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The playful team

We don’t usually think of play as an essential part of business innovation. Play is often dismissed as an optional extra—something you do after the real work is finished. However, with innovation productivity in decline, it is time to become more "productively playful."

We define 'play' as deploying improvisation, imagination, and inspiration within a business context to explore possibilities effectively. In today’s volatile and unstable environment, we cannot rely solely on rigid plans. We need the mindset to adapt to new situations, the imagination to identify unsatisfied needs, and the inspiration to drive creative solutions.

Below are eight games designed to enhance your team's innovative culture. We typically facilitate these sessions in combination with our INNOmaps to bridge the gap between play and strategy.

Lego® Serious Play® (LSP). A powerful methodology that uses LEGO bricks to translate abstract thinking into concrete business insights. LSP encourages "out-of-the-box" thinking, allowing participants to build their own metaphors. It is based on the belief that everyone has a unique, valuable perspective to contribute to decisions and outcomes.

Duration: 2–4 hours.

The Unicorn Game. This game drops you straight into a startup mindset, disrupting your standard way of working throughout the experience. Players learn to think like founders, fostering co-creation and rapid innovation. It’s all about challenging industry norms and generating ideas that inspire immediate action.

Duration: 90 minutes.

The Cover Story Vision. The goal here is to suspend all logical restrictions and imagine the future of your company or product without constraints. By envisioning a "front-page success story," participants unlock their creative potential and clarify the company's long-term vision.

Duration: 2–3 hours.

The Innovation Game. Using metaphors like travel or retail, participants identify barriers and opportunities in current processes. By brainstorming how to improve an experience that everyone understands, participants develop a valuable, customer-centric mindset that translates directly to their own business challenges.

Duration: 1–2 hours.

Moon Landing Survival Challenge. Stranded on the moon, your team must cooperate to survive. This classic simulation forces teams to refine their communication, decision-making, and resource-prioritization skills under high-pressure conditions.

Duration: 45–90 minutes.

Storytelling Startup Challenge. Lead a new creative project and compete to build the best business. Using strategic "inspiration cards," players must pitch their ideas to others. This game emphasizes the art of persuasion, strategy, and turning possibilities into a viable business narrative.

Duration: 1–2 hours.

'What If' Card Deck. Designed to spark divergent thinking, these cards help participants uncover the "blind spots" hindering new ideas. Questions like "What game-changing idea have you seen recently?" or "If you had infinite resources, what would you do?" provide a fresh, necessary perspective.

Duration: 1–2 hours.

Business Simulation Board Game. We combine the best elements of strategy board games with a business context. Participants navigate entrepreneurship, finance, marketing, and negotiation. It is an intensive way to master critical thinking and decision-making in a low-risk, high-engagement environment.

Duration: 1–2 hours.

Additional Game Suggestions

To further expand your toolkit, consider adding these proven methods:

The 'Worst Idea' Contest. A fantastic icebreaker. Instead of asking for the best solution, ask teams to generate the worst possible idea for a problem. This removes the fear of failure and often leads to absurd, unconventional solutions that contain the seeds of genuine innovation.
SCAMPER Workshop. A structured, game-like process where teams take an existing product or process and apply triggers to manipulate it: Substitute, Combine, Adapt, Modify, Put to another use, Eliminate, and Reverse.
Empathy Map Game. A design-thinking activity where participants physically map out the emotions, pains, and gains of a specific user persona. This forces the team to shift from internal logic to user-centered empathy.

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