30 virtual retreat ideas to refresh and reset your staff blog

A virtual retreat is beneficial when it allows employees to step back from the daily routine to reflect, reset, and cultivate team bonds.

But, the leaders of today face serious issues. Forbes reports over fifty percent ( 52%) of survey respondents experience burnout in 2021. And with the majority of workers working in the information industry working remotely, or clocking in to a hybrid workplace and a hybrid workspace, it is difficult or even impossible to gather everyone on the team for a retreat.

In this piece, we provide a brief overview of what a virtual retreat can be and why leaders need to consider organizing one. We also provide a few suggestions of the best practices and many ideas to help you hit the starting point.

What will we cover

What's a virtual retreat?

However, hybrid work and remote work aren't free from difficulties. 16 percent of folks from Buffer's poll say remote work is lonely and another 16% struggle working in a team. The day-to-day work can dampen moods and gradually take a toll on individual and team productivity.

Virtual retreats are similar to the in-person retreats they're modeled after. There's still certain planning, like making a plan, setting goals, preparing an agenda and putting the dates on your employee calendars, but we'll get to more details in the article.

So, without further ado we'll give an inventory of 30 suggestions to help you plan a productive retreat for the team.

30 ideas for virtual retreats

1. Wellness workshop

An analysis from 2018 revealed that two-thirds of the employees within the US suffer from fatigue. The pandemic's arrival however I'm betting the numbers will only increase this is why that virtual wellness program such a popular option.

Encourage office workers to join in for the practice of yoga or a meditation for a relaxing time. It is also possible to dedicate some time to asking everyone what they are doing to increase their fitness.

2. Virtual coffee

A virtual coffee session is the perfect way to start the conversations going with an enticing cup of hot coffee. Be sure to send the coffee and cups with a logo for employees in advance.

To create a cafe-like environment you can hire a band who will play during the opening or in the middle of your retreat session. It is also possible to encourage your employees to trade their tips for making coffee with one another.

3. Virtual workshop

A different learning option you can add to your online retreat plan is inviting your group to join a virtual workshop. The Remote Company designed an Museum Hack storytelling workshop to their employees and they did it virtually.

For the duration of the 3 hour group activity, the participants worked in groups of 4-5 participants to develop their own narrative, guided by the storieshacks, examples as well as other tips that workshop hosts discussed.

Create a storytelling session with your group or one that will teach a related important skill that teams of all kinds including sales, marketing customer service, sales, and so on - can appreciate.

4. Virtual coffee, learn and experience

You can share news and gossip during a coffee chat at your online retreat, you can make use of coffee to share your knowledge with each other.

The remote Hotjar team often hosts 15-minute lengthy sessions in which each person from the team gives a speech and the other members relax and enjoy their coffee and all the while, they learn something new.

Check out their coffee and learn schedule:

Source: Hotjar

On your agenda for the virtual you can plan small-scale learning workshops where participants choose the topic they want to learn about. Invite the group to participate with any drink - including freshly squeezed juices or fancy smoothies in case they would like. There's no end to being imaginative, in fact.

5. The team should create music lists together

In teams that collaborate all day long on tasks related to work, plan a 30-min virtual chat in which teams collaborate over the creation of music-related lists.

Take a page from the Trello team that uses Spotify to listen and curate productivity-boosting and de-stressing playlists. Replicate this to your group.

6. Virtual book club

It's hard to beat this retreat online idea if you've got readers on your staff. Ask for book recommendations before the event and ensure that everybody has an audiobook paperback or eBook (whatever the book of their choice).

Give the team enough time to either read a section of the book or its entirety before meeting virtually to discuss the book. Every person should bring two questions, two takeaways (even when it's a non-fiction reading), and lots of different opinions.

7. Virtual movie screening

Also, you can bring colleagues to a movie showing. Bring everyone in for the movie, live chat responses in real-time as well as a debrief at conclusion. Also, you can send snacks for the screening like popcorn, cupcakes as well as cookies and other treats prior to the event.Alternatively you can choose a smaller show that you all can watch in a group.  ERGs from's hosts a monthly show of the America TV drama Pose. Verve Logic, an IT business, gave its employees an extra day to watch the popular Spanish series, Money Heist. Therefore, you could definitely consider such a day as an element of your retreat without worrying if it'd get a lot of attention from employees.

8. Virtual Office Road Trip

Before 2020, several remote firms held offsite retreats, where teams would fly to a destination. A good alternative now but not the virtual office trip -- like one that was planned by the Front office team had planned for their team.

