Perspectives
Trainer Tool – Icebreakers
by Shirley Fine Lee
In November, I spoke at
the Fort Worth ASTD dinner program on meeting
management using R.A!R.A! Before the program, the chapter has a
volunteer do a quick icebreaker so everyone has a new tool to add to their
trainer’s kit. At this particular
meeting, the icebreaker was “Take What You Need”, an activity using toilet
paper to allow us to get to know each other.
Everyone was to take as many sheets of paper as they thought they might
need to the activity. It was quite
amusing to see and hear those who took too much. For each sheet taken, the individual had to
reveal something about themselves to the group.
It took about 15 minutes for us to go around the entire room
Doing this icebreaker got
me to thinking about icebreakers and why we use them other than to kill time
before we start a meeting or training class.
Why do trainers use icebreakers? Icebreakers
are typically used as a mixer to get people acquainted or as a pre-training exercise
to encourage involvement. What
icebreaker we use should depend on what we want doing the icebreaker to
accomplish. Do we want it to be a simple
introduction, an in-depth getting to know you activity, or should it involve
hunting out particular people or objects?
Do we want it to get people working individually, in groups, or for solving
a problem or puzzle?
Once we know what the
purpose of the icebreaker should be, it will make it easier to find the one
that meets our need. If we were to do a
search for “icebreaker” on the internet, we would get over a million
results. If we do a search for an
icebreaker book on Amazon, we will get over five thousand results some of which
will have nothing to do with icebreakers.
If we include another keyword along with “icebreaker”, then we will
narrow our results. Some words to
consider are: games, activity, training,
meeting, get acquainted, know you, problem, trust, puzzle,
hunt, team, group, and FREE.
NOTE: For some simple activities that require no
special materials, see www.shirleyfinelee.com/FreeTeam.htm.
About the Author: Shirley Fine Lee is the author of “R.A!R.A! A Meeting Wizard’s Approach”, which is a quick guide to planning
and conducting meetings so that they are as productive, effectual, and smoothly
run as possible. She has
considerable training and expertise in leading effective meetings herself, as
well as training others within the corporate world to be able to do the
same. Shirley has worked as a training
and development specialist since 1986, and an independent consultant since
2000. She has extensive experience
helping organizations with their team building, training development, meeting
facilitation, presentation delivery, and other communication needs. You can find out more about Shirley and how
to contact her on her website at www.ShirleyFineLee.com.