How to Create a Fun and Motivating Company Scavenger Hunt

A few years ago I did a full blown company scavenger hunt with 55 General Managers from all over Southern California. To date, this infamous scavenger hunt remains the most requested team building activity we have ever done. I hear you saying "scavenger hunts are for slumber parties and kids..." Not even! A company scavenger hunt can be a ton of fun for as few as 10 to as many as 100 people.

Customize a scavenger hunt to fit your company needs, your town's resources and your employees' likes and dislikes. The following suggestions may help you in planning a fun, team building exercise that will have your employees talking for months to come:

1. Divide your group into equal teams

2. Provide each team with a Polaroid Camera

3. Provide each group with a raw egg

We used the raw egg to symbolize the safety and security of my manager's employees. The key was to feature the egg in every picture taken during the scavenger hunt and to keep it safe till the end of the scavenger hunt.

Teams were instructed to document the demise of their eggs (with a picture) if someone dropped it, sat on it or somehow harmed the egg. The egg stories became the highlight of our scavenger hunt wrap up. One team actually tried to replace the egg with a proxy!

The egg can represent almost any core belief your company feels strongly about and wishes to keep safe and secure. A friend of mine used the egg to represent the fragility of her patients; she did a scavenger hunt for a group of registered nurses.

Another friend used the egg to represent the delicate nature of a marriage; she plans weddings for a living and needed a team building activity for her staff of servers and bartenders.

Other suggestions for what the egg can symbolize:

• Your company's product
• Your companies sales
• Your companies precious employees
• Your boss! (This might get a lot of laughs and may spark some very interesting stories if your boss has a good sense of humor...)

4. Create a clue sheet to be passed out at the start of the game.

The clue sheet should send your teams all over town collecting items and completing tasks. Its always fun if you can make the clues rhyme but it's not required.

Fun Task Ideas:

• Throw in a twist to start things off with a challenge. Give each team just one roll of Polaroid film (10 pictures per roll). Remind them that the raw egg must appear in EVERY shot and sure enough one of your teams will forget the egg in at least one shot. They will have to work together to decide whether to take another picture or risk running out of film before the end of the game.
• Ask teams to take a ride on a local rollercoaster and present the ticket stub as one of the collected items.
• Ask your team to wade in a public fountain up their knees and take a Polaroid picture to prove the task complete.
• Ask teams to have their picture taken with a tourist from out of state who is over 60. Be sure to ask them to take a picture of the tourist with their out of state drivers license.
• Ask teams to collectively name their eggs and their team. Collective creativity is fun for everyone and always gets a laugh.
• Your last clue should send your teams to a final meeting spot. Select a restaurant, banquet hall or conference room where your teams can meet once they have completed their tasks.

The real fun comes with the wrap-up, at the end of your scavenger hunt. Be sure to allow enough time for each team to present their findings, their pictures from the hunt and their raw egg stories.

Your teams will be worn out, tired and hungry after a long day of scavenger hunting. Feed your teams and you will get a group of happy employees, excited to share their stories and scavenger hunt adventures with the group!

Finally, end your event with a few fun superlative awards. Best Team Name, First Team to Arrive with ALL Tasks Completed, Best Egg Story....

Although my experience suggests our staff enjoys the prestige of the titles just as much as the prizes; we do like to give out a number of inexpensive gifts: Gas Cards, Starbucks Gift Cards, Pizza Cards...

A company scavenger hunt is an inexpensive, fun and creative way to engage your employees in a team building activity that they may actually enjoy!

Happy Scavenging!