They visited all three cities in which they have offices, and everyone shared videos at each place, documenting what they loved, other places they went to as well as other places they visited.

Source: Front

Have teammates in different countries? It's no problem. Request them to choose a location and go on travel at the same time as the rest of the team as everyone records their journey along the way. Do not forget to bring along the essential travel accessories.

9. Virtual GIF battles

Who doesn't love a fun GIF? It's a simple and simple idea for the agenda of your virtual retreat. The GIF battle can include 3-4 themed rounds.

Try playing in pairs or let your employees fight the game battle royale-style as they look for themed GIFs during each round, with Google images or GIPHY.com. The participant with the most votes in their GIF is the winner of the round and eventually the game.

Pro Tip: You can also create a meme or find a similar battle like this.

10. Virtual guide to work style creating a session

A great bonding idea for the virtual retreat is asking employees to develop their working style guidelines. Before you go on the retreat, have participants to write a document about their working style that describes their communication style as well as how they work and some tips on collaboration. Atlassian offers a number of User Manual templates for you to test out to help everyone get started.

Once ready, team members are expected to read one another's "user manuals" whether asynchronously or synchronously. Then, it is time to create a repository or library to store all manuals.

11. Self-care retreats, fitness or virtual

It could be anything from an enlightened meditation, using face masks, or getting pedicures together with the group. Individuals can go out to salons, and then share their updates as well as photos with their team to help keep positive energy flowing.

It is also possible to organize a fitness challenge. With Peloton as an example, virtual bikeathons for teams are so much easier, thanks to their streaming-friendly bike workouts.

12. Virtual creative challenges

Another option is to ask your employees to take part in an creative writing or art challenges in your company-wide retreat. This could involve anything from encouraging them to draw, paint, sketch writing, sketch, or any else.

The Balsamiq team held creative Challenges during which participants had fun making an Frida Kahlo-inspired portrait using a variety of supplies - acrylic paints, sharpies, crayons and highlighters.

Source: Balsamiq Creative Challenges

13. Virtual concert with music

The next step is another of the most effective suggestions for virtual retreats for staff: a virtual music concert. Request musicians to be part of your remote staff on the internet.

Have musicians with you? Great. Get those talented folks to perform the guitar or some other instrument that's their specialty for a music-themed virtual session for everyone to recharge.

14. Virtual food challenge

It's a fun and exciting virtual retreat concept to consider the idea of an eating contest that participants can take part in online. Offer coupons for delivery or restaurant prior to the event and request all participants to take home the winning item like pizza, nachos, hot wings, hot dogs, so they can participate.

15. Virtual cooking/baking classes

There's no end of things your team can do together. Consider the Parabol group that arranged a Chinese cooking course to host a team retreat. Everyone struggled together, created with each other, and enjoyed dumplings in a group and made great use of the shared experience in a time of gathering.

16. Have fun playing Lego with your friends.

This one's another enjoyable and easy concept to host a virtual retreat. Choose a theme, and begin building live with your team. You can also play other games such as Bingo together. Learn more about the games you can play for your online retreat are below.

17. Find something to learn every day.

To balance out fun with some fun learning, chalk off an to learn something new every day task for your virtual retreat agenda. The plan? Learn something new about your teammates, about a new topic, or even an entirely new technique.

For example, ask teammates to come up with and present the '10 things that I am proud of list' to uncover the hidden talents and jokes they can share. Like the HelpScout team, you can ask team members to share GIFs that represent them anonymously. Then, let others determine which GIF represents which member.

Another idea that came from the Helpscout group is to encourage everyone to create hats from objects in their own homes.

18. Cocktail making class

The hat-making class adds a sense of adventure for your retreat online, a cocktail-making class can add a whole new dimension of excitement.

19. Virtual scavenger hunt

It is possible to plan an entirely remote or a hybrid Scavenger hunt with your team. If you choose the latter option, request participants to travel from one place to another in their location to uncover the clues while following other cues at their home.

If you want to conduct a digital hunt, have participants to browse the web to find items available on the internet.

Here's a beginner level Microsoft Teams Scavenger Hunt:

Source: Microsoft Teams

20. Geocaching

For your group to be able to move out of their homes look into geocaching as an efficient and invigorating solution. The Parabol team scouted out for in two days and gave their group with a GPS tracker so that they could get out and enjoy the natural world around them. The team members shared pictures and videos of their adventures.

