Team Building During The Pandemic

Here’s why you should host a virtual escape room for your remote teams

My wife and I launched our live-hosted, virtual escape room company, Paruzal Games, much earlier than we had originally intended because when the Covid-19 pandemic hit, we knew people would be looking for fun online activities as a way to combat quarantine boredom. 

At the time, we figured our primary customers would consist of refugees from brick-and-mortar escape-rooms who were missing the thrills of solving a challenging puzzle in-person - and maybe some video gamers who were looking to branch out from non-stop point-and-shoot fare.

What we didn’t expect was a call from a national staffing company who contacted Paruzal to run a series of games for their management internship program. Interns?  Our puzzles were designed for hardcore game fans and self-described mystery geeks. Why would a corporation be calling us?  Sure, we had also done several birthday parties for family and friends who wanted a group activity since they couldn’t get together… but we never expected to hear from a corporate office.

Turns out, the staffing company wanted to see what happened when they placed their interns into a competitive environment.  They wanted to spot what soft skills were manifested during the adventure gameplay.  Would someone try to take charge and shout down competing ideas? Which intern might quietly try building consensus from the group? Who would work well alone? And who would offer up the imaginative, crazy ideas that just might work? 

It was a new audience to us for sure, but we knew our escape room scenarios were engaging and relied heavily on teamwork.  So why shouldn’t it work as an off-the-wall teambuilding exercise?  Especially during this pandemic, when traditional team activities were all shut down.

We arranged for the interns to take part in one of our escape room adventures.  They had a great time and both the staffing company and we, as game developers, gained a lot of new insights from these young players.

The games were a big hit and the program leadership team took pages of notes, documenting each intern’s leadership style. From this hour-long game, that program’s leadership was able to identify:
 

As HR managers charged with filling key positions and promoting talented performers, identifying soft skills and personality traits is critical for putting the right people in the right jobs.  

On the surface, Paruzal’s games appear to be nothing more than a fun pastime and a terrific way to bond with friends you can’t see in person. But the staffing company saw more to the activity. They realized that in observing players taking part in the game, they could evaluate how employees (or in this case, interns) interact with their peers. 

They later told us it was especially useful to see how quieter, introverted personalities, displayed unique skills that weren’t evident in the routine office environment. Those players actually blossomed in the virtual escape-room environment, where many of their more outspoken colleagues were initially stymied by the challenge.

Why do virtual escape rooms work so well as a team-building exercise?
 

1) The team is given the common goal – escape the room in the allotted time – so there is clearly a shared purpose. But how to achieve the goal is not readily apparent at all.

2) Teams must talk out each move, evaluate each clue, and make connections with other available information. This elicits a lot of varying skills, from mathematical to cognitive to diplomatic. Not one player necessarily stands out as a key resource. Leaders don’t always have all the answers.

3) Conflicts do arise, as team members evaluate the clues and propose different next steps.  How internal conflicts are resolved and by whom is particularly useful to witness.

4) Escape rooms are learning experiences. They uncover skills and capabilities that aren’t always apparent in the workplace setting and reveal different sides to employees and how they think under pressure.

5) Everyone walks away from the experience feeling different about themselves and others. “You really saved us back there.”  “Who knew you were so intuitive?” “If we did it again, I think I’d contribute more” are all responses we hear again and again.

When you can’t go out for a team lunch or take a field trip to a rope course, please know there are other team building events that your corporate staff can engage in. At a time when teams are working remotely, a virtual escape room can make a fun, and insightful, HR exercise.