroom into a board games room for an afternoon, and play some of the classics such as Scrabble, Snakes and Ladders or Cluedo.  Games which call for people to form teams can be a great way of getting people to work together and socializing with one another.  As an alternative to a quiz night, they can be great fun, as long as nobody brings along Twister…

5. Go Strawberry Picking

On those rare occasions when the weather is nice, what could be more quintessentially British than a trip out to the countryside for some strawberry picking?  Escape the office and the city for an afternoon, and this is a great way for your team to spend some time together, doing something a little different.  Most people won’t have been strawberry picking since childhood, but there’s something oh so satisfying about enjoying the fruits of your labor and a cheeky glass of champagne on a summer’s afternoon.

Hopefully, these five suggestions will have given you a little inspiration.  Avoid the standard warm beer in a dingy pub or the tedious office dinner and try something a little different next time you want to hold a work social.

 

By Ella Patenall

Inspiring Interns & Graduates is the UK’s leading graduate recruitment agency, based in London. Since 2009, they’ve placed over 7,500 candidates and worked with 3,000 companies.