21. Virtual bonfire

Make use of the retreat to help to catch up with your team, too. Bring a box of snacks (campfire cupcakes are a must!) ahead of time. Be open to discussion or discuss some interesting topics that break the ice such as your personal goals for growth as well as achievements.

22. 30-minute chatroulette

It's a different remote team building exercise of the Hotjar team that you can include in your virtual team ideas for retreats.

The strategy? Find office buddies to share a 30-minute chat - something is vital for teams that are remote, as a lot of people may not (or perhaps, never) be able to speak with people who are from different teams.

Try Donut the Slack-based app which randomly pair teammates to make an online chat. Each participant can participate with a drink and of course donuts, if they'd prefer to chat about anything other than work.

If you prefer to have your team chat the chat method, then you could start by having a chat for 15 minutes as well, so that everyone gets onto at least 3 calls within one hour.

23. Themed parties

It is also possible to host a similar to a Met Gala party, or a simple themed party. To add to the entertainment, think about hosting live entertainment at your event.

24. Fireside chat with an industry thought leader or influencer

25. Social media challenges

26. Virtual video game streams

With streaming, it's possible to get the team to play live video games with each other. Warning: this virtual retreat concept could consume much more time than you imagine because do people not lose track of time when they're having fun?

You can not only have teams of players play however, you could also organize gaming streaming where well-known online game streamers play as office workers watch or cheer and change side in real time.

27. Virtual photography contest

Everybody loves to capture the perfect picture, don't they? It's even possible to get people who are shy about cameras to be a bit more adventurous, encouraging all to utilize filters and shoot themed pictures.

End the contest with an awards ceremony with prizes such as the most hilarious picture,' 'the hard worker, the influencer and so on.

28. Virtual art conference

A conference centered around art can be a great way to engage employees. A lot of art-related conferences are now presenting live shows and even organizing live events on the internet.

29. Virtual theater performance

Similar to an online concert, a virtual theater production is a fantastic way for everyone to enjoy enjoyable. You can easily choose from small-scale plays or musical performances.

In fact, theaters almost all over the globe have live streams - something they adopted in light of the pandemic COVID-19. Ballet Idaho, Toledo Alliance for the Performing Arts, and Opera Philadelphia are some examples.

30. Virtual games

Finally, you could punctuate your retreat with games online too. It's great because games can easily fit in any retreat schedule, regardless of the goal to learn and strategize. Try some of these: Skribblio, Weavr two truths and the truth and Picktionary.

How do I do a virtual retreat?

Do you like all these virtual team idea for retreats? Awesome. Let's go over the steps necessary to set an unforgettable virtual retreat:

Make sure you have your event team

Begin by deciding who you'll team up with to plan, organize, and execute the retreat online.

It is possible to take on the entire responsibility along with a bunch of tech support folks. But a better approach is to get departmental managers to work out the goals, strategies and sources for virtual retreat concepts internal.

Each department can have small, individual goals for the online conference - all of which must be integrated into a company-wide overarching plan.

The details, however, depend on what your organization and different departmental heads want to achieve during the retreat.

Create your agenda for your virtual retreat and 2-3 goals

The first step is to determine why you need to plan an online retreat. what will it aid the organization and employees achieve?

Learn in Agorapulse's CMO, Michael Angiletta's memoir, in which he organized their team's first ever virtual retreat. "I carried out a survey of the marketing team, and I asked everybody which they believed were the most difficult challenges and the best possibilities. I tried to build an agenda around that."

Next, brainstorm and then write goals.

Do you wish to unite the group and help them get to know one another? Or, do you want to pair fun with strategy and planning to plan the next quarter? It is also possible to organize a virtual retreat to achieve another objective such as employee appreciation and recognition.

One thing to keep in mind: you can't write down the most goals you can and attempt to meet them all with a single retreat. This could backfire in a variety of ways.

How can you ensure that your retreat runs smoothly, hits its goals, and that your employees are having a great time? The best way is to define between three goals and planning the retreat around them.

Determine important information like cost and length of the event

After you've set your goals, get into infrastructural planning. Complete each of the following questions:

• What is the budget you have available? Can it allow you to explore the ideas that are within your thoughts?
• How many people will be at the event? This helps you decide and prep virtual tech accordingly.
• What will the duration of the virtual retreat last? What will be the day's subject?

