Storytelling Activities

Philipp Humm

7 Storytelling Activities and Exercises to Create an Unforgettable Team Event

March 21, 2022

Do you have a team-event coming up and you’re thinking, How can I make this the most fun and useful team event EVER?

If that’s the case, I’ve got something for you.
In my five years in Improv Theatre and ten years in workshop facilitation, I’ve had the chance to experience hundreds of exercises that help improve team bonding, collaboration and motivation.

While most of the exercises are incredibly fun, a few of them also teach very specific skills such as storytelling.

Here are seven storytelling activities for an unforgettable team event:

1. Story of Your Name

Overview: Each participant shares the story of how they got their names/nicknames

Objectives: Get to know each other and start feeling comfortable sharing stories

Time: 1 minute per participant

Number of participants: 5-10

Instructions:

  • You (the facilitator) ask participants to share how they got their names
  • You can tell participants that they aren’t bound to share the story of their first name. It can be a narrative about their last name, middle name, or nickname whatsoever. To make it clear to everyone, you can give an example. But, watch out to not give an incredibly polished example of the Story of Your Name. Otherwise, it might intimidate the participants, and they’d hesitate to proceed with their stories. Here’s a quick example:
    • “My parents literally opened up a dictionary and saw a random word “fin.” They thought it was cool and came up with the name Phinita. So yeah, that’s how I got my name.”
  • After you give an example, you can ask for a volunteer to go first
  • Once the first volunteer has finished his or her story, he or she can choose the next person to share the Story of Your Name

Tips:

  • This storytelling activity is fun if it is kept short. Make sure you remind people to keep it to maximum a minute
  • If someone feels nervous, try to cheer them up by telling them that their story doesn’t necessarily have to be intriguing. Instead, they should be open to sharing a boring narrative 
  • If someone has no story about their names, ask them to share one of their pets or family members – keep it flexible

2. Story Around the Circle

Overview: Participants improvise a story on a random topic without following a defined structure

Objective: Learn how to listen closely, accept each other’s ideas and opinions, and come with creative solutions

Time: 5-10 minutes

Number of participants: 3-6 people

Instructions:

  • The facilitator asks everyone to sit around in a circle
  • He or she starts the story with the first line(s). For example:
    • “In April 2020, Josh arrived at the Google office in NY with an envelope in his hand…”
  • The facilitator then asks the next person to continue the story
  • Now, this person continues the story until the organiser invites the next person
  • The series resumes till everyone in the group has contributed to the story

Tips:

  • Pick a random person to continue the story to keep everyone on their toes
  • Make sure that everyone gets enough speaking time. Feel free to interrupt people in the middle of their sentences to hand it over to the next person
  • A person who has already participated in the storytelling can be asked again to continue the story. This will keep people engaged until the end of the story

3. Story Exchange

Overview: Players share interesting short stories from their lives. Once they exchange the story, they move to another participant and share the story they just heard – as if it was their own

Objective: Learn how to listen very carefully, improvise a story and insert certain elements to make the story more interesting

Time: ~30-40 minutes

Number of participants: 5-10 people

Instructions:

  • Before starting the game, the facilitator gives participants 2-3 minutes to think about a story, a story should be:
    • Only 60-90 seconds long
    • True
    • From any time or facet of their lives (childhood or adulthood)
  • Then, he or she tells participants to look for a partner 
  • Now, the participants have 2 minutes to share their story and 2 minutes to listen to the stories of their partners (4 minutes in total)
  • Whenever the participants share their stories, the partners listen and not interrupt
  • When the first round is over, ask everyone to find a new partner
  • Within the new couples, each person tells the story they just heard from their first partner
  • Once both partners have exchanged their stories, it’s time for the third round. Ask them to find a new partner and repeat the same process
  • How many rounds you choose to do depends entirely on your preferences. However, we recommend between 3-4 rounds to keep it exciting and fun
  • After the last round, the facilitator asks everyone to get together, form a circle, and share the story they just heard. People love hearing how their stories have evolved

Tips:

  • If you want this activity to go smoother, it’s better to assign numbers to each participant at the beginning of the game. Later, you can announce numbers for each couple, each round
  • You can permit players to tweak the story slightly. It should not change the structure of the original story. The aim is to make it more exciting and not alter it entirely

Free Masterclass: 3-Step Formula To Master the Art of Storytelling

Discover the tools to find, structure, and enhance your stories. Watch the replay now and discover the storyteller within you!
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4. Story Seeds

Overview: Participants craft a story, using four random, neutral sentences as input

Objective: Instil creative thinking skills and train members to make intriguing stories out of an ordinary setting

Time: 10-20 minutes

Number of participants: Variable

Instructions:

  • The facilitator comes up with four neutral sentences or asks the group members for prompts (For example: “Phoebe ate a pizza.” “The PC stopped working.” “The cat chewed on the catnip.” “The boss yelled at his employee.”)
  • Each participant writes a story using these four sentences 
  • Give each participant 10 minutes to complete their stories
  • Ask participants to turn to the neighbour and share their stories
  • Alternatively, the players can share their stories with everyone

Tips:

