Team Building, Ice Breaker Activities, Fun Educational Tools, and Outside The Box Trade Show Ideas

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Something New

Everyone is always on the lookout for new ways to do old things. In our twenty-plus years in the inflatable equipment rental industry we’ve done a little bit of everything. Our jobs haven’t always been relegated to festivals and parties. We’ve used our obstacle courses and other inflatable rides and activities as team building activities, ice breakers, and educational rewards. Today though, I’m writing about something that can be easily used for all of those purposes and more, year round and in nearly any venue. I am referring to game shows.

Game shows have been around in one form or another since the 1930’s, when they were broadcast over the radio. Since then they’ve continued to gain in popularity and have cemented themselves as a staple across television networks worldwide. While they may occasionally dip in popularity, they never go away.

The Family Feud was first aired in 1976 and is still going strong today. Wheel of Fortune was started in 1975 and is the longest-running syndicated game show in the United States, with over 6,000 episodes aired. The Price is Right made its debut in 1956 and Jeopardy in 1964.  Since then hundreds of game shows have aired worldwide. Some, like Minute to Win It, burned brightly for a short time while others, like Who Wants to Be A Millionaire, may hold up against the test of time.

Now companies and corporations, colleges and universities, and schools big and small can enjoy professional style game shows that recreate the experience of their favorite television game show. More than that, these productions can be customized so that they are not only entertaining but functional as well. Bellow, is a list of pragmatic uses for professional mobile game shows and descriptions of how they can achieve the desired goals.

 

Team Building

Team building activities have actually been scientifically proven to help team effectiveness. The research shows that there are four approaches to team building. They are goal setting, role clarification, problem solving, and interpersonal-relations management. While the research has shown that all four are important team building factors, it has also shown that goal setting is the lynchpin component. This is because clearly set challenging goals enhance motivation to work harder to become more effective, and also reduces stress. Unlike many team building exercises, which only manage to address one or two of these approaches, there are game shows that can actually satisfy all four.

Goal setting is an obvious one. The overall goal for any game show is to win. However, there are game shows that incorporate physical challenges, or obstacles, into their format and these individual challenges have clearly set goals. For instance, the team needs to work together to trigger a device.

You can’t have successful team building without role clarification emphasizes increasing communication among team members regarding their respective roles and duties within the team. With the right physical challenge a game show can place your team in a situation where this is immediately necessary to win. If the game is run properly, the fun atmosphere should help to drop team member inhibitions, which will allow the leader to shine by directing his people to success.

Problem solving is another obvious one for quality team building. Trivia game shows with organization specific questions can help to enhance critical thinking. Since most game shows have time limits, there is the added dynamic of working under pressure, but since it is an entertaining venue the teams are only left feeling good even if they are not successful.

Interpersonal-relations management emphasizes increasing teamwork skills like supportiveness and communication. This can help to engender trust within the team which leads to more effective teamwork. Game shows, be they Family Feud analogues or Minute to Win It equivalents, are completely dependent upon good communication and intra-team support. Once again, the game show structure is uniquely suited to the task of team building.

By disguising all of the aforementioned within the format of a game show, corporations and companies as well as other organizations like schools and colleges can boost their teams’ effectiveness in a fun and engaging way.

Ice Breakers

Meeting new people can be a rewarding experience that enriches our lives with new lifelong friends, or it can be an awkward and uncomfortable enterprise that leaves you talking to a potted plant and praying for the end. There is simply nothing worse than convening with a new group of people and being unable to think of something to spark a conversation, or something that would smoothly insinuate you into an existing conversation.

As we all know, the key to building any relationship is rapport. This cannot be done without first finding common ground. Therefore, it stands to reason that by putting a group of strangers into a fun communal situation in which achievement is team dependent, you can give them that foundation from which they can build something meaningful. Game shows do just that.

 

boring-presentation

Say goodbye to boring presentations. Use a game show to spice things up and get your point across in an entertaining and engaging way.

Educational Games

As any educator will tell you, engendering real metabolized understanding of a subject is challenging in the extreme. They will also tell you that associative learning is one of the most successful techniques for doing so. That is precisely what makes game shows perfect as an educational tool.

Associative learning is the process by which a person relates information based on its association to an event or other outside stimuli. With bells ringing, buzzers buzzing, people laughing, and optional physical challenges all corresponding with targeted questions, a game show is an associative learning smorgasbord. It’s uniquely effective at aiding all manner of educational needs.

Whether you need to train a sales team, or help your 5th graders learn about American History, the right game show company can turn a dry presentation or lecture into something fun and exciting.

 

Trade Show Booths

Sure you’re excited about your products or services, but how can you convey that excitement to prospective customers and clients? You could make a flashy trade show booth…just like everyone else. You could hand out branded kitsch…just like everyone else. Wait, I know. You could provide them with world class full color literature…just like everyone else. You know what you’ll get? The same people who would have stopped at your booth anyway.

So, how can taking advantage of a game show format help set your trade show display apart? The novelty and a chance to break from the malaise and tedium of the trade show will draw prospectives to your booth. The questions that you provide the professional game show host will allow your potential clients to lead themselves to the one inescapable conclusion that your company is the one for them.

If you choose the right game show company, they will be able to configure a game show around your needs. They can add a bonus round with a cash cube money machine or give away “prizes” that help reinforce your message. They can turn your booth into a memorable information collecting information disseminating machine with no parallel.

Other Out of The Box Ideas

So, we’ve explored how renting a professional mobile game show can make amazing team building exercises, unequaled ice breaker activities, teachable moments, and creative trade show displays. Now let’s talk about some uses for a game show that you may never have thought of before.

Weddings and Rehearsal Dinners

Apart from the birth of any children, your wedding is arguably the most important day of your life. So, why not spice things up? You can add something like a photo booth, and that’s really nice. Now consider adding a Family Feud style game show. Nothing can get everyone in the room laughing and as engaged as this. It’s a terrific way to bridge gaps and to get to know your new family.

Parties

Birthday’s, Christmas, New Year’s, and more. A trivia game show or, better yet, a game show that includes minute to win it style games can make your party to talk of the town right up until you do it again next year.

In Conclusion

Game shows, game shows, game shows.  Did I mention game shows? Everyone loves them. Everyone wants to be on one. Most people will only get to watch them on their TV’s. Contact the right professional game show company and you can experience the best team building exercises, ice breaking activities, and educational devices. Do yourself a favor and check out Fun & Game Show. They are a family run and operated game show company with years of entertainment experience.

Tell us what you think in the comments below.

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1 Comment

  1. WitchBounceHouse on October 15, 2015 at 6:02 pm

    These are some great ideas and things to do with inflatable. I have to admit, I never thought of using them as ice breakers or team building activity. Thanks!

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