Make a list of all virtual retreat activities and the schedule

In the vast themes your mind, look through the list of virtual retreat ideas we've shared in the previous post and select those that align with your objectives to host the retreat.

In the case, for example, if your goal of your remote team is to get employees to become acquainted, you'll want to explore the 30-minute chatroulette idea. If you're looking to promote learning, consider the coffee and study retreat idea.

Pro-tip Get suggestions from your colleagues. It will be amazing how many imaginative ideas they're able to bring to you. Additionally, asking employees engages them and builds anticipation for the event as well.

When your list of activities is complete, you can flesh it out using the appropriate timing of each one. Incorporate breaks to ensure you have a realistic plan in place.

Take a look at Parabol's schedule for their virtual retreat. You can see how they've provided the sessions fun names and then paired them with a line-long description to provide clarity.

Source: Parabol

Attention Take care to pay special attention to timing zones when you're planning if you're from different nations. It is also important to keep a record of every session so that those who aren't able to attend can be able to watch them when they are.

Pick your preferred technological

Now comes the tech-y part which is the base that will control the whole event.

Consider: How will the group coordinate and get up throughout the retreat? Then write down each tool which will help, beginning with your team's communication channel (such as Slack) for sourcing ideas, sharing schedules, as well as reminding them.

You might also want to include Slack-based plugins such as Donut to your list. The two other tools you'll require to support your virtual retreat:

• Zoom for one-on-one interaction.
• : For broadcasting live events to employees such as art classes, wellness workshops, etc.

This HelpScout group, as an example was bonded through home tours videos. Becca Van Nederynen, the company's head of People Ops shares:

"We are a family where we film home tour videos known as At Home with Help Scout. Our team enjoys watching these videos, however they often don't find the time to create their own, so we incorporated filming a home tour as a specific retreat activity!"

Similarly, they used video in lieu of an online award ceremony. Van Nederynen explains:

"Instead of a real-time awards ceremony like we would be able to do at a retreat, each manager recorded a fun, silly video of the ceremony and posted it on our Slack retreat channel.

In order to make the bizarre more interesting, we asked managers to select a random object from their household as a representation of the award to present in their videos. We ended up with dancing T-Rexs, a ceremonious toilet paper, and even an animated unicorn which would've never happened had we met in person."

However, if you are thinking that you are using new software for your online retreat ensure that you know how to use them. Be sure to provide tech support ready to help guests use these tools to ensure a smooth-sailing retreat event.

Send invites

Depending on your budget, these can be online email invitations or Slack invitations. Also, you could create excitement by mailing out physical invitations as part of the special care packages for the event.

Be sure to add things to your care package in line with the types of games that teams will be playing and the other activities that they'll engage in during the retreat. Examples include snacks, a good book, coffee mug, notebook along with a travel plan (if you're planning one) to name a few.

Ask for feedback

And, finally, when your retreat ends, be certain to gather feedback through survey. Find out how your employees felt the retreat helped facilitate your goals. Be sure to mention each goal individually.

Example: On a scale of 1-10, how did your virtual retreat aid in helping to strengthen your bonds with the rest of your team members?

Other questions to ask in an after-retreat survey are:

• Did you feel satisfied with the event?
• What was the activity you enjoyed the most?
• Do you have any other ideas or comments?
• What are some things that we could improve next time?
• Was it easy to make use of the tools during the virtual retreat?
• What did this incident do to your opinion of the company?

Virtual retreat FAQs

    How can you create a fun virtual retreat?    

Pair learning with entertainment to get employees' minds off of work and to have amusement. Make snack packs in advance and watch films together. make art with each other and learn from one another, and chat with coffee. The fun is everything in the activity and bringing the energetic spirit into the room.                     How do I host a virtual retreat?    

A virtual retreat can be a success with an organized plan and tools. The first step is to determine your goal for the retreat, then select the activities that will assist in reaching the goal. Finally, select the best equipment for your needs and you'll have a basic blueprint for hosting a virtual retreat.                     How do you make a virtual retreat for staff?    

Set a virtual retreat agenda begin brainstorming, and then sourcing ideas for activities to be held by your team. Then, you can narrow down the ideas to be able to fit them into the event's scheduled timeframe. Then, you'll need the equipment to help facilitate the event and you're all set.                     What do you do during an escape?    

At a retreat, your team unplugs by doing something different than the daily routine of working. Retreats help teams connect to have fun, discover new things, and increase efficiency by allowing moment to slow down and appreciate the life of a group.