  • You can ask participants to share their stories without looking at their notes
  • You can guide them on how to enliven the story, showing them how to add emotions, surprise elements or interesting dialogues. For more information how to turn an ordinary story into a great one, check out our article on the 7 ELEMENTS OF GREAT STORYTELLING

5. Powerpoint Karaoke

Overview: Participants give a presentation on slides they’ve never seen before

Objective: Learn how to improvise and remain calm under pressure

Time: 2-3 minutes per player

Number of participants: 3-10

Instructions:

  • For this specific activity, you need to create a few slides – ideally, slides that none of the group members have seen before. You are free to use random, irrelevant slides to keep things light-hearted and fun. They can be from a past company presentation too
  • Invite the first volunteer to get up and start with with the first slide
  • Encourage the volunteer now to give a presentation on the slide with a clear call-to-action
  • Once the volunteer has talked for 2-3minutes, he or she can pick the next presenter

Tips:

  • We recommend keeping the text on the slide as minimal as possible. In fact, if you want the activity to be more exciting, it’s better to go with visuals only
  • Before asking participants to do the exercise, it may be interesting to show participants how it’s done. For instance, you can ask a participant to pick a random slide or visual that you don’t know and, then, improvise a short speech on that slide

6. Story Spine

Story Spine

Overview: Participants improvise a story together, using a sentence-at-a-time to structure the story

Objective: Get familiar with a common story structure, listen closely, and accept each other’s ideas 

Time: 5-10 minutes

Number of participants: 2-9 people

Instructions:

  • You (the facilitator) present the narrative arc that participants should use to structure the story. While there are many different story structures, here’s a very common structure:
    • Once upon a time…
    • Every day…
    • But, one day…
    • Because of that…. (repeat three or more times)
    • Finally…
    • Ever since then…
    • The moral of the story is…
  • Ideally, you want to share the structure on-screen or in-paper, so that participants remember and refer back as needed
  • Assign numbers to each participant and define the order of the activity. (For instance, Jack goes first, Nora goes second, and so on)
  • Provide players with a random topic (e.g., “investment banker finding enlightenment”) and ask person 1 to start the story with “Once upon a time…”
  • Once person 1 has completed the first sentence, person 2 takes over
  • The pattern goes on until the story finishes. Here’s an example:
    • Once upon a time, 23 years old college graduate, Jack started his career at Goldman Sachs in London
    • Every day, he worked until three in the morning, spending hours and hours formatting slides and preparing excel models that no one even looked at
    • Until one day, he noticed a poster in the metro that said: “You only have one life. Don’t waste it!”
    • Because of that, Jack left the metro on the next stop even though he was still far away from work
    • Because of that, his manager called, asking: “Where the heck are you? You’re 5 minutes late!”
    • Because of that, Jack’s heart started racing, worrying that he was making a major mistake
    • Finally, he realised that it didn’t matter and sent his manager an email with the words: “I’m out. You can format the slides yourself!”
    • Ever since then, he has opened a powerpoint, living every day to the fullest
    • The moral of the story is to follow your heart and do things that you care about

Tips:

  • To guide the participants properly, you can improvise a story on a random topic. You can ask the participants to give a random topic for which you will improvise a story
  • Remind participants that they are only supposed to cover their respective sentences and not to narrate the entire story. You’ll likely have to interrupt the one or the other participant as they start sharing a full story instead of their sentences  

In case you’re looking for different story structures, one that is more relevant for business, check out our article on the 6 STEPS TO CRAFT A POWERFUL STORY

7. Colour/ Advance

Overview: Participants are asked to go into the details of their stories

Objective: Learn how breathe life into their stories and make them more intriguing

Time: 10-15 minutes

Number of participants: Variable

Instructions:

  • Split participants into pairs – Participants As and Participants Bs
  • You, then, ask each participant to come up with a story. You can make it easier for them by giving them a prompt. For instance, “what’s the the funniest moment during your time in college”
  • After a 1 minute of reflection, ask As to share their stories
  • As As share their stories, Bs can pause As anytime, saying “Colour this”. In these moments, As shall give more details about the situation. “Colour” symbolises any detail around the story – the landscape, the characters, the emotions, etc.
  • After giving As some time to elaborate on the details, Bs say “Advance,” and As proceed with the story’s action
  • Bs can do that a few times throughout the story whenever it feels appropriate
  • Once the story finishes or time is up (5 minute should be good), you can switch roles

Tips:

  • You may want to demonstrate this storytelling activity with a volunteer. If you choose to do so, it’s best to play the role of storyteller to show them how to add colour

Conclusion

These are the 7 storytelling activities that you can try out in your next team event.

Pick one or two and see how it goes. I’m sure your team will love them.

If you’re not yet ready to facilitate these storytelling activities at your team-event or you want a professional to help, feel free to drop us a note.

Every day we are helping organisations around the world discover the power of storytelling in fun keynotes and workshops. We’d love to help you create an unforgettable team event.

P.S. If you’re looking for more fun exercises for your upcoming team event, you should check out Kat Koppett’s book Training to Imagine. Her book will give you dozens of exercises from Improvisational Theatre to help improve your team’s trust, spontaneity, storytelling and awareness.

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