Year End/Beginning Team Activity: The Songs of My Life

Year End/Beginning Team Activity: The Songs of My Life
Year End and Beginning Team Activity
Year End and Beginning Team Activity

At a recent team-building off-site, we needed a simple, fun, short and meaningful team activity to close the five-day event.  The Songs of My Life activity allowed each team member to reflect on the past year and dream about the next year in a personal way using songs.  The activity was an interesting way to learn about each team member.  It was fun, funny, sentimental and interesting to learn about each other through the lens of music.

It is simple, each person creates a 1-6 song playlist that represents their reflections of last year, hopes for the holidays and dreams for next year.  Then, they share these with each other and explain why they chose each song.

Supplies:

  • Paper and pens
  • It helps if each person has access to their phone to generate ideas.

Instructions:

  1. Tell the team they are each going to come up with their own playlist of songs that represent:
    1. Reflections on 2018 (personal and/or professional)
    2. Hopes for the holiday
    3. Dreams for 2019 (personal and/or professional)
  2. Share an example using your personal playlist.
    1. Here is an example of my playlist:
      1. Man in the Mirror by Michael Jackson because it was a year of a lot of self-reflection and personal growth.
      2. Don’t Worry, Be Happy by Bobby McPharin because this year I worked on reducing my stress and increasing mindfulness through meditation.
      3. Celebration by Kool and the Gang because I had a lot of exciting successes personally and in my family to celebrate this year.
      4. Holly Jolly Christmas by Burl Ives because I just want a happy, relaxing Christmas with my family.
      5. I Gotta Feeling by The Black Eyed Peas because I think next year is going to be a great year!
  • NOTE:  It is optional if they share the artist, just the name of the song is enough.
  1. Each person has only 4 minutes to select between 1-6 songs that create their playlist.
    1. You can create lists of songs for them to choose from; and/or,
    2. Let them scroll their own playlists on their phones; and/or
    3. Let them do a Google search for “songs about ____” to generate ideas.
  2. Go around the team and let each person share their songs and tell why they selected them. (About 1-2 minutes per person). Be sure each person shares their “why” because that is what makes this so interesting – especially when everyone won’t know the song or the reason it was selected.
  3. OPTIONAL: Create a real playlist of these songs and share with the team later.

About the Author: Leigh Ann Rodgers, Founder of Better Teams and Forward, is an IAF Certified Professional Facilitator with 20 years of experience in the human development field. Leigh Ann is a skilled meeting facilitator, trainer, and coach working across the globe to help leaders cultivate teams that are happy and high-performing.

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