Employees aren't programmed robots who will do your bidding from sunup, to sundown. They require trust and patience from those around them, where the honest group must be encouraged, while the dishonest slackers should be allowed to reevaluate their goals and purpose. Everyone involved - be it a solo or team project - should collectively be given pep talks, team-building workshops, motivational activities to participate in, and above all, a reward for their hard work. When you acknowledge hard work, a person is propelled to be better, efficient, and focused. These motivational games should help an organization boost their employees' overall performance and mindset about the company. Motivational Games for Workplaces Presentation Skills We aren't born with exceptional oratory skills, where a presentation can only garner attention and respect if the speaker knows how to handle their audience. In a boardroom, we're all familiar with the drone of the speaker's voice, as we stifle yawns and repeatedly check our wrist watches. In this activity, make employees group into teams of five or more, depending on the strength of the workforce as a whole, and instruct each group to come up with a compelling presentation. The topics you put forward can be anything from how to make work-life interesting or convince a new client with a groundbreaking pitch. Have the boardroom members or management of the company witness each presentation, marking off teams' overall performance based on skill, precision, tactic, confidence, body language, and choice of words. The team that pulls off a great presentation, gets to experience a fancy dinner with the boss (or some other kind of reward that you'd like to put forward). The Bigger the Brains, the Better Crossword puzzles are fun to solve, but sometimes they can be a tad overwhelming for someone who isn't really a hardcore fan of them. Design a special crossword puzzle that purely deals with the ins and outs of a company, human nature in general, and the attributes of an ideal leader / employee. Have everyone solve an individual crossword puzzle, or in groups of two. The team / employee that solves the crossword puzzle first, can be given the liberty to take the day off the following morning. Employee of the Month While this isn't a motivational game per se, it is nonetheless a great way to boost employee performance. The insouciance of some companies in not giving employees their due recognition, is not an uncommon feature; this is where you get to turn things around. Every month, have the management vote for employees based on varied criteria, by keeping track of those who have performance levels that equal stellar and consistent. How Long Can You Go? This may sound silly, but trust me, it is an exciting motivational game to try with employees. Make two employees come forward to compete with one another, on who can hold a pencil the longest without dropping it, as it balances between their nostrils and upper lip. Have them wedge the pencil between this space in a 'smooch' position, while tilting their heads back. Others can throw taunts, jokes, sarcasm, and the like, to see who breaks focus first. You could ask the two participating employees to walk through a series of barricades and such, to see who can still manage to keep the pencil in its place. The one who drops the pencil first, indicates a lack of focus in a stressful situation. Good Old-Fashioned Scrabble Scrabble occupied a major part of the growing-up years, for those who had an obsession for word games. More than a motivational game, this will give employees some time to cool off, and take a break from their desks doing something besides snoozing, or getting involved in mindless gossip. Have everyone compete in the game as the winners advance, to ultimately play against the last person standing amongst the rest. These motivational games aren't the sort that will have employees yawning, or wishing they weren't born. Make it synergistic, fun, not too childish, and more importantly, a learning experience for everyone.