2020 and 2021 were unlike any previous years delivering
Build-A-Bike ® team building programs. 2020 started off strong with dozens of team activities in January and a few in February. However, the Covid pandemic caused most in-person meetings to shut down in March.
In April and May, most of the prescheduled events for the year were postponed. However, by the end of May and June, it was apparent that the pandemic was going to be around a while. So our team brainstormed a way to deliver the team activity virtually.
The Very First Virtual Bike Team Building Event.
For those of you new to the Build-A-Bike ® team building event, the magic occurs at the end when kids rush into the room to receive their new bikes. Even the toughest participant finds it hard to hold back a tear or two as he adjusts the handlebars and seat for the cute kid who is receiving the bike.
But during the Covid pandemic, there were no in-person meetings and no kids coming to the activities. At the same time, supplies of bikes were scarce.
Then, one of our instructors had a brilliant idea. “Why not deliver the unassembled bikes to the charity and have our instructors and the charity directors help them build the bikes on their own?”
The virtual Build-A-Bike ® activity was born. And it worked phenomenally well.
A Virtual Bike Building Activity? How Does that Work?
What is more boring than a Zoom meeting? I can tell you, not a lot. That is until we created this program. Basically, the facilitator starts the event with the virtual participants on a Zoom call being introduced to their kid who is at his or her local Boys & Girls Club.
Next, each team has a series of fun games that they have to win to get their kid each part of his or her bike. The first game gives the kid the front tire. The next one gets the seat. As the team accomplishes each task, a facilitator at the charity gives each kid the next part and helps the kid assemble the bicycle.
The whole activity is fun and heartwarming. In fact, we found that the emotional impact of the virtual version was actually more intense than our normal in-person events.
We Ended 2020 Strong with a Combination of Many Virtual Activities and a Handful of In-Person Events.
By the end of 2020, many of our clients had Zoom fatigue. So we began to do a few in-person events again. Most were in parking lots, LOL. A strange thing occurred in early 2021, though. We began to get calls from people wanting to “get back to normal.” For most of 2020 and the early part of 2021, we’d always start the conversations with, “So are you looking to do something virtually or in-person?” By April of 2021, we got to the point where we couldn’t even finish the question before the other person said, “Oh no. No virtual. We are SO SICK of virtual.”
Since then, we have done the occasional virtual Build-A-Bike ® activity, but most have been in person. And of course, every once in a while, we have done a hybrid event with a little of both.
We have had such a good time helping teams come back together and build great teams. Interestingly, a lot of the clients shown in the video above used Build-A-Bike ® as a way for their team to meet for the first time ever. (Many of the participants were hired during the pandemic and had never met their coworkers face-to-face.)
So if you are ready to get your team back together, try starting with a
fun charity team activity like Build-A-Bike ®!
